David Malouf thus sets about to forge anew the consciousness of his reader,
to cause them to consider anew the real nature of individual existence and identity.
That we must, in his words, like:
The green things of the earth
discover a fifth season to push through to, all
grace notes, as their vegetable souls
aspire to “the condition”. A new species
taps at the boundaries. Beethoven’s Tenth is what
it breathes (Malouf,1992:198).
(b) The Child
I n An I maginary Life David Malouf has created a deeper, richer, more
intense level of experience and revelation than in any of his other works. This is
achieved, partly, through the presentation of one of humanity’s most profound
mythic symbols: that of the Divine or Primordial Child. Although based loosely on
the exile of the Roman poet Ovid the work reveals a state of consciousness rather
than a dramatic event:
... I am describing a state of mind, no place. I am in exile here
(Malouf, 1978:16).
I t is also one where unmistakably the voice of Ovid is really the same voice that
articulates the major themes and concerns throughout the Malouf corpus. It is
interesting to note that the adolescent narrator in Malouf’s ‘Southern Skies’ utters
similar words prior to his epiphany:
... but what I am describing, of course, is neither a time nor a
place but the mood of my own bored, expectant, uneventful
adolescence (Malouf, 1985:12).
Out of that state of consciousness Malouf creates an allegory of modern
scepticism and the evocation of desolateness and open space seems to insinuate
that of the Australian landscape. This, together with the theme or sense of
alienation is similar to that experienced by many settler Australians in the past as
well as today; alienation and exile not only in the physical sense but perhaps
socially, culturally and spiritually too:
As Ovid says,
I t is the desolateness of this place that day after day fills my mind
with its perspective (Malouf, 1978:15).