The Drover's Wives
 | |
| Author | Ryan O'Neill |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Brio Books |
Publication date | July 2018 |
| Publication place | Australia |
| Pages | 304 |
| ISBN | 9781925589290 |
The Drover's Wives is a collection of short stories by Ryan O'Neill. It comprises 99 reinterpretations of the 1892 short story "The Drover's Wife" by Australian author Henry Lawson.[1]
O'Neill has dedicated the book to both Lawson and French novelist Raymond Queneau, who was a co-founder of the Oulipo (Ouvroir de Littérature Potentielle) movement in 1960. In The Drover's Wives, O'Neill adopts Queneau's method used in his 1947 book Exercises in Style (French: Exercices de style) which comprises 99 retellings of the same story.[1]
The Drover's Wives was shortlisted for the 2019 Russell Prize and was shortlisted at the 2019 Queensland Literary Awards.[2][3]
References
[edit]- ^ a b Drayton, Dave (25 February 2025). "Inside the story: 99 versions of the same tale in The Drover's Wives". The Conversation. Retrieved 17 May 2025.
- ^ "Russell Prize for Humour Writing 2019 shortlist announced". Books + Publishing. 18 April 2019. Retrieved 30 April 2019.
- ^ Qian, Jinghua (12 November 2019). "Winners announced for the 2019 Queensland Literary Awards". ArtsHub Australia. Archived from the original on 10 March 2020. Retrieved 13 November 2019.
Further reading
[edit]- Poacher, Jeffrey (31 January 2020). "The Drover's Wives: 101 retellings of a classic short story". Times Literary Supplement (6096): 36. Wikipedia Library link
- Webb, Jen (27 June 2018). "Jen Webb reviews 'The Drover's Wives: 99 reinterpretations of Henry Lawson's Australian Classic' by Ryan O'Neill". Australian Book Review (403).