Romulus My Father Notes
Romulus My Father: Values & Belonging
Romulus values education and learning, but sadly, only completed primary school. He is a tragic figure from the very beginning:
3: ...an inefficient postal service, however, prevented his application [for high school scholarship examinations] from arriving on time. He cried bitterly, not because of lost employment prospects, but because his love of learning would never be fulfilled.
Romulus values European landscape – he does not find serenity, and does not belong to the landscape:
14: Though the landscape is one of rare beauty, to a European or English eye it seems desolate, and even after more than forty years my father could not become reconciled to it. He longed for the generous and soft European foliage, but the eucalypts of Baringhup, scraggy except for the noble red gums on the river bank, seemed symbols of deprivation and barrenness. In this he was typical of many of the immigrants whose eyes looked directly to the foliage and always turned away offended.
23: The peppercorns, to be found at almost every settlement in the area, were planted as though to mediate between local and European landscapes.
21: The Frogmore farmhouse is deplorable – it is not homely, or conducive to belonging and comfort: There was no electricity and no running water... Rats lived under the house and occasionally bit us in bed... Hora woke one night to find a large rat tugging at his elbow trying to make off with a piece of flesh. Large brown snakes came to eat the rats...
Romulus values purposeful work but is belittled by menial labour as a new immigrant: another example of Romulus not belonging to the mediocrity of Australian culture:
16: ‘New Australians’... were almost always given menial manual tasks... In the case of my father, this unusually gifted man was set to work with a pick and shovel. He noted how incompetent some of the Australian tradesmen were, especially the welders, but not with resentment or
Romulus values education and learning, but sadly, only completed primary school. He is a tragic figure from the very beginning:
3: ...an inefficient postal service, however, prevented his application [for high school scholarship examinations] from arriving on time. He cried bitterly, not because of lost employment prospects, but because his love of learning would never be fulfilled.
Romulus values European landscape – he does not find serenity, and does not belong to the landscape:
14: Though the landscape is one of rare beauty, to a European or English eye it seems desolate, and even after more than forty years my father could not become reconciled to it. He longed for the generous and soft European foliage, but the eucalypts of Baringhup, scraggy except for the noble red gums on the river bank, seemed symbols of deprivation and barrenness. In this he was typical of many of the immigrants whose eyes looked directly to the foliage and always turned away offended.
23: The peppercorns, to be found at almost every settlement in the area, were planted as though to mediate between local and European landscapes.
21: The Frogmore farmhouse is deplorable – it is not homely, or conducive to belonging and comfort: There was no electricity and no running water... Rats lived under the house and occasionally bit us in bed... Hora woke one night to find a large rat tugging at his elbow trying to make off with a piece of flesh. Large brown snakes came to eat the rats...
Romulus values purposeful work but is belittled by menial labour as a new immigrant: another example of Romulus not belonging to the mediocrity of Australian culture:
16: ‘New Australians’... were almost always given menial manual tasks... In the case of my father, this unusually gifted man was set to work with a pick and shovel. He noted how incompetent some of the Australian tradesmen were, especially the welders, but not with resentment or