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This resource is designed to help you survive this unit only. It is not enough to rely on this basic presentation of the text if you wish to succeed.
It is expected that each of you will make your own copy of this presentation and add to each of the topics discussed in order to deepen your own interpretation of the novel.
Family Bonds & Structure
Nine Days is ultimately a story about family, and in particular, the complexity of family
- Exploring four generations of one family shows how being part of a family is challenging, but that ultimately they are able to ride out the difficulties and come together
- The novel shows that families are not perfect – people have faults, they lie, they have secrets, they argue
- It also explores the bonds that connect families, from names, to secrets, to tangible items that are passed down from generation to generation
-Jordan uses her novel to highlight the different ideas of what family can be. She presents function and non-functional, single parent and dual parent, and any combination of these.
The value of the shilling that is gifted to Kip from Mr Husting for his work in looking after Charlie the horse is, at first, valuable only as money would be to a child. To Kip, having it means he has amassed some control and is now faced with choices on how he might spend it, toying with the idea of spending the afternoon at the ice rink or spoiling his crush, Annabel Crouch. Its value compounds as it makes an appearance again in Stanzi’s chapter, being displayed in an album. Although, the value of the shilling in monetary terms has dissipated, when it was gifted to Stanzi from her father, now an elderly man, to her it holds a far more personal appreciation. The disappearance of the shilling, just as Stanzi and Charlotte have planned to frame it as a gift for their father highlights that it’s presence has been an important factor in their lives growing up.
For Kip, the shilling also represents a major shift in the way people have treated him in his life. This moment reveals a side of Kip that is concerned with 'gentleman's honour', being respected and treated like a man.
‘It wasn’t just any old coin. It won me my new saddle in a two-up school last winter, back on the station. That was my lucky shilling.’ (Jack Husting) p 105
‘Maybe love is more like a coin: moving between people all around us, all the time, linking people within families and on the other side of the world, across oceans. If we drew the path of a single coin, the trajectory it had taken, it would link us to all kinds of strangers. We would be connected to people we’ve never even met.’ (Stanzi Westaway) p 69
The amethyst pendant is a minor symbol to represent love’s power to connect people across time, place, and family, functioning in the same way as the shilling. Like the shilling, the pendant surfaces throughout multiple narratives, forming a common, concrete thread between them and reflecting the love that each character shows to another when they gift it to them.
After Francis steals the pendant from an old woman as a young teenager, he sells it to Kip, who eventually gifts it to Annabel. Annabel, in turn, gives the pendant to Charlotte as a memento of her love. In this sense, the pendant serves as an inter-generational connection among the Westaway family members, regardless of the different circumstances they experience in their respective time periods.
‘I hold the pendant between my hands, I hold it close to my heart, I hold it above the incense burning on my dresser. I close my eyes and say a few words to the universe. I am its child. I know the universe is listening.’ (Charlotte Westaway) p 123
‘I rub my hands together, reach around my neck to unfasten the pendant and warm it in my hands. It is perfect, purple and gold with sharp edges, the right thing to make the decision because it is part of my family. My mother gave it to me and my father gave it to her. It is my connection with all those who have gone before me.’ (Charlotte Westaway) p 142
- The novel is set against a background of events relating to several wars throughout history WWI (and the ripple effects), WWII, the Cold War and the War on Terror.
- Impact on people’s lives – financially (poverty, rationing); changing employment opportunities, especially for women in the 1940s; pressure on young men to enlist and the consequences of both choices; impact of the death of people during war; fear of war and impact on the lives of those watching from afar
- Some of these directly impact the Westaway family and other connected families in the text (Hustings and Crays)
- Others are more distant, but show how fear and anxiety can be caused by the presence of war in the world, and contemporary access to these via the media (in particular reference to 9/11).
Related ideas / motifs / symbols
The existence of the photograph of Jack and Connie is not known until very late in the novel, meaning its importance, although still poignant, provides a climax in Kip’s narrative. Kip’s emotional reaction to Alec finding the hidden picture in the backyard of Rowena Parade, confirms his involvement in the sad love story of Jack and Connie. Not only does the photograph capture the passion of a relationship that never had the opportunity to flourish, it holds place as a representation of the many sweethearts that parted ways when the men were deployed, never to return; it forms the fabric of Australia’s story in World War 2.
As an aside, it was also the catalyst that inspired Toni Jordan to write the novel. Its relevance within the novel and out is undeniable.
‘This photo won’t be out of my sight from now on. You’ve given me my sister back, Alec…wherever she is, I’m sure she’s looking out for you.’ (Kip Westaway) pp 259-60
Stigma of Gender
Much of the novel focuses on the moral and social codes dictated to women throughout time, and the ways that these change or fail to change.
- This code relates to elements of these women’s lives ranging from the jobs they can have, their behaviour in social settings, who they can associate with, how they should conduct themselves with men, how they use and control their own bodies and a variety of other scenarios
- There are significant changes apparent through the various decades explored, however the novel suggests that perhaps these restrictions have not completely disappeared yet (e.g. Stanzi's issues with body image).
- Additionally, the novel shows how men may also have social and personal pressure placed on them, and that they are not free from stigma or expected behaviours (in particular, the pressure to be stereotypically masculine and enlist to go to war).
Related ideas
Throughout the text, Jordan offers varying perspectives on society's views on abortion through Charlotte and Connie's pregnancy.
Although Jordan poses that women's rights to bodily autonomy have progressed since the partiarchal and restrictive 1940s, she also suggests that women are still not free to complete control over their bodies, with pressure on Charlotte to avoid keeping the baby. Connie contrastingly has no choice, with Jean handing the decision down to her due to societal pressures against childbirth out of wedlock.
To help her parent her children, Stanzi moves in and lives as a second mom, a permanent co-parent to Alec and Libby. Kip performs any fatherly duties that arise, demonstrating that unconventional family structures can function just as well as more traditional ones.
The reader's perception of character changes constantly as they are viewed from different angles and perspectives. Although initially the reader is inclined
to judge characters like Jean, Charlotte, or even a local bully named Mac as one-dimensional, antagonistic characters, as the narrative develops the readers sees that there is more to everyone than first meets the eye. By forcing the reader to continuously shift and develop their perceptions of each character, the narrative argues that despite first impressions, each person has a complex and dynamic personal history, as well as the capacity to change themselves over time.
Many characters within the text have a turning point in their development, but it is important to note that this is not presented in chronological order due to the structure of the text!
Jordan utilises references to historical literature to characterise many of her characters and highlight thier growth.
Kip's chapter makes reference to Hucklberry Finn and Great Expectations contributing to our knowledge of Kip as an adventurous pre-teen on the cusp of adulthood. His enlightenment, much like the protagonists in both texts, come later in the text when he is prematurely exposed to death, love and loss in the war torn neighbourhood of his youth.
Similarly, Jack Husting references Gulliver’s Travels upon his return to his old neighbourhood and family home; a suggestion of returning to his old life to find he no longer fitted in and had grown away from it.
Likewise, in the present day Alec refers to Austen’s ‘Bennet chick’ (p 267) to cement out understanding of his oppression living with three women.
‘It seems I’m the only one who notices I’ve grown… this Gulliver life fits my mood, a stranger in a strange land.’ (Jack Husting) p 72