The Book of Fame
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INNOCENCE In August 1905 a party of young men took ship for England. Among them: four farmers, two bootmakers and a boatbuilder. Bunny and Fats, Bubs and Massa and all the Georges and Billys. They set out from Auckland, never dreaming they would conquer the world. They were bound for fame. FAME The first game, in Devon, ‘played in golden farmlight: a surprising victory’. By December they were the ‘wonderful All Blacks’ who had beaten Yorkshire (40-nil), England (15-nil) and Ireland (15-nil). Englishmen stopped them in the streets. ‘Mr Gallaher. Mr Gallaher, sir. How does it feel to be famous?’ ‘The pyramids are famous, son.’ They were a tribe far from home, weary, bedazzled, a little lost—but the world showed them wonders. WONDERS The world came to look at them, and they looked back: the Eiffel Tower, snow on Tierra del Fuego, English lords, Consommé Sarah Bernhardt. America! But years later, it was something else that remained indelible. A feeling shared, grave and simple, that survived all the acclaim. ACCLAIM Winner of the Tasmania Prize for fiction Winner of the Deutz Medal for fiction In this singular melding of history and imagination, Lloyd Jones has created a work of great beauty and purity—a journey from innocence to celebrity; a story of loss and return.
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Lloyd Jones has written quite an unconventional book. It is a fictionalized account of the 1905 rugby tour by the New Zealand team to the British Isles and France. This team became known as ‘The Originals' and they achieved legendary status both where they toured, and at home.
Those of you not familiar or interested in rugby, or sport in general, may as well move on now. No hard feelings.
Jones describes the fiction / non-fiction status of the book as follows:
The myth of the 1905 Originals precedes this novel, as do various match reports on the games played. Actual events outside of the matches, however, have been harder to come by and where obtainable not that interesting or even illuminating. This is where the imagination slips easily into the gaps. While this book is a work of the imagination, it is nonetheless bedded in research.
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