I purchased this book from QBD in Melton a few days ago – “The Belburd’ by Nardi Simpson, published in 2024, of 310 pages, a very different piece of reading in terms of my reading diet!
Described in a way which was unlikely to attract me to this book initially – as a lyrical and masterfully woven novel about women, creation, belonging and the precious fragility of a life – yet something about the promotional material written about it and the author herself prompted a purchase a few days ago when I was seeking out something lighter. Yes, it was that, read in a few hours over a couple of days, though still not sure if I can say I actually enjoyed it!!
Another description applied to this book – ‘the belburd is a powerful story that shows us we are all connected from before we began to long after we begin again’.
Let’s examine the basic storyline first – Ginny Dilboong is a young poet, fierce and deadly. She’s making sense of the world and her place in it, grappling with love, family and the spaces in which to create her art. Like powerful women before her, Ginny hugs the edges of waterways, and though she is a daughter of Country, the place that shapes her is not hers. Determined and brave, Ginny seeks to protect the truth of others while learning her own. The question is how? And, all the while, others are watching. Some old, some new. They are the sound of the belburd as it echoes through the world; the sound of cars and trucks and trains. They are in trees and paper and the shape of ideas. They are the builder and the built. Everything, even Ginny, is because of them.
What does that actually tell us? As a young Indigenous poet, Ginny writes her poems, then sprinkles the paper on which they are written with water [from a bottle she usually carries with her or from any other sources of dampness she can find at the time] and then buries the poem on which they are written in soil or under a rock etc – and those various locations are her publishing house, which off the cuff when asked, she called ‘Dreamtime Books’.
The second ‘description’ mentioned above – well that forms the basis of the other part of this story which are supposedly connected – yet I found it difficult to describe both that connection, and the actual nature of that other part of the book? Books + Publishing says – ‘’The most beautiful montage of life and death . . . The Belburd will leave you with a lasting appreciation of place, nature and life itself’ – while other promotors, book sellers, etc write – ‘The Belburd is a powerful story that shows us we are all connected from before we began to long after we begin again’.
I found a review in the Arts Hub internet site summary to be the best way to place the foregoing into some kind of perspective: From November 2024. Barrina South writes:
“The Belburd is the long-awaited second novel for celebrated Yuwaalaraay author and musician, Nardi Simpson. The novel explores what it means to belong, and is told through two story threads that loop and twist throughout. The first thread is when we are introduced to Ginny, an inner Sydney Blak poet. The second is a more universal story exploring life – from birth to death.
Ginny’s story focuses on what it is to connect with Country that isn’t yours, how to navigate life after a broken relationship, plus the day-to-day challenges of being Blak. Her narrative also touches on the deep sadness Aboriginal people feel when we witness the impact of the urban sprawl on Country and the cultural responsibility to take care of it.
The second story focuses on Sprite, an egg, who is waiting to be placed by Eel Mother, to be born. Sprite’s wish eventually comes true and, when transplanted, Sprite spends the gestation period pondering on what both birth and life will be like.
Sprite and Ginny share a common story – to become what they want to be and to feel a sense of belonging.
Simpson is a lyrical, magical weaver of words who encourages the reader to read with not only their eyes, but with their whole body. This is evident when introduced to Eel Mother. The visceral imagery of this character will make you feel as though you too are safe and protected in her folds, cradled on the moving currents and captivated by her shimmering colours.
In part three, ‘The Ground’ contrasts with the world of Sprite and Eel Mother, moving as it does, to the New South Wales colony and into the present. It is in this section we learn the fate of Dilboong (the Eora word for Manorina melanophrys – the bellbird) and that of her mother, Barangaroo. Here the reader reflects on the impact of building a city like Sydney, which causes injuries and wounds to Country, disrupting a sense of place.
[South has a couple of criticisms too, which I had to agree in particular with the connection factor]
There were times reading The Belburd where I didn’t feel sufficiently guided by the author through complex themes with confidence. By the end the two stories felt jarring, unravelling from each other. The novel would have also benefited from the inclusion of images of Dilboong, and both Barangaroo and Bennelong, two seminal figures in the history of the NSW colony, and one of the first black love stories of modern Australia. A map to point out key places mentioned in the stories also would have been useful, especially for those not familiar with Sydney.
A slightly more revealing review comes from ‘Readings’ Teddy Peak where he writes:
“The Belburd is a story of The Dreaming and of dreaming, of creation and of motherhood. Nardi Simpson weaves together two threads of experience: the story of Ginny, a blak poet recovering from loss, who is trying to contend with poetry, publishing, storytelling and tradition; and, second, of being and non-being, the experiences from before you’re born and after you die. Here, Simpson’s focus is both universal and localised, considering the infinite nature of being, both within and outside a human life.
Despite this metaphysicality, The Belburd is deeply grounded, deeply relatable. Ginny lives on Gadigal land, a familiar landscape with familiar people. She goes to poetry readings and is affronted by university students who tell her to post the event on social media for likes, she goes to garage sales and meets her neighbours for the first time after years of living next to each other, she goes to her local café and simplifies her name for the barista.
The other being, whom we know as ‘Sprite’ and as ‘Splat’ and a series of other names, also has universal experiences, even if they are not ones we remember – Sprite waits with the ‘Eel mother’ to be conceived, then spends months in their mother’s uterus imagining what it will be like to be born. Both Sprite and Ginny are trying to become people, become themselves, unbecome the parts of themselves they do not like.
With a lyrical mastery only further cultivated since her debut, Song of the Crocodile, Simpson finds the sublime in the quotidian, elevating experiences (as base as being born or dying, as complex as grief or motherhood) to an art form. She shows that life is a series of becomings, experienced by humans and animals and the world alike – we all become together”
To me, a final intriguing end to the second aspect of the story – the ‘baby’ Sprite describes her experience as she is born [and borne] through her mother’s birth canal – which sequence we return to a few months later, where Sprite [and also her mother it seems] has died, and she now describes that phase of death as her body disintegrates into ash and nothingness, in the soil of her grave, intermingles with various insects, and then various building materials etc, as a bridge is constructed over the river in which we first met her – reading from page 295 in Chapter 41:
“The me that was fashioned into an arch is so deep a grey that I appear black. My darkness sparkles with winks of silver, as if a million stars are trapped inside my colour. And of course they are. Stars and paint and melted rock and rust. I am all of it. Stardust and steel……Being made into a bridge and painstakingly pierced together over the great waterway means I can see it all. I look through my foundations and cradle time in my hands. Just as I easily peer into future sunrises. My view from here is endless………………All I loved are in my breath and I am in theirs. When they eat at their fires, I am with them in the flames and the smouldering coals that embrace them. I am in the water they drink and the words they speak, and the dreams they make at night. And not just theirs. I am in everything, old and new. I am the sound of the belburd as it rings through the world. I am the cars and trucks and trains. I am the birds with jet engines. I am trams and sand that has been heated into the glass of your windows and computer screens and mobile phones. I am the concrete and metal of all the new pathways, bridges and overpasses, tunnels and causeways, and I am the rock that is moved and sold to make them. I am in trees and paper and the shape of ideas. I am words and ink and have been waiting so that you should know. No longer am I a sprite. Or a spit or splat. Or a scatter of ash. I am heiress. Your mistress. The builder and built. Everything you have and see in this place is because of me. I am the universe, the belburd. Everything, even you, is because of me”.
As Books + Publishing states “The Belburd will leave you with a lasting appreciation of place, nature and life itself: – I’m still struggling to get my head around that!!
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