On the Brink of Possibility: Alexis Wright’s Tragicomic Novel

Although many critics have emphasized the tragic and political dimension of Alexis Wright’s Carpentaria (2006), this article focuses on the novel’s use of humor and a comic structure in exploring Desperance, an isolated town in the North of Australia. An Indigenous narrator sets the humorous tone, conveying stories light and dark centered on the residents of Pricklebush, the Indigenous settlement on the fringe: their conflicts with each other; their vexed relations with Uptown, the white section; and their relationship with the powerful Gurfurritt mine. Despite the novel’s dark episodes, its comic dimension fulfills the promise of a finale defined by hope.