Narrative Origins in Christina Stead's ‘The Triskelion’

Abstract

This article gives a reading of ‘The Triskelion,’ a short story by the Australian author Christina Stead. In ‘The Triskelion,’ the twelve-year-old Kate sees a large triskelion (three right legs in a circle) detach itself from a headland, named the Skillion. The article highlights the ways in which the triskelion is then linked in the story with ideas to do with narrative. Through this linking, the story explores some fundamental elements of narrative, including repetition, association, voice, and the surfacing of hidden drives. The article argues that Stead's story is a meditation on narrative: how narrative begins, how it grows, and how it potentially creates our world. Written before any of her novels, ‘The Triskelion’ is a rarely critiqued, yet highly accomplished and complex, work.