rodhunt's review against another edition
3.0
a good read for anybody wanting to understand modern Tasmania - and the origins of the "straighteners" who deny and repress our society.
avrilhj's review
5.0
I must admit, I haven’t thought much about the history of Tasmania. I’ve assumed that it was like the history of the rest of Australia. Boyce makes it clear that that wasn’t the case. Tasmania, when it was Van Diemen’s Land, was a land of abundance rather than harshness, in which it was easy for people to live off the land and convicts could retreat to the bush and find food and shelter there. But it’s depressing to read about how quickly the incursion into Tasmania of the British affected its ecology, and the animals that no longer exist. It’s also deeply, DEEPLY, depressing to read the attempts by the British to free Tasmania of indigenous people, even when there was an alternative possibility of coexistence. A wonderful book; I learned a lot.
tasmanian_bibliophile's review against another edition
4.0
‘Tasmania was once known as Van Diemen’s Land.’
And as Van Diemen’s Land, became the enforced home of 42% of the convicts transported to Australia. The island that became home to over 72,000 sentenced criminals had its own unique character, quite different from early New South Wales.
‘The fact that protein-rich shellfish were there for the taking, that wallaby and kangaroo could be killed with nothing more than a hunting dog, and that abundant fresh water and a mild climate made travel by foot relatively easy, does change the story. The convict’s hell was, thank God, a human creation alone. This book is about the tension produced by siting the principal gaol of the empire in what proved to be a remarkably benevolent land. It sees this paradox to be the heart of early Tasmanian history, and to have important implications for the nation as a whole.’
In this book, which is mainly focussed on the years between 1803 and 1856, James Boyce writes of a society, principally shaped by convicts and with its own distinctive pre-industrial culture. Geography mattered: with an abundance of game and fresh water, it was possible for a convict in possession of a single dog to ‘live independent and free in the bush’. There were also open grasslands suitable for grazing and it was these, in the hands of a few privileged land owners by the middle of the 19th century, which led to the formal renaming of Van Diemen’s Land as Tasmania in 1856. This renaming was seen as a way of distancing the island from its convict past and while not entirely successful, it had its own impact on the island’s history.
But Tasmania’s history is not only about British colonial administration, convicts, settlers and land-owners. When the first official British settlements were established between 1803 and 1807, there was a significant indigenous population. What happened to this population, both before, during and after the ‘Black War’ of 1828-31 makes for uncomfortable reading. There has been significant debate amongst historians about the numbers of Aborigines killed during this period, but regardless of the actual numbers of people killed the outcome was tragic -for the land as well as for the people. How? Large, destructive bushfires have become a part of Tasmanian life since Aboriginal burning ceased. Increased hunting of the Tasmanian emu rendered that bird extinct, and the Forester kangaroo was almost wiped out. Ironically, these are the two creatures that feature on Hobart’s coat of arms. And, in the southern Midlands particularly, trees began to die – probably killed by possums whose numbers exploded once they were no longer hunted by Aborigines. There’s a long appendix to this book: ‘Towards Genocide: Government Policy on the Aborigines 1827-38’ which is a sad and sobering read.
I like the notion of James Boyce’s book as an environmental history, exploring the relationship between the island and those who chose (or were forced) to live there. While the tragic fate of the Aboriginal tribes is a key part of this history, its primary focus is the first generation of predominantly convict settlers who shaped the island in the first half of the 19th century. Tasmania’s history is quite different from that of New South Wales, and this book provides an explanation for why this is so.
I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in Australian colonial history or with a specific interest in the history of Tasmania.
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
And as Van Diemen’s Land, became the enforced home of 42% of the convicts transported to Australia. The island that became home to over 72,000 sentenced criminals had its own unique character, quite different from early New South Wales.
‘The fact that protein-rich shellfish were there for the taking, that wallaby and kangaroo could be killed with nothing more than a hunting dog, and that abundant fresh water and a mild climate made travel by foot relatively easy, does change the story. The convict’s hell was, thank God, a human creation alone. This book is about the tension produced by siting the principal gaol of the empire in what proved to be a remarkably benevolent land. It sees this paradox to be the heart of early Tasmanian history, and to have important implications for the nation as a whole.’
In this book, which is mainly focussed on the years between 1803 and 1856, James Boyce writes of a society, principally shaped by convicts and with its own distinctive pre-industrial culture. Geography mattered: with an abundance of game and fresh water, it was possible for a convict in possession of a single dog to ‘live independent and free in the bush’. There were also open grasslands suitable for grazing and it was these, in the hands of a few privileged land owners by the middle of the 19th century, which led to the formal renaming of Van Diemen’s Land as Tasmania in 1856. This renaming was seen as a way of distancing the island from its convict past and while not entirely successful, it had its own impact on the island’s history.
But Tasmania’s history is not only about British colonial administration, convicts, settlers and land-owners. When the first official British settlements were established between 1803 and 1807, there was a significant indigenous population. What happened to this population, both before, during and after the ‘Black War’ of 1828-31 makes for uncomfortable reading. There has been significant debate amongst historians about the numbers of Aborigines killed during this period, but regardless of the actual numbers of people killed the outcome was tragic -for the land as well as for the people. How? Large, destructive bushfires have become a part of Tasmanian life since Aboriginal burning ceased. Increased hunting of the Tasmanian emu rendered that bird extinct, and the Forester kangaroo was almost wiped out. Ironically, these are the two creatures that feature on Hobart’s coat of arms. And, in the southern Midlands particularly, trees began to die – probably killed by possums whose numbers exploded once they were no longer hunted by Aborigines. There’s a long appendix to this book: ‘Towards Genocide: Government Policy on the Aborigines 1827-38’ which is a sad and sobering read.
I like the notion of James Boyce’s book as an environmental history, exploring the relationship between the island and those who chose (or were forced) to live there. While the tragic fate of the Aboriginal tribes is a key part of this history, its primary focus is the first generation of predominantly convict settlers who shaped the island in the first half of the 19th century. Tasmania’s history is quite different from that of New South Wales, and this book provides an explanation for why this is so.
I recommend this book to anyone with an interest in Australian colonial history or with a specific interest in the history of Tasmania.
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
melbsreads's review against another edition
5.0
This book is fabulous. It covers Tasmanian history from the arrival of sealers and whalers on the Bass Strait islands and the settlement of the Derwent Valley in 1803 to the colony's name changing from Van Diemen's Land to Tasmania in 1856. It's a history that's been told many times before, but Boyce's history is different. It's primarily environmental, discussing how the landscape and the abundant wildlife of Van Diemen's Land shaped the colony and ensured not only its survival but the health of its inhabitants. At all points of the story, Boyce discusses the impact that settlement had on the Indigenous population, from early and often fraught encounters to regular and friendly contact with convict shepherds to the massacres of the 1820s and the eventual banishment and decimation of the population at Wybalenna.
There's little of the traditional history here, the history of governors and the colonial elite. This, instead, is the story of Van Diemen's Land's common people. The initial convicts, the women, the Aboriginal population. It's incredibly readable, even when it's utterly heartbreaking. The appendix on the colony's government policies towards Aboriginal people from 1827-1838 feels slightly out of place - it almost feels like Boyce started writing a separate book on Indigenous history, and then it somehow ended up published in this instead - but it's still an excellent and important inclusion to the story.
Essentially, this is the story that doesn't get taught in schools but which really should be.
There's little of the traditional history here, the history of governors and the colonial elite. This, instead, is the story of Van Diemen's Land's common people. The initial convicts, the women, the Aboriginal population. It's incredibly readable, even when it's utterly heartbreaking. The appendix on the colony's government policies towards Aboriginal people from 1827-1838 feels slightly out of place - it almost feels like Boyce started writing a separate book on Indigenous history, and then it somehow ended up published in this instead - but it's still an excellent and important inclusion to the story.
Essentially, this is the story that doesn't get taught in schools but which really should be.
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