The thorn birds
The Thorn Birds (English title: The Thorn Birds ) is a novel of Australian writer Colleen McCullough in 1977. He describes the story of a farmer's family in Australia in the first half of the 20th century. The focus is on the love story between the priest Ralph de Bricassart and the farmer's daughter Meggie Cleary.
action
The saga of the Cleary family begins at the beginning of the 20th century when Paddy Cleary emigrated with his wife and seven children from New Zealand to southeastern Australia to work as a sheep farmer for his sister Mary Carson on the Drogheda farm. Despite family tensions and the high demands that the hard, rough country life places on the Clearys, the family seems to find peace more or less. The peace, however, turns out to be deceptive: Meggie, the only daughter of the Clearys, has had great affection for the attractive Father Ralph de Bricassart, who is closely related to the family, since childhood.
The jealous Mary Carson leaves her considerable fortune to Father Ralph in the knowledge that he will leave the farm with the funds thus gained in order to pursue his ambitious career goals in the Catholic Church. As soon as he said goodbye, the priest and Meggie, who has now become a woman, have a first kiss. Years later, when Meggie's father and brother are killed in a fire, Ralph returns for a short time. It turns out that their feelings for one another are unchanged. However, Ralph makes it clear to Meggie that God will always come first in his life.
When Meggie realizes that she will never be able to have a relationship with Ralph, she marries Luke O'Neill, who outwardly reminds her of Ralph and with whom she goes to Queensland. Luke turns out to be a not exactly caring husband: Although the two of Meggie's money could lead a good life, Luke joins a group of sugar cane cutters. For Meggie he organized a job as a domestic help for a childless couple.
Meggie believes that having a child together can bring Luke to a more familiar life. When she tells him that she is pregnant, however, she realizes that Luke only sees the child as a burden. Due to the unhappy situation, she developed little maternal feelings towards her daughter Justine.
Her employers, with whom Meggie has developed a friendly relationship over time, advise her to take a vacation. She travels to Matlock Island and has the first opportunity to be alone and reflect on her life. She decides to leave Luke and live on Drogheda again with her daughter. Ralph appears surprisingly on the island: He's worried about Meggie and wants to be by her side as a friend. From the first moment, the two overwhelmed the long-suppressed passion, and they spend the days as lovers.
Back in Queensland, Meggie knows that she is pregnant with Ralph. She informs Luke that she is leaving and returns to Drogheda.
Meggie, who never received much attention from her mother, swore in her childhood that she would never love one of her children more than the other. In fact, she now loves her son Dane, the son of Ralph, more than her daughter Justine. Justine senses this and develops into an inaccessible child who can only muster real feelings for her brother. She decides to become an actress in Europe. When Dane is in his teens, Father Ralph visits Meggie, Dane and all the other Clearies on Drogheda. Ralph and Dane are drawn to each other. Dane admires Ralph and wants to succeed him as a priest. Dane tells Meggie that he wants to become a priest - a hard blow for her, because she sees it as another sacrifice that she has to make to God. However, she sees the events as logical, as she has "stolen" Dane from God, and entrusts his training to Ralph, who has meanwhile become cardinal - who still does not know that Dane is his son. When Dane is ordained a priest in Rome, Meggie refuses to come to Rome and take part in the ordination, although she also receives the message that Cardinal de Bricassart's health is not going well. Justine meets Ralph's long-time friend, Rainer Hartheim, who soon falls in love with her. However, he notices their emotional seclusion and tolerates each other for years until they finally have a night of love together. Justine opens up to him, only to be confronted with the news that Dane drowned in Greece. Justine reproaches herself for not protecting her brother because of Rainer and decides to go back to her mother in Drogheda.
As before with Patty and Stu's death, Ralph returns to Drogheda with Dane's coffin to attend Dane's funeral. Rainer asks Meggie to get Justine to allow her love for him. Meggie has now also become clear due to the new, closer relationship with her mother that she always disadvantaged Justine, and she explains to Justine that she is not responsible for Dane's death and that she has to live her own life. Justine then decides to live with Rainer in London. She is the first Cleary in four generations to lead an independent life beyond family ownership.
Meggie feels punished by God by Dane's death and, in her bitterness, tells Ralph that Dane was his son. Ralph collapses, but then decides to stay on Drogheda and asks Meggie's forgiveness for never quite making up her mind. He then dies in Meggie's arms. The return of Ralph after the death of a family member of the Clearies Drogheda thus became a leitmotif of the film, until he died in the presence of Meggie after the particularly painful funeral for Dane. Dane and Ralph, the people Meggie loved most, died with it in a short time.
Another typical leitmotif of this mini-series was the recurring film melody. The series, which began at the beginning of the 20th century, ends in the 1960s. This is indicated by the election of Angelo Roncalli as Pope John XXIII. (1957) and the mention of the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965).
About the name of the book
The author has Ralph explain to the young Meggie what the thornbirds are all about:
“There is the legend of a bird that sings only once in its life, but it sings sweeter than any other creature on earth. From the moment he leaves his nest he looks for a thorn tree and does not rest until he has found it.
And when he begins to sing in the twig, he sits down on it so that the largest and sharpest thorn pierces him. But as he dies, he rises above the agony of death, and his singing sounds more wonderful than the cheering of the lark or the flute of the nightingale . An incomparable song, paid for with your own life. But the whole world stops to listen, and God in heaven smiles. Because the best can only be achieved with great sacrifice ... At least that's what the legend says . "
reception
The book reached number one on the United States bestseller lists , and the television series achieved the second highest rating of any mini-television series.
Observer magazine says: "One of the greatest bestsellers ever".
Adaptations
In 1983 the novel, also called The Thorn Birds , was filmed as a four-part television series. In the film, playing Richard Chamberlain , Rachel Ward , Barbara Stanwyck , Christopher Plummer , Mare Winningham , Jean Simmons and Bryan Brown . Directed by Daryl Duke . In 1996, a middle part of McCullough's novel, which deals among other things with the persecution of the Jews during World War II and was omitted in the 1983 film adaptation, was subsequently filmed as a two-part TV series entitled The Thorn Birds - The Lost Years , with up to Cardinal de Bricassart all roles have been refilled.
An adaptation of the novel as a musical premiered in 2009. McCullough himself wrote the libretto and Gloria Bruni composed the music. It was performed by the Wales Theater Company , directed by Michael Bogdanov , who toured the UK with the production in spring 2009.
literature
- John Sutherland: Bestsellers (Routledge Revivals): Popular Fiction of the 1970s . Routledge, 2010, ISBN 9781136830631 , Chapter 6 "Woman's fiction I: The Thorn Birds ", pp. 47-51
- Mary Jean DeMarr: Colleen McCullough: A Critical Companion . Greenwood Publishing Group, 1996, ISBN 9780313294990 , pp. 13, 17, 79-87, 151
Web links
- Review: The Thorn Birds - Colleen McCullough on The Literary Edit
- Ingeborg van Teeseling: The Thorn Birds on australia-explained.com.au
Individual evidence
- ^ John Sutherland, Bestsellers (Routledge Revivals): Popular Fiction of the 1970s . Routledge, 2010, ISBN 9781136830631 , Chapter 6 "Woman's fiction I: The Thorn Birds ", pp. 47-51
- ↑ "Certainly overweight": "The Australian" because of obituary in criticism . Deutschlandfunk Kultur, January 31, 2015
- ↑ Munich publisher Rolf Heyne has died . Spiegel Online, December 8, 200
- ↑ Patricia Maunder: Outspoken writer Colleen McCullough praised by all except literary establishment . Sydney Morning Herald, Jan. 30, 2015
- ↑ [1] at wunschliste.de, inserted April 15, 2017
- ↑ Vanessa Thorpe: Epic romance is reborn as Thorn Birds, the musical . The Observer, January 4, 2009