Dancing on Coral

Dancing on Coral

First edition
Author	Glenda Adams
Language	English
Genre	Novel
Publisher	Angus & Robertson (Aus)
Publication date	1987
Publication place	Australia
Media type	Paperback
Pages	291 pp
ISBN	0-670-81242-0
OCLC	13947149
Dewey Decimal	823 19
LC Class	PR9619.3.A324 D3 1987
Preceded by	Games of the Strong
Followed by	Longleg

Dancing on Coral is a Miles Franklin Award-winning novel by Australian author Glenda Adams. ^{[1] [2]}

Synopsis

Lark Watter is desperate to leave behind her life in suburban Sydney in the 1960s. At university she meets an American, Tom Brown, and travels with him across the Pacific by freighter to a new life in the USA.

Critical reception

Marion Halligan, in The Canberra Times referred to the novel as a "fine farce" and noted that the author "seems rather more interested in the episodes than the essentials; or maybe she sees herself as hiding the essentials in order to make her readers work at discovery. But I found that the pleasures of this book were in the multiplicity and complexity of its episodes, pleasures which appeal to the intellect as games and puzzles do. Emotions aren't important, amusement is." ^[3]

Awards

• Miles Franklin Literary Award, 1987: winner ^[4]
• New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards, Christina Stead Prize for Fiction, 1987: winner ^[5]

Notes

Parts of this novel first appeared in Lies and Stories and The Hottest Night of the Century. ^[6]

See also

• 1987 in Australian literature
• Middlemiss.org

References

1. Adams, Glenda; Wyndham, Susan, (writer of introduction.); Text Publishing, (issuing body) (2013), Dancing on Coral, The Text Publishing Company, ISBN   978-1-922148-18-6
2. "Dancing on Coral". Tharunka . Vol. 34, no. 8. New South Wales, Australia. 20 June 1988. p. 26. Retrieved 4 November 2022– via National Library of Australia.
3. ""Fine farce in a saga of youth"". The Canberra Times, 19 September 1987, p5. Retrieved 17 July 2023.
4. ""Literary win"". The Age, 11 May 1088, p3. ProQuest   2521286110 . Retrieved 16 January 2025.
5. "No prize for coming first, say literary judges". Sydney Morning Herald, 3 September 1987, p4. ProQuest   2526227339 . Retrieved 3 May 2024.
6. "Austlit - Dancing on Coral by Glenda Adams". Austlit. Retrieved 17 July 2023.