Keneally’s humid cauldron

The People’s Train, a book that links Queensland to the Russian Revolution, comes with baggage. Not least, there is the mixed critical reaction Tom Keneally has endured over the decades. Perhaps most notably, he is forever to be hailed and damned as the author of Schindler’s Ark (1982). Keneally’s popularity seems double-edged: Simon Sebag Montefiore, a writer of books about Russia, breathlessly lauds The People’s Train as a ‘tremendous read and really exciting’, yet Keneally’s compulsive readability – surely cause for celebration – has somehow dented his reputation as a ‘serious’ writer.

Then there are the complications caused by Keneally the nearly Catholic priest, his early reputation as ‘the next Patrick White’, the republican, the refugee advocate, the slightly awkward but humorous and impassioned public speaker, the Akubra, the funny beard, the twinkling eyes, and so on. His detractors have sometimes played the man not the ball, but these days Keneally is something of an iconic Aussie – and one of the National Trust’s ‘Living National Treasures’ (astonishing though the existence of such a list might be).