Rosamund Dalziell Shameful Autobiographies: Shame in Contemporary
Australian Autobiographies and Culture
MUP $29.95pb, 302pp,
0 522 84860 5
THIS IS A TIMELY BOOK. Shame, as Rosamund Dalziell points out, has become a central feature of Australian consciousness, especially with regard to Indigenous issues. Shame, then, deepens our conception of cultural politics. In the words of Raymond Gaita (quoted by Dalziell) shame is 'a fact of our moral practice'. Significantly, shame, unlike guilt, can be felt for something not done by the subject feeling the emotion.
Dalziell uses Australian autobiography to critique the place of shame in Australian culture. Narratives of shame allow not only for a cathartic release of the shameful 'secret', but also can engage in 'counter shaming', by resisting the myths that brought about the initial shamefulness (such as racism). Dalziell's main concerns are sociological, viewed through the prism of individual identities. One of the strengths of Shameful Autobiographies is the way it has chosen an almost-ignored field of biographical studies and makes that field seem central to our understanding of autobiography. After all, recounting shameful episodes is a key feature of Western autobiography, as Augustine and Rousseau demonstrate. In addition, shame is, according to Darwin, 'an emotion of self-attention' in relation to others. This is strikingly close to the condition of autobiography itself, as viewed by many contemporary theorists.
The representation of shameful events in an autobiographical narrative, however, is a problematic business, something Dalziell recognizes but does not actively pursue. The subject being shamed is radically not in control of the situation, whereas the autobiographer of shame is (more or less) in control and can use the representation of the shaming events as an authenticating strategy, or to avoid charges of narcissism. Dalziell tends to avoid this issue by focusing on shame not as associated with the subject's moral transgression, but as provoked by the attitudes of a dominant 'other'. In this way, representation of shame becomes primarily an act of resistant testimony in the face of oppression based on difference.
By emphasizing the second meaning of 'confession' as a 'declaration of faith or statement of principles' (rather than a recounting of 'sin'), Dalziell further associates autobiography with testimony, and thus opens up the form to events and discourses that transcend the experience of the individual narrator. For Dalziell, such a political reading of shame in autobiography is ultimately based on a pluralist humanism. To confront the difficult emotion at a 'cultural' level, Dalziell argues, 'can lead to a deeper self-knowledge and a greater recognition of shared humanity'.
While understanding that choices must be made, it does seem to me that Dalziell is disappointingly constricted in her choice of texts through which to read her chosen loci of shame in Australian culture. The chapter on the 'illegitimacy' of Australian culture with regard to the 'mother country' relies wholly on Kathleen Fitzpatrick's Solid Bluestone Foundations, where numerous other works deal with the issue, even unexpected ones such as David Malouf's 12 Edmonstone Street. Personal 'illegitimacy' is covered by Bernard Smith, Robert Dessaix, and Germaine Greer. After a chapter covering a somewhat larger sample of Aboriginal autobiographies, the critical section is wound up with a discussion of 'immigrant shame' with reference to Morris Lurie, Amirah Inglis and Andrew Riemer.
While there is much to commend in these readings, some do seem unnecessarily detailed, and some even lapse into descriptiveness. The use of biographical research (surprisingly rare among scholars of autobiography) is often illuminating (especially with regard to Fitzpatrick), but Dalziell's anatomising can sometimes be wearingly copious. Numerous other autobiographies could have been turned to (and some more recent works would also have been welcome. The latest work discussed here is five years old). Relevant autobiographies include those by Robin Wallace-Crabbe, Roger Milliss, Gabrielle Carey and James Murray (all especially in regard to the discussion of fathers), Peter Conrad, Barry Humphries, and Ruth Park, to name a few.
Incomplete:
David McCooey is the author of Artful Historiesdern Australian Autobiography (CUP, 1996)