Re-inventing self and nation : a search for an Australian identity in Peter Carey's Jack Maggs, Illywhacker and The tax inspector

Abstract

Australia's one hundredth anniversary of its Independence on 1 January 2001 will undoubtedly, for many Australians, be overshadowed by the failure of the referendum held on 6 November 1999 to sanction the birth of an Australian Republic. Amongst these, one will be sure to find Peter Carey, who has not hesitated to voice publicly his support of an Australian Republic. His open-minded stance questioning the relevance of the British monarchy to the Australia of today, has not been without its ramifications. Carey found himself open to attack from the press, both in Australia and Britain, when in 1998 he won the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Jack Maggs and declined the usual invitation issued to writers to meet the Queen. Apparently, Carey's intention was to postpone the meeting due to family commitments, but the Palace decided to cancel the meeting altogether which 'gave the tabloids all the ammunition they needed'. As an expatriate living in New York, Carey has been criticized, especially in his homeland, for his politically orientated fiction which seeks to challenge the traditional notions of Australian imperial history and the culture upon which Australian identity has been, and continues to be, constructed. At the same time he questions the new cultural and political ideals which are influencing current trends of Australian society. In order to understand the issues concerning identity that Carey tackles in the three novels being discussed in this thesis, namely Jack Maggs (1997), Illywhacker (1985) and The Tax Inspector (1991), it is important to know the rudiments of the historical situation and contemporary reality around which this fiction is built.