Tim Winton- the Turning

547 Words3 Pages
Tim Winton’s novel ‘The Turning’ depicts reality in Australian households and not the picture perfect family. The seventeen short stories that make up the novel shows us 3 dimensional characters that have the harsh reality and normality of life; being damaged either emotionally or physically. Tim Winton shows us how childhood determines what happens later in life through the jealously of the character Max from ‘Sand’ and how little he differs from the Max they see in ‘The Turning’. The damage in Max also impacts on his wife, Raelene, and children. Through the use of language Winton depicts how Raelene and her new friend Sherry from ‘The Turning’ copes with the damage in their lives. While Raelene is struggling to cope both emotionally and physically, Sherry is using her and her husband Dan’s failures to change their life and movie to White Point for a new start. Winton’s use of narration shows us the jealousy of Max as a younger boy. When he was slower than the others or picked last for sports Max was in malice. He wanted to be there better man and eventually grows up to be the typical Aussie bloke, who smokes is masculine and goes fishing. In ‘Sand’, Winton constructs his protagonist, Frank, as an innocent child who is constantly being berated by his older brother, Max. Then in ‘The Turning’ without being the main character, Max shows his spite that shone when he was a child. The three stories which Max is involved in- ‘The Turning’, ‘Sand’ and ‘Family’ are through 3rd person, focusing on Raelene and Frank. Both whom are treated badly by Max. Language is used to compare the characters of Raelene and Sherry. Sherry is a very sophisticated woman and open minded due to her and her husband already being damaged. Sherry and Dan have had problems of their own and changed their life around to fix it, this was moving to White Point, which became their ‘second chance’
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