Thunder Road

Teaching notes for Five Parts Dead by Tim Pegler
The team at Text Publishing have put together some terrific teaching notes for Five Parts Dead. To download them as a PDF document, click here.

Teaching notes for Game as Ned by Tim Pegler

To download the teachers’ notes prepared by HarperCollins Publishers Australia, please click the link here: game-as-ned-tns

To check out my attempt at a book trailer synopsis, please click here.

The teachers’ notes below were written by me.

SYNOPSIS
Nicholas ‘Ned’ Edwards is 17 and doesn’t speak. Diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder, he lives with his grandfather and generally shuns other human contact, particularly that of the neighbourhood bully, Nigel Collier. Sent along to primary school, Ned ends up spending most of his time in the library, where he absorbs facts and figures on his favourite topic – Australian bushrangers. Eventually, Ned becomes too old to remain at primary school and is moved to a sheltered workshop.

Erin is 16 and keen to finish school and become a nurse. Unfortunately for Erin, her father can’t keep out of trouble and soon winds up in jail again. When her mother has a stroke, it falls on Erin to become the family breadwinner but, in a small country town where your name is mud, there are few opportunities for employment.

After moving to a larger town, Erin finds work as a carer at the sheltered workshop. She befriends Ned and soon realises he faces regular bullying at the hands of the thuggish Collier. When the feisty Erin gives Collier a tongue-lashing, she unknowingly triggers an horrific chain of events.

Ned finds himself on the run from the law and in desperate need of a means to have his say. To achieve justice he’ll need to be as game as Ned Kelly.

WRITING STYLE
Erin’s voice is chatty and colloquial. Ned’s “voice” involves short, abrupt sentences, particularly when he is anxious. Because he doesn’t speak, his observational skills are more acute:

Excerpt:
I know what people say. They reckon I’m simple. Call me dumb. Retard. Spastic. Some of them don’t even bother doing it behind my back. They don’t get a response so they do it to my face. Think I don’t understand.

Nigel Collier started it. Back in primary school. From the moment I arrived, he was on my case. Thought he had my number, he did. He lived a couple of blocks from my place. He’d seen me around. Knew I wouldn’t answer back, no matter what he dished out. So he started this chant: “Neddy, Neddy, never ready; ain’t got nothin’ in his heady.” For a moron like Nigel, it was probably his greatest work.

AUTHOR INSPIRATION
I began with a character who does not speak or communicate. How would this affect the people who know and love him? Would they speak more to compensate or would they be worn down by his silence? Would other characters react to his silence with mistrust and/or fear, or empathy and understanding?

As this character grew in my mind, I found myself asking how he would get his point across if he needed to stand up for himself. What instances of “taking a stand” have permeated the Australian consciousness? The most obvious example was that of Ned Kelly’s last stand.

These two ideas gave me the basic structure for my story. I began researching conditions where people might not speak and discovered that this could occur within the range of autism spectrum disorders. I then read as many books by authors with autism that I could find. These included books by Donna Williams and Temple Grandin.

In researching the Ned Kelly story, I looked at how the famous outlaw attempted to have his say – and how circumstances largely silenced him until after his death. The Jerilderie letter was an obvious attempt to influence public perceptions after the tragic events of Stringybark Creek. This also became an important ingredient of my plot.

STUDY NOTES
I have woven factual material from the Ned Kelly story throughout Game as Ned. This includes character names, events and extracts from the Jerilderie letter. In part, this is designed to invite comparison between the Kelly Gang story and Game as Ned. For example, Erin’s family and their troubled relationship with the police, represent the poor, Irish, Kelly family.

Key themes include:

• Masks – Do we all wear masks in daily life?
• Justice & power – Is there one justice for the rich and powerful and another for everyone else? How easy is it to manipulate opinions and make or break reputations?
• Taking a stand – In what ways can you make yourself heard?
• Bullying – Is bullying behaviour limited to the schoolyard? Can adults be bullied?
• Autism – The main character in Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time is also autistic. What are the similarities/differences between the ways Christopher (Curious Incident) and Ned interact with other people and express themselves?

REFERENCES

Autism:

Note: When autism spectrum disorders were first diagnosed, the causes suggested included poor parenting! Autism is now known to be a disorder of the central nervous system.

Autism spectrum disorders vary significantly from person to person so that no too cases are identical. Some of the more common characteristics include difficulties with communication and social interaction; fear of emotions and the unfamiliar; and repetitive actions or movements.

Prior to the development of early intervention and other intensive therapies, people with autism spectrum disorders were sometimes institutionalised – put out of sight, out of mind.

Nobody Nowhere by Donna Williams
Doubleday 1992

Nadia: a case of extraordinary drawing ability in an autistic child by Lorna Selfe
Academic Press 1977

Somebody Somewhere: Breaking Free from the World of Autism by Donna Williams
Jessica Kingsley Publishers 1998

Thinking in Pictures: and other reports from my life with autism by Temple Grandin
Doubleday, 1995

Autism Victoria
http://www.autismvictoria.org.au/home/

Donna Williams
http://www.donnawilliams.net/front.0.html

Autism Speaks (US)
http://www.autismspeaks.org/

Dr Temple Grandin
http://www.grandin.com/
http://www.templegrandin.com/

National Institute of Mental Health (US)
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/publicat/autism.cfm

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (US)
http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/autism/detail_autism.htm

Bushrangers:

The Ned Kelly Encyclopaedia by Justin Corfield
Thomas C. Lothian 2003

Ned Kelly: A Short Life by Ian Jones
Thomas C. Lothian 1995

A Pictorial History of Bushrangers by H Nunn, Bill Wannan and Tom Prior
Paul Hamlyn 1968

Ned Online (documents from the Public Record Office Victoria)
http://nedonline.imagineering.net.au/main.htm

State Library of Victoria – Jerilderie letter
http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/collections/treasures/jerilderieletter1.html

Iron Outlaw
http://www.ironoutlaw.com/