Author: JENNIFER GENION
Explorations No 38 (Jun 2005): 29-60
https://doi.org/10.62586/PAGQ2348
Genion offers readers a foretaste of her thesis on aspects of nineteenth-century French fiction set in a half-real, half-imaginary Australia. The article focuses mainly on early nineteenth century popular novels and short stories with a moral lesson. These generally feature convicts and Aborigines. The penal-colony experience, representations of the Australian landscape (or rather the authors’ idea of the Australian landscape) and the missionary activity of the Catholic Church in the Pacific provide the backdrop to what Genion calls the “redemption narrative”. The travel account is always accompanied by a spiritual journey and the story ends with the moral rebirth and social rehabilitation of the fallen hero.
Keywords: Nineteenth century French fiction, Australian setting, redemption narrative, missionary, Catholic Church in the Pacific