BLUEBACK by Tim Winton Grade 8 - 2020

Lesson 4:
In this lesson we will consider how Tim Winton’s use of description of the Jackson’s life reveals
some of the important issues of the novel. Please notice how these descriptions also reveal subtle
detail about the characters’ lives and history.

Chapter 2:

Read through the chapter and find a quote to support each of the following:

1. Abel and his mother live a sustainable life which does not disrupt the environment.
2. The Jackson family has lived in isolation, off the land, for over a hundred years.
3. Abel is lonely.
4. Abel’s mother is very resourceful and independent.

1. Write down a quote which shows that Abel is very connected to the natural world
and does not fit in at school.

These next three paragraphs demonstrate how powerful writing in a simple way without
melodrama can be:

He looked up at the mantelpiece and the old photo of his father. Abel didn’t really remember him. He died
when Abel was two years old but the bay and the garden and the house were like a memory of him. Abel saw
his mother as a memory of him. Everything she did seemed to have something of his father about it – the way
she was with boats and motors, her tough working hands. Abel knew she remembered his father every day.
Near the orchard there was an old peppermint tree with a deep fork in it. His mother kept a candle there and
some pearl shells and a dolphin he once carved from driftwood. Some days she stayed up at that tree for
hours. Crying sometimes, thinking, remembering. Abel’s father had been a pearl diver. Every year he went
north for the pearling season. He came back with the year’s money and swore he would never go back. It
was boring work, he said. But he always went back. And then one year a tiger shark took him. The crew of
the lugger pulled in his air hose to find no one at the end of it. They found his fins on the murky bottom of
Roebuck Bay but his body was never recovered.
2. The symbol of the peppermint tree is a subtle, delicate way to reveal the deep love
Abel’s parents had for each other and his mother’s continued loyalty.
How does this paragraph make you feel?
Which vivid detail in his description has the most impact on you?
3. Read the paragraph describing Abel’s father’s death. Notice that the writing style is
not dramatic or sentimental (soppy). It is powerful because it is simple and sincere.
Which detail has the most impact on you as a reader?

Read the last line of this chapter:

As well as wondering what fish thought, Abel also wondered what dead people thought. Both things were
mysteries; they tied his mind up in knots but he never gave up wondering.

4. What are the mysteries that tie up your mind in knots?