Away Michael Gow Analysis
Australian voices: I am, you are, hold on! What is an Australian?
An Australian voice? What can an Australian voice be? To many the definition of an Australian voice will vary from opinion to opinion. One can describe an Australian voice as being a perspective of the Australian culture in relations to Australian values ideas, attitudes and actions.
To many it may be how a typical Australian is perceived by the rest of the world, and the differences between their own culture and that of Australia’s. Today’s typical Australian is in many ways different to the typical Australian 50 years back. It is extremely hard to define an Australian in this day and age as Australia is such a diverse multicultural society when compared with that of the …show more content…
Gow uses the technique of setting to show how the effect of the Vietnam War impacted many Australian families. This is shown when Roy tells Coral “We are not the first people in history to lose a son in a war, in the last war practically every family lost someone”.
This extract depicts how many Australian families were devastated like Coral and Roy to the point where it caused the collapse of countless family. This line also portrays a new perspective of war by Australians as that of being terrible.
Gow emphasises the strong influence that the setting can have by placing the characters in a number of typical Australian holiday places, and having the play set during the holiday season. The beach, Caravan Park and the luxury hotel on the gold coast depict the importance of the Australian values and idea of spending time with family during the hot Christmas season at popular Australian destinations.
As a result of the play being set in the 1960s Gow uses comments and jokes of that time. For example, there is constant referral to Coral looking like Kim Novak, as well as Meg parents reminding Meg about how hard life was in the great …show more content…
Even though Gwen and vice aren’t close, Vic shows mateship when taking Gwen for a walk and telling her from a friends point of view how she acts.
Symbolism is a key way that Gow portrays the image of Australian voices. The beach is symbol of cleansing and harmony, and where lessons are learned. The storm in Away is an icon representing change as well as symbolising the power of nature and how sometimes we really have no control over many aspects of our life.
The representation of many Australian voices through the song "I am you are, we are Australian” jumps out at you the moment you start reading the first few lines. You notice how the chorus speaks of a multiculturalist sense of unity. The lines “from all the lands we come and sing with one voice, I am, you are, we are Australian” is a prime example of how diverse Australian society has become. The song writer Bruce Woodley has achieved this by structuring the chorus with very short sentences (syntax) with most of them only being 2 words. This is to highlight the importance of those key words and convey the true meaning of diversity into the audiences
An Australian voice? What can an Australian voice be? To many the definition of an Australian voice will vary from opinion to opinion. One can describe an Australian voice as being a perspective of the Australian culture in relations to Australian values ideas, attitudes and actions.
To many it may be how a typical Australian is perceived by the rest of the world, and the differences between their own culture and that of Australia’s. Today’s typical Australian is in many ways different to the typical Australian 50 years back. It is extremely hard to define an Australian in this day and age as Australia is such a diverse multicultural society when compared with that of the …show more content…
Gow uses the technique of setting to show how the effect of the Vietnam War impacted many Australian families. This is shown when Roy tells Coral “We are not the first people in history to lose a son in a war, in the last war practically every family lost someone”.
This extract depicts how many Australian families were devastated like Coral and Roy to the point where it caused the collapse of countless family. This line also portrays a new perspective of war by Australians as that of being terrible.
Gow emphasises the strong influence that the setting can have by placing the characters in a number of typical Australian holiday places, and having the play set during the holiday season. The beach, Caravan Park and the luxury hotel on the gold coast depict the importance of the Australian values and idea of spending time with family during the hot Christmas season at popular Australian destinations.
As a result of the play being set in the 1960s Gow uses comments and jokes of that time. For example, there is constant referral to Coral looking like Kim Novak, as well as Meg parents reminding Meg about how hard life was in the great …show more content…
Even though Gwen and vice aren’t close, Vic shows mateship when taking Gwen for a walk and telling her from a friends point of view how she acts.
Symbolism is a key way that Gow portrays the image of Australian voices. The beach is symbol of cleansing and harmony, and where lessons are learned. The storm in Away is an icon representing change as well as symbolising the power of nature and how sometimes we really have no control over many aspects of our life.
The representation of many Australian voices through the song "I am you are, we are Australian” jumps out at you the moment you start reading the first few lines. You notice how the chorus speaks of a multiculturalist sense of unity. The lines “from all the lands we come and sing with one voice, I am, you are, we are Australian” is a prime example of how diverse Australian society has become. The song writer Bruce Woodley has achieved this by structuring the chorus with very short sentences (syntax) with most of them only being 2 words. This is to highlight the importance of those key words and convey the true meaning of diversity into the audiences