Cirrus@Austlit

'The Harp in the South, Park’s best known novel set in Sydney’s Surry Hills, and the lesser-known The Witch’s Thorn, set in a fictional town in Aotearoa New Zealand, both received criticism for being prone to the ‘scandalous’ and ‘sordid’, euphemisms for the themes of sex, violence and abortion. This article examines the novels for accounts of domestic and family violence, specifically reproductive coercion. It argues that the term ‘reproductive coercion’, which has emerged in the context of recent research on contemporary experiences of gendered violence, contraception and abortion, can illuminate the intersections of structural and intimate partner violence in 1930s rural Aotearoa New Zealand and 1940s inner-city Sydney. By considering the limits and possibilities of reproductive autonomy in the periods and class contexts in which the novels are set, this reading historicises the phenomenon of reproductive coercion while identifying continuities in gendered violence over time. These continuities are brought to light by a reading that zeroes in on the treatment of threats posed by fragile masculinities in both of Park’s novels.'  (Publication abstract)