Conflicts of interest
Tom Keneally captures the tragedy of the Great War in his tale of two sisters, writes James Kidd
by Tom Keneally
Sceptre
Tom Keneally has made an art of reimagining reality. Or to be more precise, he has made art from transforming reality into beautifully written, morally complex novels. One could argue that this is what all novelists do, from Laurence Sterne to Mo Yan, from Arthur Conan Doyle to E.L. James. But Keneally's reputation, built on works such as Schindler's Ark and now The Daughters of Mars, owes more than most to the way fiction can breathe new life into fact - particularly when those facts are found in and around the two world wars.
As an author's note informs us on the first page, The Daughters of Mars is based on and inspired by "the forgotten private journals of the Great War, written by men and women". Keneally's focus is predominantly on the latter. Despite being epic in scale and scope - its 519 pages extend across half the world, most of the 20th century and encompass war, death, empire and love - this book is essentially a two-hander between sisters Naomi and Sally Durance, who leave their home in rural Australia to serve as nurses in Europe.
The sisters have a history, even before history itself intervenes. In the opening chapter, titled "Murdering Mrs Durance", they seemingly end their mother's suffering after a battle with cervical cancer. Sally and Naomi carry this secret into battle in Europe, where its moral gravity is weighed against a world where millions of men perish almost as a matter of fact.
Their mother's death is the first of many tragic existential ironies the sisters will face. Most, as is so often characteristic with depictions of the first world war, examine the value of human life in a world that routinely sacrifices it to abstract notions of the greater good: patriotism, empire, victory, honour and duty.
