the Keneally corpus is one where minor characters and motifs from earlier works are
reinvestigated, often from a different perspective, as is the case in Shakespearean
literature, these works, in particular, elucidate the theme of place as a temenos and
the influence it has on bringing to individual consciousness an epiphany of the soul.
I ndeed, place is a significant influence in the Keneally canon, as one can see, for it
was after Keneally’s sojourn to Antarctica in 1968 that he published The Survivor
(1969), and it was his United Kingdom tour of 1970 that produced his European
literature, beginning with Gossip from the Forest.
Thomas Keneally had always intrigued me and I knew that at age seventeen
he had entered a seminary to study for the Roman Catholic priesthood but left
before ordination in 1960. However, the apostate Keneally may have subjectively
rationalised the words spoken by the consecrating bishop at the many ordinations
he must have witnessed, and indeed, the one he anticipated himself to be nearing:
You are a priest of the Order of Melchizedek, and for ever (Hebrews 7:17). So it is
possible that Thomas Keneally sees himself as an Ordinary of another priesthood,
that archetypal priesthood of mediators between humankind and the ineffable; it is
the Order of the Bard, the ancient and wise teacher. Keneally has, after all, said
that as a child he was enthralled by:
... the priest-figure in a landscape, in black under the Australian
sun. An I rish priest with the Sacrament. A powerful, supernatural
being – overdressed, who performed the work of the I rish spiritual
empire. I t was the appeal of this priest figure which enticed me
into sacred orders (Hartley, 1985:118).
(a) A Craftier Theology
I n Bring Larks and Heroes (1967), Keneally develops a thematic motif using
the defacto marriage of Halloran and Anne Rush; namely, that in the absence of
representatives of the major Western religious institutions, a deeper, often a more
fundamental sacrament comes into play. That motif is widespread throughout the
Keneally corpus, particularly his European literature, and often seems to emerge
from places where those institutions or their representatives are absent or have
become inconsequential; the Antarctic, Auschwitz or the more pristine places of the
Australian landscape. I ndeed, it is in such places that the truth of the Keneally
protagonists is often revealed. I t even seems to spill-over into the day to day
reality of Keneally’s life for he writes that one day, whilst touring I reland, a plump