D'alpuget, Blanche

Sydney. 1980. Aurora Press. 1st Australian Edition. Very Good in Dustjacket. 0867480017. 176 pages. hardcover. Cover illustration is a detail from ‘The Jetty’ by Donald Friend. keywords: Literature Australia Women. FROM THE PUBLISHER - Alexandra Wheatfield, a young journalist, has come to work in the Australian embassy in Djarkarta at a time of chaotic change: the coup of 1965 has been crushed but the new Order of the Indonesian Army has not yet overthrown the revered President, Sukarno. He has warned that without him the people are 'monkeys in the dark.' As a privileged group the Australian diplomats view this scene with benign contempt. The problem of Frank Greaves of Security and his protEgEe, Anthony Sinclaire, is to find the new sources of information and power in the crumbling and corrupt city. But for Alex the city mirrors her affair with Maruli Hutabarat, poet and party activist, its colours, fruits, smiles and cruelties counterpoint the sensuality of their relationship. Her love is no protection against the demands of the two conflicting societies - she is used and betrayed, first by her lover, then by the brutal demands of ‘Security.' The sexual tensions and personal betrayals of this richly perceptive novel mirror wider betrayals in the two different societies until the role of ‘monkeys in the dark' is grimly reversed. inventory #630 ISBN: 0867480017.