The Commonwealth of Thieves

Oct 17, 2024 9:23 AM

Author:Thomas Keneally

The story of modern Australia begins in eighteenth-century Britain, where people were hanged for petty offences but crime was rife, and the gaols were bursting. From this situation was born the Sydney experiment, with criminals perceived to be damaging British society transported to Sydney, an 'open air prison with walls 14,000 miles thick'.

Eleven ships were dispatched in 1781, and arrived in Australia after eight hellish months at sea. Tom Keneally describes the first four years of the 'thief colony' and how, despite the escapes, the floggings, the murders and the rebellions, it survived against the odds to create a culture which would never have been tolerated in its homeland but which, in Australia, became part of the identity of a new and audacious nation.

By the author of Schindler's Ark, since made into the internationally acclaimed film, Schindler's List.

Reviews

Australia is lucky to have Keneally. Few writers have a public voice that one wants to take to the bedroom... He gets down and dirty with his characters form their perspective at the time... complex moderate and humane... likely to endure

—— Nicholas Shakespeare , Daily Telegraph

Evocative, broad-ranging and intelligently observed

—— Mail on Sunday

Keneally has deployed his outstanding talents as a narrative writer to produce an enlivening, informative and judicious book about his country's troubled origins

—— Barclay McBain , Herald

Keneally has always had a grand talent for the telling of a tale. His rattling account of the genesis of his native city is one of his very best

—— Carmen Callil , The Times

The Commonwealth of Thieves is immaculately researched and historically exact... a great read and a useful scholarly resource....an account of an extraordinary event described with gusto and sympathy

—— Kate Grenville , Guardian

[A] beautifully written account of the foundation of New South Wales, complete with disastrous attitudes towards the "Indians" and a horrific account of the convicts' sea-crossing

—— Martin Hoyle , Financial Times

Elegantly written and solidly researched narrative... this is a fascinating study of a unique social experiment

—— Saul David , Sunday Telegraph

Keneally uses his novelist's skill to construct a lively mosaic from contemporary accounts of what today seems an utterly barbaric process

—— Christian Tyler , Financial Times

Tom Keneally's book offers an engaging treatment of a subject which over the years has provoked a long and sometimes heated debate

—— Glyndwr Williams , Times Literary Supplement

DeGroot tells the story of the American lunar mission with verve and elegance

—— Richard Aldous , Irish Times

Fascinating, gossipy and occasionally hilarious

—— Jeffrey Taylor , Express

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