Away Study Guide

Language Form and Style

Intersecting Plots

Gow crafts a tripartite narrative thread in Away through the individual, yet ultimately intertwined, family holidays. The intersecting narrative plots are used to illustrate Gow's key message about the value of lived experience and family bonds over materialism.

• Harry, Vic, and Tom: As an immigrant family who are financially disadvantaged in Australian society, Gow uses this narrative thread to promote how meaningful relationships can provide people with hope.
• Jim, Gwen, and Meg: As a representation of the Australian middle class, Gow uses this narrative thread to interrogate the impact of materialism on human relationships through integrating economic fears of loss into family conflict. This family foils Harry, Vic, and Tom, who prove that financial privilege does not guarantee happiness.
• Coral and Ray: Coral and Ray are a wealthy but emotionally fractured family unit who suffer to reconcile with the grief of their son lost in the Vietnam War. Gow integrates this historical trauma into the play to critique material obsession and demonstrate that human relationships are invaluable, and their loss can irreparably damage our connection to one another.

Manipulation of Dialogic Rhythm

Gow manipulates the rhythm of speech delivered in Away. Characters often speak in short and truncated exchanges that prevent a meaningful discussion of the underlying conflict in each family.

• Shorter exchanges, typically duologues, denote an unspoken tension in the family unit.
• Longer exchanges, typically monologues, are used for an emotional revelation.

Intertextuality

Away opens with an intertextual recitation from the ending of William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream and closes with a passage from the opening of William Shakespeare's King Lear. The play draws on a variety of Shakespearean devices, both structurally and conceptually, which include, but are not limited to:

• Appropriating elements of magic as a comedic plot device.
• Appropriating conventions of the pastoral comedy to suit an urban and coastal Australian world.
• Use of the storm trope in King Lear to create a point of intersection and reconciliation between the three families.

The Common Module Rubric

Published by the New South Wales Education Standards Authority (NESA)

Individual and collective human experiences

Gow represents human experiences that include, but are not limited to:

• Family: its unconventional nature and capacity to be influenced by external factors
• Loss: of one's possessions, memories, relationships, and life
• Forgiveness: fostered through developing empathy for the experience of others and understanding the motivations for people's behaviour

Emotions and qualities related to these experiences

Gow represents human emotions and qualities including, but not limited to:

• Greed: material obsession
• Courage: to challenge family conflicts, cultural conventions, or self-perceptions
• Love: familial, romantic, and platonic

Emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences

• Emotional Experiences: love and its variants, including loss, conflict, and forgiveness
• Intellectual Experiences: thinking about how people's pasts have shaped their present self
• Physical Experiences: the experience of Australian travel and the challenges it can present
• Cultural Experiences: negotiating differences in cultural backgrounds and experiences
• Lived Experiences: adversity

Identity, culture, acceptance and growth, invite the readers to see the world differently, and challenge assumptions

• Identity: shaped by an individual's past experiences but can be challenged by generational differences
• Culture: can foster division between people that must be dismantled through recognition of our shared hardships in life
• Acceptance and Growth: acceptance of present circumstances and growth in appreciating both the material and immaterial things people can possess in their lives
• See the World Differently: recognise the shared nature of adversity, even if it manifests in different ways for people
• Challenge Assumptions: the nature of loss as restorative

Tension between agency and conformity

Gow explores a generational tension between agency and conformity. Apart from Coral's son, Meg and Tom seek to exercise personal choice and responsibility in their lives that is often met with resistance by their parents. Likewise, Meg and Tom's parents are challenged to reconcile their own fears and enable their children to live free and fulfilling lives. The play illuminates how generational expectations create tensions between agency and conformity in the family unit.

Paradoxes in human motivation and behaviour

The Paradox of Loss:

Gow presents the notion of loss as a morally restorative medium. The experience of loss becomes a pathway in the play that enables individuals to recover important facets of their humanity that have been compromised by the obsessive pursuit of something. In this way, Gow paradoxically encourages us to view loss as a means through which we may grow.

Summary of Key Ideas

Family Conflict and Resolution

• Gow explores the idea that conflict can manifest in our shared experience of family when generational differences create contrasting perceptions of present circumstances.
• Within all three of the family units portrayed, there is an emotional conflict between parent and child that fractures a conventional and idealised family dynamic.
• Gow promotes the human capacity for empathy as an important conduit in resolving these generational differences, which enables people to better understand the motivations and behaviours of those we love most.

The Value of Human Connection

• The play critiques material obsession and advocates for the value of lived experiences.
• Gow rejects the idea that financial prosperity is necessary to live a fulfilling life, and instead uses the three families to communicate that the intangible aspects of our human relationships, such as compassion and empathy, are far more valuable than material possessions.
• Coral's loss of her child and Harry and Vic's impending loss of Tom serve as a provocative reminder that human life is irreplaceable and far transcends the importance of materialism.

The Importance of Journeying

• Gow communicates that individuals must sometimes journey beyond their conventional surroundings to develop a closer connection to place and the people around them.
• The 'Australian Summer Holiday Trope' enables Gow to disperse the three families from their typical family homes. When each family is positioned in a new environment, it quickly exposes the emotional tensions that previously remained concealed.
• Through the process of travel, the families are ultimately brought close together, which suggests that the physical experience of holidaying can facilitate a simultaneous emotional journey.

Essay Questions

Module Specific: Texts and Human Experiences

1. How has the exploration of human experiences in your prescribed text enhanced your understanding of paradoxes in human motivation and behaviour? In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.
2. To what extent does the composer of your prescribed text explore the power of human emotions in shaping experiences? In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.
3. Evaluate how the study of your prescribed text has offered insights into the way collective human experiences promote acceptance and growth. In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.
4. In what ways does the composer of your prescribed text reflect tensions between agency and conformity in our individual human experiences? In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.
5. Texts reflect how the interconnection between our qualities, emotions, motivations, and behaviours shape human experiences. To what extent is this statement true of your prescribed text? In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.

Text Specific: Michael Gow, Away

1. Evaluate how Gow's representation of lived experiences offers insights into the intersection between journeys and transformation. In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.
2. To what extent does Away represent the individual and collective nature of growth? In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.
3. How does Gow shape dialogue and setting in Away to challenge our assumptions about the paradox of loss? In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.
4. Gow explores the relationship between the individual and adversity, enriching the way we understand family. To what extent does this statement reflect your understanding of the human experiences represented in Away? In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.
5. How has your study of Away invited you to reflect personally on the nature of forgiveness? In your response make close reference to your prescribed text.

Essay Model and Scaffold

Introduction: Scaffold and Modelled Example

Thesis

Address the question through a clear and conceptual argument.

Michael Gow’s play Away explores how generational differences can result in family conflict to challenge audience assumptions about the conventional nature of family relationships.

Why it works

• Specifically references the prescribed text (author, form, title, and publication date)
• Uses key language from the question
• Conceptualises the key question language into an argument about family, conflict, and relationships.

Elaborate

Expand on the line of argument by explicitly linking it to the concepts and features of your prescribed text.

Gow crafts tripartite and intersecting family holiday experiences in his play that are set in 1960’s Australia to illuminate how personal trauma can be easily misunderstood between loved ones, resulting in the need to look beyond one’s own values and foster empathy for others.

Why it works

• Specifically references the form of the text to address the 'how' aspect of the question
• Links the macro function of form to audience purpose
• Elaborates on the conceptual response to outline the order of argument in the response

Link

Demonstrate awareness of the module's focus by connecting your argument to both the question and key module directives.

Away dramatically incorporates a range of Shakespearean comedic and tragic conventions to expose the fragility of family relationships when generational differences are unreconciled, thus challenging idealised assumption about familial love in our human experience.

Why it works

• Incorporates key module terminology that is relevant to the question
• Concludes the introduction by making a specific and arguable claim about the question

Body Paragraph: Scaffold and Modelled Example

Sub-Argument

Present a clear and single idea that progresses the argument of your thesis. This may be universal or text specific.

Individual focuses in life are often a reflection of past challenges and can be easily misinterpreted by those around them, constructing conflict where empathy is needed.

Why it works

• Argues key thesis concepts
• Establishes a link back to the question

Explanation

Connect a macro-feature to the sub-argument. Outline how the form of the text actively supports the sub-argument.

Gow manipulates dialogic rhythm in Away to subvert the notion that materialistic greed is inherently self-serving and explores how past economic pressures in 1960’s Australia can intensify human ambition.

Why it works

• Demonstrates a specific awareness of form
• Connects aspects of form to the meaning created within the text
• Explains its relevance to the question

Example

Identify a technique specific to form. Provide the evidence of that technique. Explain the purpose.

The paternal conflict between Meg and Gwen arises from Gwen’s materialistic focus in life which is conveyed through her rhetorical question, ‘I hope no one-expects to take any of my good towels down onto the beach. Did you hear me?’ (Gow, 1986), whereby she negates the experiential value of her family holiday.

Note: more than one example is required in an essay.

Why it works

• Provides a micro-analysis of the broader structural features addressed
• Uses a specific technique
• Uses a specific and accurate example
• Note: more than one example is required in an essay

Link

Demonstrate the relationship between your evidence, the sub-argument, and the question.

Gwen’s ‘good towels’ are an idiosyncratic symbol of how her middle-class and materialistic nature erodes the sincerity of her family bonds, but Gow seeks to account for Gwen’s values within the 1960’s framework through Jim’s later revelation.

Why it works

• Expands on the evidence provided to create a clear relationship between the text, its meaning, and the question

Conclude

Reinforce the topic and its relevance to the question.

Through dramatic characterisation, Gow endeavours to challenge the monomyth of family relationships and present the empathy that is required to overcome generational differences in the family unit.

Why it works

• Reinforces the main argument in reference to the question

Conclusion: Scaffold and Modelled Example

Restate Thesis

Readdress the key elements of your argument as outlined in the response.

Gow’s Away functions as a powerful reminder that family relationships are sustained through our shared empathetic capacity and are not inherently easy to navigate within our human experience

Why it works

• Restates thesis concepts without repeating the introduction word-for-word

Reoutline Key Elements

Readdress how those key concepts answer the question asked.

Through the intersecting 1960’s family narratives that are dramatised through Shakespearean conventions, the playwright offers insights into how motivations and behaviour are shaped by the personal and shared nature of adversity.

Why it works

• Reconnects the argument's key elements directly to the question

Reinforce Judgement

Reinforce your position in relation to the question.

Ultimately, Gow challenges audience assumptions about family relationships and reinforces the importance of journeying beyond our own worldviews to live with empathy and compassion for experiential diversity.

Why it works

• Leaves the marker with a final, confident statement of judgement

Works cited

All works cited in this document are based on Australian Fair Dealing copyright laws as of 2023–2024.

Gow, M. (1986). Away. Currency Press.