In 1789 in Sydney Cove, the remotest penal colony of the British Empire, a group of convicts and one of their captors unite to stage a play.
As felons, perjurers and whores rehearse, their playmaker becomes strangely seduced.
For the play's power is mirrored in the rich, varied life of this primitive land, and, not least, in the convict and actress, Mary Brenham.
Thomas Keneally, of Irish extraction, was brought up in Australia and still lives in Sydney. His novels include The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith, Confederates (which first led him to study nineteenth century American history). Schindler's Ark was later turned into as remarkable a film by Steven Spielberg under the title Schindler's List.