‘Robert Runs’ is described as an ‘imaginative retelling’ and ‘fast paced thriller’ based on historical accounts of actual characters. It provides readers with a vivid story of lives lived under harsh and unjust conditions.
The main character is Aboriginal runner, Robert Anderson Goupong. Australian history records him as having defeated the world-record holder, Arthur Postle, in a sprint race. Mariah Sweetman, the author of this story, is Goupong’s great-great granddaughter. She wishes to honour Goupong’s memory and also the Aboriginal children who lived on the Deebing Creek Mission. Themes of identity, culture and religion are woven into this complex story. ‘Robert Runs’ also touches on the massacre of Aboriginal people. The author’s approach is not to dwell on details so that readers experience these times at their own level of understanding.
Goupong, referred to as ‘Thomas’ by those running the Deebing Creek mission, along with the other children on the mission, grapple with being educated by white people whose lifestyle, religious beliefs and education are very different to their own. Goupong, his little sister Dot, and his best friend Jonathan belong to the Ugarapul people. Together they live with their families and others within the harsh confines of the Deebing Creek Mission near Ipswich, Queensland. The mission is run by the malevolent ‘Boss Man’.
Throughout the story violence is perpetrated on both the Aboriginal adults and young children who suffer inhumane treatment by the white ‘Boss Man’. These scenes are scattered throughout the story. They are rendered in sharp, short phrasing and minimum detail that somewhat circumscribes the readers’ imagination.
There are moments of light banter and humour as the young boys tease and joke with one another. In the closing pages, Goupong comes across the scene of the Deebing Creek Massacre where an Aboriginal community has been killed. In the author’s acknowledgements at the story’s conclusion, she explains that she writes this story to process her own ‘feelings and understandings’ of history.
An Afterword states that Goupong grows up to be a community leader and tribal Elder. The author, Maria Sweetman, concludes that Goupong’s descendants acknowledged their ancestors’ hardships and sought ‘harmony and peace for the future’. Sweetman is a descendant of Ugarapul people and lives on Gubbi Gubbi Country. This is her first book, for which she won the Daisy Utemorrah Award for an unpublished manuscript by a First Nations author. Sweetman struggled with the injustice perpetrated on the Ugarapul people and sought to create a fictional retelling of what Goupong’s life would have been like growing up on a mission, torn between the beliefs of his ancestors and what he is told by white missionaries.
Aboriginal and or Torres Strait Islander Resource
