WEEK 3
The book, A Commonwealth of Thieves by Thomas Keneally was a very interesting book. I think out of all the literature we have read so far in the class, in my opinion this book seemed to be the closest thing to factual and non-bias. Throughout the book it seems like Thomas Keneally uses factual information rather than opinion. For example when he is describing the ship and the arrangements of where the convicts were to stay it did not seem like the reality was tainted at all. He also uses other factual information such as what each person was allowed to eat.


I found it fascinating that they took the convicts from England and shipped them to colonize other areas. Before taking this class I would not have known that. It seemed to me like England had an over populated area. It appears that they convicted people of really tedious things such as stealing lace or a loaf of bread. I think that the consequences for stealing were horrendous. It seems pretty ridiculous to me to up root someone just because they stole something that was so minuscule in value. Some people stole to help their family eat or have clothes to wear. I can see, where to them it may give the impression like they should get part of what they make. Things are not industrialized yet so what people grow or help grow would make it appear to be partially theirs. England had no where else to put anyone because they were running out of room; so they took convicts and decided to send them to colonize areas such as Australia. They basically put them on jail boats. The conditions of the ships seemed terrible. Many people became sick and ended up dying.

I found it interesting that the relied so much on the descriptions of prior explorers to figure out where they were. The explorers, much like Cortes, described the land as being much better than it really was. He made it appear like a perfect place. But for the people that were trying to settle it, they could not settle in the area that was planned. So they had to move their colony elsewhere. The French were just a little behind England in colonizing Australia, which is very fascinating to think about how different Australia could have been if they would have been first.

Another thing that I found interesting in the book was the arrangements with the women and the convicts. I liked how Phillip treated everyone equally and if the marines or the convicts broke any of the rules about visiting each other they would be beaten. I also found the relationship with the Indians pretty interesting. At first they hated them but then began to become friends with one of them at earn their trust they learned a lot.

Overall I didn't really like this book. I found it repetitive and some what boring. I do think that some of the information that Keneally talked about throughout the book was interesting. I do think that the book gave a really good idea of what life was like for the settlers that were in Australia. He used a lot of different sources to come up with his book and because of that it seems very factual. There were some slight bias at some points throughout the book but it appeared to be straight forward and matter of fact.