&sq=Google&lang=en&file=File:MonkeyGrip.jpg) First edition | |
| Author | Helen Garner |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Publisher | McPhee Gribble |
Publication date | 16 September 1977 |
| Publication place | Australia |
| Media type | |
| Pages | 245 |
| ISBN | 0-14-004953-3 |
| OCLC | 11950836 |
| 823 19 | |
| LC Class | PR9619.3.G3 M6 1984 |
| Followed by | Honour & Other People's Children |
Monkey Grip is a 1977 novel by Australian writer Helen Garner, her first published book. It initially received a mixed critical reception, but has now become accepted as a classic of modern Australian literature. The novel deals with the life of single-mother Nora, as she narrates her increasingly tumultuous relationship with a flaky heroin addict, juxtaposed with her raising a daughter while living in share houses in Melbourne during the late 1970s. A film based on the novel, also titled Monkey Grip, was released in 1982. In the 1990s, when critics identified the Australian literary genre of grunge lit, the book was retrospectively categorized as one of the first examples of this genre.
The novel, published at the height of a burgeoning counterculture movement and bohemia scene in Melbourne, achieved some degree of notoriety for its astute, uncompromising depiction of heroin addiction, sexuality, relationships and love. It became recognised as being one of Australia's "first contemporary novels", and long since its initial publication, has come to be regarded as being the "voice of a generation".[1] Furthermore, it helped establish the career of Helen Garner, who is now one of the most well-known writers in Australia.[2] Garner later admitted that there was an autobiographical element to the novel, with much of its plot being diaristic and based on her own experiences.[3][4]
Despite dividing critics after its publication in 1977, the book sold very well.[5] It was one of the first majorly successful works released by Melbourne publishing house McPhee Gribble. In 2018, Monkey Grip was selected by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) as number 47 of a list of "100 stories that shaped the world" – the only Australian novel on the list.[6]
- ^ "Helen Garner's Monkey Grip". ABC. 1 October 2014. Retrieved 3 September 2017.
- ^ "Helen Garner on murderer Robert Farquharson". The Australian. 25 March 2017. Retrieved 3 September 2017.
- ^ Bennett, Tegan (3 November 2012). "A phone call to Helen Garner". The Australian. Retrieved 26 December 2017.
- ^ Rooney, Brigid (2009). Literary Activists: Writer-intellectuals and Australian public life. University of Queensland Press. p. 154. ISBN 9-78070224-143-7.
- ^ "Helen Garner's Monkey Grip makes me examine myself". The Guardian. 25 October 2018. Retrieved 31 October 2018.
- ^ "The 100 stories which shaped the world". BBC. 22 May 2018. Retrieved 23 July 2018.