Kuttainen, Victoria (2026) The Perfect Getaway. Quadrant, 70 (9). 629. pp. 105-109.

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Abstract

The Perfect Getaway reworks Henry Lawson’s canonical Australian short story “The Drover’s Wife” through the conventions of regional crime fiction, Outback Noir and Australian Gothic. Set in Major’s Creek, North Queensland, the story draws on the atmosphere of contemporary rural crime writing associated with writers such as Jane Harper while entering a long tradition of adaptations that have revisited Lawson’s tale through changing understandings of gender, colonialism, race and power. Rather than simply adding another corrective lens to the original, however, The Perfect Getaway turns its scrutiny back upon the writer herself and on the forms of exoneration often used when intersectional equity lenses falsely exonerate people by equity categories. In this take on the Drover's Wife, the progressive and middle-aged female literary professor becomes implicated in the very structures of appropriation and entitlement she is accustomed to critiquing. The story therefore uses literary theft both literally and metaphorically to examine writing as an act of both taking and stocktaking: theft and the question of reckoning or lack thereof.

Research Statement

Research Background	The Perfect Getaway sits at the intersection of Australian literary studies, creative writing research, adaptation, regional crime fiction, Outback Noir and Australian Gothic. It reworks Henry Lawson’s canonical “The Drover’s Wife,” a text repeatedly reinterpreted through changing understandings of gender, colonialism, race and power. Set in Major’s Creek, North Queensland, the story asks what happens when the critical scrutiny usually directed toward inherited cultural structures is turned back upon the writer.
Research Contribution	The work innovates by using the conventions of crime fiction and literary theft to interrogate creative writing as an act of both taking and stocktaking. Its progressive, middle-aged female English professor becomes implicated in the very structures of appropriation and entitlement she is accustomed to critiquing. The story therefore extends existing reinterpretations of “The Drover’s Wife” by examining how structural and intersectional categories can become forms of moral exoneration when they substitute for individual accountability. It contributes a new ethical framing of a longstanding literary adaptation.
Research Significance	The work was selected for publication in Quadrant, a long-established Australian literary and cultural magazine with national circulation and a significant history of publishing Australian fiction, criticism and public intellectual writing. Its publication places the work within a recognised national literary venue and demonstrates peer/editorial selection beyond the university context. The story also contributes to the continuing cultural afterlife of “The Drover’s Wife” by extending its adaptation tradition into contemporary regional crime fiction and by reframing questions of culpability, authorship, and ethical responsibility.
Item ID:	94025
Item Type:	Article (Creative Work)
ISSN:	0033-5002
Copyright Information:	© 2026 the author.
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Funders:	Roderick Centre for Australian Literature and Creative Writing
Date Deposited:	15 Sep 2026 01:55
FoR Codes:	36 CREATIVE ARTS AND WRITING > 3602 Creative and professional writing > 360201 Creative writing (incl. scriptwriting) @ 100%
SEO Codes:	13 CULTURE AND SOCIETY > 1302 Communication > 130203 Literature @ 100%
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