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Jonah

Jonah: Text Classics

Text Classics

Louis Stone

Introduction by Frank Moorhouse

One side of the street glittered like a brilliant eruption with the light from a row of shops; the others, lined with houses, was almost deserted, for the people, drawn like moths by the glare, crowded and jostled under the lights.

It was Saturday night, and Waterloo, by immemorial habit, had flung itself on the shops, bent on plunder. For an hour past a stream of people had flowed from the back streets into Botany Road, where the shops stood in shining rows, awaiting the conflict… 

One of the first great novels about Sydney, Jonah is the story of two larrikins: the unforgettable Joe Jones—known as Jonah—and Chook. 

Jonah, born a hunchback, is feared and revered in equal measure as the ruthless leader of the Push, a violent gang that terrorises the slums of Waterloo. Chook, a fellow member of the Push, is Jonah’s loyal best friend.

But after a chance encounter with his son, the result of a casual affair, Jonah decides to abandon the larrikin life and settle down. He marries Ada, the mother of his child, and takes advantage of an opportunity to open his own business.

Chook, too, leaves the Push and finds love in the arms of factory worker, Pinkey. But can either man escape his awful past?

Contrasting the sordid streets of the inner suburbs with the glittering lights of the harbour city, Jonah is a brilliant evocation of Sydney life at the turn of the century.  

This edition comes with a new introduction by Frank Moorhouse. 

Louis Stone
About the Author

Louis Stone was born in Leicester, England, in 1871. He and his family migrated to Brisbane in 1884, and soon moved to Redfern, then Waterloo, neighbouring inner suburbs of Sydney.

With the aid of a scholarship Stone attended Fort Street Training School and studied arts at the University of Sydney. He qualified as a teacher in 1895....

Read Moreright
Extent:
384pp
Format:
Paperback
Text publication date:
26 June 2013
First published:
1911
Region:
NSW
ISBN:
9781922147448
AU Price:
$12.95
NZ Price:
$15.99
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Praise for Louis Stone
andJonah

‘An excellent novel…Jonah, the deformed hero, is a sort of Napoleon of the gutter…[Stone’s book is] a valuable and original contribution to Australian fiction.’

‘With one book…Stone has put himself in the front rank of Australian authorship.’

Jonah is a book in which every page, as a novelist said to me lately, “feels written.” What that means is, I think, that the words are not slammed down in a hit-or-miss fashion. The author has felt aware that he has only, let us say, about ninety thousand words to use, and that there must be no waste pages, no dead paragraphs, no words that a mere counters…[Jonah is] a book extraordinarily well written.' 

‘Recognizable at once as a classic…Mrs Yabsley…is one of the most real and memorable characters in Australian fiction.’

Other editions ofJonah
  • Jonah
    ebook
    ISBN: 9781922148490
    26 June 2013
    Buy ebook