Australian Author Kate Grenville has a knack for crafting historical novels based on the lives of real women. In her latest novel, Restless Dolly Maunder (2023), Grenville has drawn on the life of her grandmother Dolly - who wanted more from her life than society expected of women.
Dolly thrived at the one room schoolhouse. She was a sharp, diligent student. She took great pride in the felt stars she earned for her fine recitations of 'The Wreck of the Hesperus'. She dreamed of becoming a teacher and running her own school one day. At fourteen, she seeks to take an exam to become a pupil-teacher, her father responds that she would go over his dead body as 'no daughter of mine goes out to work'. He expected her to be back on the farm now that her schooling was done. Without his permission she could not fulfil her dream and had to find some other means of escaping the hard labour on the farm. To get out from under her father's hands, her only option was to marry.
Dolly could see that her future was mapped out for her - she would wed some local farmer, have children and live the same small life as her mother. There was little scope for suiters in the bush, and class and religion further limited her options and caused her to give up on prospects that she could have been very happy with. At age 28 she was still at home on the farm, a spinster. Her mother pushed her towards Bert Russell, an employee of her father. It was not a love-match, but Bert was an amiable man and it allowed her to get away from the farm. They married in January 1910 and honeymooned at the Caledonian Hotel in Tamworth. Shortly after their marriage they move to Gunnedah, where Dolly learns of a humiliating secret hidden by her mother and Bert. She wants to leave, but there is no way to live alone.
Disappointed and betrayed, Dolly shrinks her ambitions again and resigns herself to married life. As the years pass, the couple form a liveable routine and have three children. They spend their years together moving around regional NSW and Sydney suburbs running various businesses like shops, pubs and boarding houses. With her business acumen, Dolly is the engine behind their business. She does the accounts, develops the business plans to expand their offerings and thrives but each time they start to get settled, they are forced to move on.
Dolly is a tough woman who never really experienced affection. She has been repeatedly disappointed in life and had to scale back her restless ambitions. She represses her emotions, forging distance with her children and grandchildren. While this is the story of one woman, there were undoubtedly many women like Dolly who could have gone on to great things but were thwarted by societal executions. Dolly did not want to be a man, but wanted a man's freedom to forge his own destiny. This is also the story of Australia, as it develops from a British colony in the Victorian era through to the post war era.
