REVIEW #30: A PROMISE OF PEACHES – WITH GENEROUS LASHINGS OF HISTORY, CULTURE AND HUMANITY

A Promise of Peaches
By Valerie Volk
Ginninderra Press,  2011

A PROMISE OF PEACHES:
A VERSE NOVEL BY VALERIE VOLK

Through her metaphorical ‘peaches,’ Valerie Volk has captured the melancholy reality that the plump, golden peach of our childhood innocence is going to gradually wither and leave us only the rotten fruit of ‘the thousand small betrayals’ that have exposed us to the worst of human nature, leaving us sad and cynical and ‘[g]uilt ridden,’ wondering what it all meant. Our choices have consequences and Volk’s characters mercilessly slam that message home. The choice to leave Czechoslovakia and seek a new life free of the hostile humiliations of the controlling communist regime. The choice to risk your life for the promise of a new one in an alien country. The choice to befriend someone. To welcome them into your home and help them make a new life for themselves in their strange new country. The pain of watching that generosity eat your family alive and spit them out, changed and forever estranged by the clash of cultures that sent them careering in different directions, rejecting the familiar in the pursuit of new ideas, new pastimes, new attitudes, new language.

It seems to me, this narrative is an allegory for our national identity. Each wave of migration has shaken us afresh and challenged us to discover our Australian character, never letting us settle into anything. For a while we latched onto mate-ship. Later came multiculturalism. And bubbling along in the background, we have tried to work out our relationship with those who were here before the British staked their claim. For a time, we suffered from the cultural cringe of colonialism, but we began to appreciate ourselves and make our mark in the world in our own small way, at least enough to gain confidence and find our voice. Now, like Claire looking back on her life, we are cynical and wonder what our legacy will be. How will our nation be characterized? Will we ever be pardoned for the choices made by our forebears? Will we be able to cling to the promise of our ‘young and free’ nation, or will those eager dreams dissolve and our imagination fail us. I am optimistic. Volk and our treasure trove of magnificent Australian writers, innovators and inventors give me hope that our imagination will not fail us. Our creative ingenuity is a rich ‘golden soil’ that will enable us to face the challenges that are before us and produce a national character we can be proud of from the clash of cultures and ideas that is our everyday reality.

Though there is a pessimistic symmetry in the beginning and the conclusion, and the inference that the ‘promise of peaches’ has fallen from the tree and they are slowly rotting in the harsh Australian sun, I believe in our country and our future. I believe that the coming together of people with different ideas, different backgrounds, different traditions, different lifestyles can make us people who move away from following familiar conventions, to people who question conventions and think about why we do, or say, things and this will encourage us to revisit the values that inform those choices. My hope is that this will lead to valuing this land with its vastly different landscapes and rich resources, and to valuing the sacred responsibility of caring for it — and each other — by choosing life and love and valuing the qualities of our great God: holiness, justice, mercy, forgiveness, loving kindness, compassion, generosity and grace. And may we grow the fruits of his Holy Spirit living in us: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

Using the verse novel form, Volk has given all the main characters an opportunity to express their response to their experiences. This worked brilliantly, enabling the reader to put themselves in each person’s shoes, rather than seeing everything through one character’s perspective. The language, alone, reinforced the enormous changes that have been wrought in our society over the past seventy years. Moreover, these characters represent different generations, broadening the insight even further. It is profitable for us to look back from the beginning of the twenty-first century to the middle of last century. To stop and take a breath long enough to see something of the journey we have taken as a country which was so clearly laid out before us in the lives of these characters. As we plot our path forward, it is instructive to look back and learn from the past. My hope is that Volk’s verse novel will be recognized as a timely warning to disembark the bullet train in which we are hurtling along to our destruction, and spend a few leisurely Sunday afternoons on the Cockle Train to Victor Harbor, contemplating the kind of future we would like for ourselves and our country. Let that be the first step towards a grander vision that will weave together our pioneering spirit and our melting pot of potential. With so much wisdom to gain, I think it is well worth setting aside a day to read A Promise of Peaches.