Van Diemen's Land

Van Diemen's LandThe acclaimed history of colonial Tasmania 'A brilliant book and a must read for anyone interested in how land shapes people' Tim Flannery Almost half of the convicts who came to Australia came to Van Diemen's Land. There they found a land of bounty and a penal society, a kangaroo economy and a new way of life. In this multi award winning history of colonial Tasmania, James Boyce shows how the newcomers were changed by the natural world they

The acclaimed history of colonial Tasmania 'A brilliant book and a must-read for anyone interested in how land shapes people' -Tim Flannery Almost half of the convicts who came to Australia came to Van Diemen's Land. There they found a land of bounty and a penal society, a kangaroo economy and a new way of life. In this multi-award-winning history of colonial Tasmania, James Boyce shows how the newcomers were changed by the natural world they encountered. Escaping authority, they soon settled away from the towns, dressing in kangaroo skin and living off the land. Behind the official attempt to create a Little England was another story of adaptation, in which the poor, the exiled and the criminal made a new home in a strange land. Inseparable from this was a growing war against Aboriginal Tasmanians, which became ever more extreme. This is their story, the story of Van Diemen's Land.