image of person or book cover 5587014270459605481.png
Image sourced from the University of Sydney, Fisher Library
Issue Details: First known date: 1878-1879... 1878-1879 Moondyne : A Story from the Under-world
The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.

AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Cross-cutting between England and Western Australia, which is described here as "a vast and unknown country, almost mysterious in its solitude and unlikeness to any other part of the earth," O'Reilly's novel mixes romance, transportation, and discussion of penal policy, with Moondyne Joe himself, a prisoner who escapes to the Australian bush, re-emerging subsequently as "Comptroller-General of Convicts in Australia," in which role he propounds a system of reform based upon "the radical principles of humanity".

'The novel's plot develops through a romance between an English Catholic with an Irish name, Will Sheridan, and his childhood sweetheart Alice Walmsley, who is wrongly convicted of murdering her own child and held in London's Millbank Prison, after being transported to Australia.'

Source: Giles, Paul. Antipodean America: Australasia and the Constitution of U.S. Literature. USA: Oxford University Press, 2014.

Adaptations

form y separately published work icon Moondyne ( dir. W. J. Lincoln ) Australia : Lincoln-Cass Films , 1913 6190848 1913 single work film/TV crime historical fiction adventure

'It contains the life history of Joe Gilchrist, a convict, transported by the English Government to Western Australia, for some trivial offence. Gilchrist, known as Convict No. 406, has earned the enmity of a fellow prisoner, named Isaac Bowman, who determines to ruin him, and concocts a robbery from a settler's home, endeavoring to cast suspicion on Joe Gilchrist; his plot, however, fails, and he is lashed at the triangle, while Gilchrist counts the strokes. Later, Bowman is released as a free settler, and takes up a selection away back on the outskirts of the Vasse Valley. All free settlers had a right to select a convict servant, and Bowman selects Joe Gilchrist. For a term Gilchrist lives his life regardless of the brute man who was his master, but one day he struck his enemy down. This offence, by an assigned servant, meant the chain gang at Freemantle for life—one of the most hideous and dreaded of punishments—so Joe took to the bush. Befriended by the natives of the Vasse Valley, for years he lived in their stronghold, and was named by them '"Moondyne," the great white chief. The natives, when visiting the more populated districts, were frequently seen wearing crude golden ornaments. Governor Hampton issued a proclamation offering £5000 reward for the discovery of the mine from which the natives of the Vasse obtained their gold. The effect of this was fruitless; but the whites were ever on the alert to trace the source of this mysterious wealth. Moondyne, as one of the Vasse tribe, has learnt the secret. One day, on the summit of the ranges, a native sees a police party, and knows their territory is endangered; he informs the chief—Te-Mana-Roa. Moondyne with a party proceeds to investigate. The party are ambushed and Moondyne is recaptured, and to his horror once more discovers his life's enemy, Bowman, who, retired from the land, has now become a sergeant of police. He is manacled to Bowman's horse, and the cavalcade proceeds to return to civilisation. On the road, Moondyne arouses the cupidity of Bowman, and informs him he is in possession of the secret of the mountain of gold—the price is his freedom. Bowman accepts, and effects the escape of Moondyne, and accompanies him to the Vasse Valley. The chief, on the return of Moondyne, agrees to respect his promise and disclose the secret of the golden mountain to Bowman, but refuses to permit his departure. Later, however, Bowman, in the absence of Moondyne, half kills the chief, seizes as much gold as he can carry and rides off. Moondyne is banished by the tribe, and rides for his revenge on the tracks of his enemy. Bowman loses the track, and perishes on the verge of the plains, but not before Moondyne has found him, and instead of killing, endeavors to succour Bowman with his last drop of water. Next morning, a native discovers two forms lying still upon the plains. Moondyne lived to return to the Vasse Valley and the love of his friendly natives.'

Source:

'Moondyne', Daylesford Advocate, Yandoit, Glenlyon and Eganstown Chronicle, 24 February 1914, p.3.

Notes

  • Dedication: 'Dedicated, in the interests of humanity, to the prisoner, whoever and wherever he may be.'

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

Serialised by: The Pilot 1858 newspaper (1 issues)
      1878-1879 .
      Note/s:
      • First published in weekly instalments in The Pilot (a Boston-based newspaper) between 30 November 1878 and 1879. Issue details unknown.
    • Boston, Massachusetts,
      c
      United States of America (USA),
      c
      Americas,
      :
      Roberts Brothers ,
      1879 .
      Extent: vii, 315p.p.
      Edition info: 3rd. ed.
      Reprinted: 1883
    • Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,
      c
      United States of America (USA),
      c
      Americas,
      :
      H. L. Kilner ,
      1880-1889 .
      Alternative title: Moondyne Joe
      Extent: 315p., [20] leaves of platesp.
      Description: illus.
    • Melbourne, Victoria,: E. W. Cole , 1880 .
      image of person or book cover 3628328272203904519.jpg
      This image has been sourced from Colonial Australian Popular Fiction Digital Archive
      Alternative title: Moondyne : A Tale of the Australian Bush
      Extent: 320p.
      Description: illus.
      Note/s:
      • Other E. W. Cole editions/printings have varying subtitles e.g. An Australian Story.
    • London,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Routledge ,
      1889 .
      Alternative title: Moondyne : A Story of Convict Life in Australia
      Extent: 320p.
      Reprinted: 1900 , 1909
    • Adelaide, South Australia,: Rigby , 1980 .
      Alternative title: Moondyne
      Extent: xx, 255p.p.
      Edition info: Facsimile reprint of 1880 edition
      Note/s:
      • Introduced by Brian Elliott.
      ISBN: 0851796540
      Series: y separately published work icon Seal Australian Fiction Adrian Mitchell (editor), Rigby (publisher), Adelaide : Rigby , 1971- Z824800 1971 series - publisher
    • Sydney, New South Wales,: Sydney University Press , 2003 .
      Alternative title: Moondyne : A Story of Life in West Australia
      Extent: 274p.
      ISBN: 1920897038
      Series: y separately published work icon Classic Australian Works CAW Sydney University Press (publisher), Sydney : Sydney University Press , Z1087478 2003- series - publisher

      'This collection features books that should always be available for readers and students as part of our national cultural heritage. These works retain their influence and impact, the richness and quality of their writing, and their importance as a record and reflection of Australian life and perspectives, but have disappeared from traditional publication.'

      (Source: Classic Australian Works website, http://www.sup.usyd.edu.au/projects_cal_about.html )

Works about this Work

Irish Republicanism and the Colonial Australian Bushranger Narrative Ken Gelder , Rachael Weaver , 2021 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australian Literary Studies , vol. 36 no. 2 2021;

'This article examines a range of colonial Australian Irish bushranger narratives in terms of their investments in revolutionary republicanism, arguing that these become increasingly contested and compromised over time. Beginning with the anonymously published novel Rebel Convicts (1858), it looks at how the fate of transported Irish revolutionaries is imagined in relation to colonial settlement and the convict system. It then turns to Ned Kelly’s Jerilderie Letter (c. 1879), highlighting Kelly’s rhetoric of resistance and mapping his affinities with Irish American republicanism. John Boyle O’Reilly was a Fenian activist, transported to Western Australia in 1867. His novel Moondyne (1878, 1879), rather than unleashing an Irish revolutionary political agenda, is based instead on an English-Catholic bushranger, and its interest in republicanism is in any case displaced from its Australian setting. Ned Kelly’s execution in 1880 gave rise to a new wave of popular narratives, including James Skipp Borlase’s The Iron-Clad Bushranger (1881), which fictionalises Kelly’s career – embroiling him in Irish Fenian plots – and recasts his political affiliations as criminal characteristics. Rolf Boldrewood’s Robbery Under Arms (1882–3) was also published in the wake of the Kelly saga but is notable for its political conservatism, stripping its Irish-Catholic bushrangers of their revolutionary potential to better serve the interests of a powerful pastoral elite. This conservatism is both challenged and magnified in Rosa Praed’s Outlaw and Lawmaker (1893), which celebrates the career of John Boyle O’Reilly while also re-directing his political radicalism into romance. The article concludes that the revolutionary figure of the Irish bushranger is gradually divorced from any radical agency and relegated to a remote chapter of colonial Australia’s history.'

Source: Abstract.

Fiction and Fakements in Colonial Australia Jonathan Lamb , 2020 single work criticism
— Appears in: Postcolonial Studies , September vol. 23 no. 3 2020; (p. 360-370)

'The imaginations of convicts in Australia became attuned to the pairing of opposites and this led to strange tensions in their way of representing things. On Norfolk Island the meanings of words were reversed, so that ‘good’ meant ‘bad’ and ‘ugly’ meant ‘beautiful’. This undermining of official meanings produced the argot called the ‘flash’ or ‘kiddy’ language of the colony. Designed at first to keep private sentiments from being inspected, it eventually supported a system of dissident actions called ‘cross-work’ or ‘cross doings’. One word loomed large amidst these inversions: ‘fakement’, meaning booty, forgery or deceit. The verb has more extensive meanings: rob, wound, shatter; ‘fake your slangs’ means break your shackles. It also meant performing a fiction and accepting the consequences of it.' (Publication abstract)

Fremantle : The Port as a Threshold of Consciousness in the Novel Graham Nowland , 2006 single work criticism
— Appears in: Westerly , November vol. 51 no. 2006; (p. 145-158)
Explores the David Lodge q.v. notion of the narrative nature of consciousness in fiction with regard to literature set in the Western Australian Port of Fremantle. Discussion ranges over a period from 1879 to 2006.
Ego, Sight and Insight in Convict Fiction by Henry Savery and John Boyle O'Reilly Bruce Bennett , 2000 single work criticism
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Colonial History , October vol. 2 no. 2 2000; (p. 28-40)

— Appears in: Homing In : Essays on Australian Literature and Selfhood 2006; (p. 157-168; notes, 272-273)
Investigates 'narratives of imprisonment and escape' focusing on the extent to which they are dominated by the personal experience of the convict writer and the degree to which they explore the broader issues of place and community.
For the Love of the Jailer's Daughter Brendan Nicholson , 1999 single work biography
— Appears in: The Age , 15 May 1999; (p. 17)
Life in West Australia 1880 single work review
— Appears in: The Leader (Supplement) , 3 April 1880; (p. 1-2)

— Review of Moondyne : A Story from the Under-world John Boyle O'Reilly , 1878-1879 single work novel
Fremantle : The Port as a Threshold of Consciousness in the Novel Graham Nowland , 2006 single work criticism
— Appears in: Westerly , November vol. 51 no. 2006; (p. 145-158)
Explores the David Lodge q.v. notion of the narrative nature of consciousness in fiction with regard to literature set in the Western Australian Port of Fremantle. Discussion ranges over a period from 1879 to 2006.
Settlers, Convicts and Early Narrative Joseph Jones , Johanna Jones , 1983 single work criticism
— Appears in: Australian Fiction 1983; (p. 1-7)
Novels of 'The System' Clive Hamer , 1957 single work criticism
— Appears in: Southerly , vol. 18 no. 4 1957; (p. 206-211)
History, Literature and J.B. O'Reilly Veronica Brady , 1977 single work criticism
— Appears in: Westerly , December no. 4 1977; (p. 47-59)
For the Love of the Jailer's Daughter Brendan Nicholson , 1999 single work biography
— Appears in: The Age , 15 May 1999; (p. 17)
Last amended 13 Feb 2018 13:49:17
X