Historical documents may enliven our understanding of the past but they also flatten it, leaving certain people – often those marginalised due to sexuality, gender, race – as blurred silhouettes on the fringes. In Jay Carmichael’s novel Marlo – set in Melbourne in the 1950s – he attempts a correction, breathing into sharper focus the gay men demonised and criminalised as “sexual perverts” in the annals of Australia’s past.
Carmichael’s popular debut, Ironbark, was shortlisted for 2016 Victorian premier’s unpublished manuscript award – and was so deftly written it made Christos Tsiolkas jealous. It was a cutting, artfully restrained tale of a young gay man coming of age in a small country town, enduring grief, a crisis of identity and unfulfilled desires. Similar themes populate the author’s second book, Marlo, which also centres a young gay man, Christopher, who has uprooted from the “quiet pastures” of regional Victoria for the bustle of the city.
