The status of Oblivia’s silence in Alexis Wright’s The Swan Book. Keira Wright College

Alexis Wright’s The Swan Book deals with the complexities of the ongoing colonisation of Australia, the loss of traditional stories and the horror that continues to be inflicted upon Indigenous Australians. Much of this is achieved through the characterisation of protagonist, Oblivion (Oblivia) Ethyl(ene) who is rendered mute after a vicious gang-rape. She escaped into the “bowels of a giant eucalyptus tree…locked in the world of sleep” (pg 8). After ten years, she was dragged out from the tree by Bella Donna of the Champions, rendered unable to speak. This essay will analyse the status of Oblivia’s silence, and the ways in which Wright uses it to represent a myriad of ongoing injustices faced by Aboriginal Australians including ongoing colonisation and appropriation of Indigenous stories.

One way in which Wright uses Oblivia’s silence to represent stolen Indigenous autonomy is via the characterisation of the ongoing colonisation of Indigenous minds. That is, Oblivia’s silence represents the ways in which colonisation seeks to strip the autonomy and power of the colonised. The colonisation of Oblivia’s mind can be examined in the nature of her relationship with Bella Donna of the Champions, Oblivia’s adopted mother figure. In...