It started with a challenge from the late Christina Stead: it’s very difficult to make an interesting novel with no men in it at all.
Released to acclaim in 1987, Remember The Tarantella was heralded as a great work of feminist fiction. Twenty four years later the prose continues to have a fresh and contemporary feel.
Remember The Tarantella is a remarkable work. It’s learned and frivolous, female not feminine, silly and serious.
Remember the Tarantella is a novel with twenty-six characters each represented by a letter of the alphabet with the vowels as central characters.The quality of the prose achieves a kind of concerto-like poetry where the many instruments of differing tones assist the reader to know who is who.
This new edition includes cover art by Suzanne Bellamy (“Starship” porcelain 1989). As well as an Afterword and an interview with the author and novelist Sue Woolfe about the making of Remember The Tarantella, complete with diagrams andextracts from early drafts. (The interview was first published in Making Stories: How ten Australian novels were written by Sue Woolfe and Kate Grenville, A& U, 2001.)
