Fatto, finzione e contaminazione in 'True History of The Kelly Gang'

This paper analyses Peter Carey’s Booker Prize-winning novel True History of the Kelly Gang (2000) through the lens of postcolonial theory, which I combine with Jules de Gaultier’s notion of bovarism. Concentrating on interdiscursivity and intertextuality, I will discuss how Carey draws inspiration from Sidney Nolan’s Ned Kelly series, the history of bushranging, Irish folklore, and official documents to re-write the story of the most famous Australian (anti)hero. Furthermore, I will highlight how the author uses various materials from the Irish-Australian tradition to develop the themes of national identity, individuality, and sense of belonging. In this novel intertextual references emerge in the forms of pastiche, quotation, collage, and postcolonial rewriting. The overlapping of history, myth, different mediatic and linguistic registers can be seen as a formal equivalent of the hybrid and polymorphic nature of the Australian cultural identity.