Seven Little Australians - Basic Notes

1423 Words6 Pages
English Essay – Seven Little Australians, Ethel Turner. Synopsis (summary of the book) This book is about the Woolcot family. Seven siblings, ranging from four through to sixteen in age who live in the 1880’s in Sydney with their father who is an army Captain and their 20 year old stepmother Esther. Their father has little understanding of his children and their stepmother finds it difficult to keep charge over the children. All throughout the book the children cause trouble, a good example of this is when their parents have guests over and were entertaining and the children embarrassed them by asking for some of the guest’s dinner. After one prank pulled by Judy and Pip humiliates Captain Woolcot at his military barracks he orders Judy, the 13 year old ringleader, to be sent to a boarding school away in the snowy mountains. While the younger children are causing trouble, the oldest, Meg, falls under the influence of an older girl, Aldith and tries to make herself prettier according to the fashions of that time. Together with Aldith they meet two young men but Meg is convinced that she has fallen in love with Alan, the older brother of one. When the two girls arrange to meet the young men for a walk, Meg is embarrassed when Alan shows up instead and accuses her of being spoilt, When Meg goes home and she later faints because she had laced up her corset until she could hardly breathe. Back to Judy, who is missing her siblings so much that she runs away from boarding school to go home. Knowing she can’t tell her father, she hides away in her barn. She is sick from the several days walking it took to get home but her siblings don’t tell their parents that she is there. Despite this, the Captain eventually finds her. He planned to send her straight back to school except he finds out that she is suffering from tuberculosis, so he lets her stay with them. To
Open Document