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UBC Theses and Dissertations

White bodies and colonial history : sexual violence in Kate Grenville’s Lilian’s Story and Mark Behr’s The Smell of Apples Thomas, Kylie

Abstract

In this thesis I explore the significance of sexual violence in colonial Australia and apartheid South Africa through analyses of Kate Grenville's Lilian's 5'rory(1985)and Mark Behr's The Smell ofApples(\995). The explicit focus of the thesis is on the sexual violence enacted by white men on white children and the relation between this form of violence and the practices of white racism. I argue that both texts confront instances of sexual violence that have been made unspeakable in colonial history. In the concluding chapter of the thesis I attempt to formulate how it might be possible to represent the violence of the past in an ethical way.

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