A verse novel that centres around the impact of colonisation in mid-north South Australia around 1880. Ruby, refugee of a massacre, shelters in the woods where she befriends an Irishman trapper. The poems convey how fear of discovery is overcome by the need for human contact, which, in a tense unravelling of events, is forcibly challenged by an Aboriginal lawman. The natural world is richly observed and Ruby’s courtship is measured by the turning of the seasons.
Magabala Books
Silence
the ambience of the morning is ruined
the stench of death fills the air
love will exist here no more
a young woman sits like rock
staring at her husband and mother
their bodies turned tombstone
arid eyes slit with sand
tears will no longer flow
life is doomed to drought
Wash
her new life starts
this young woman of sixteen years
she washes herself in the stream
scrubs her skin with handfuls of coarse sand
with a stone knife she razors her matted hair
it burns acrid on the embers
the knife slices into her thighs
one sorry mark for each family member
blood mingles in the shallow pool
dissolving the pain and the past
Merger
she is glad Jack is
a man of few words
Jack is glad she is
a woman of few needs
in their remoteness
they are heaven
in their remoteness
they are earth
remoteness is essential
in their merger
it is forbidden for Europeans
to fornicate with blacks
Ali Cobby Eckermann is a celebrated poet and writer living in Koolunga, South Australia, where she has established an Aboriginal writer’s retreat. She identifies with the Yankunytjatjara/Kokatha people from the north-west desert country of South Australia.
Ali won the ATSI Survival Poetry competition in 2006 and the Dymocks Red Earth Poetry Northern Territory Award in 2008. In 2012 she won the Deadly Award for Outstanding Achievement in Literature. Ruby Moonlight won the kuril dhagun Indigenous Writing Competition through the State Library of Queensland and in 2013 was awarded the Kenneth Slessor Prize and Book of the Year Award in the NSW Premier's Literary and History Awards.
Magabala Books
WINNER, 2013 NSW PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARDS, BOOK OF THE YEAR
WINNER, 2013 NSW PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARDS, KENNETH SLESSOR POETRY PRIZE
WINNER, 2012 BLACK&WRITE! INDIGENOUS WRITING FELLOWSHIP
WINNER, 2012 DEADLY AWARDS, OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN LITERATURE
"A compelling and dramatic story told in hauntingly sparse free verse, and one of the best examples of the narrative verse genre in recent memory."
– Ali Alizadeh, Overland Literary Journal
"These innovative poems take up traditional narrative voices, bringing past conflicts vividly to life with short lines that are lucid, refined, and luminous... The writing is delicate yet strong, the tone is pitched so well the reader is not distracted by the agile technique that carries the narrative forward."
– Judges' Citation, New South Wales Book of the Year Award
"One of the most remarkable things about 'Ruby Moonlight' is the subtlety with which its political implications are handled: Eckermann invites (rather than dictates) political readings of what is, at heart, a simple and highly engaging narrative."
– Sarah Holland-Batt, Southerly
Themes
Aboriginal history and culture, Books by Indigenous creators, History, Indigenous culture, relationships
General Capabilities
Critical and creative thinking, Ethical understanding, Intercultural understanding, Literacy, Personal and social
Cross-curriculum Priorities
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures
