The Grand Experiment
Two aboriginal boys travel three continents to follow one monk's dream.

Two boys travel three continents to follow one monk's dream, in this untold story from Australia's colonial history.

In 1848, the Spanish missionary Rosendo Salvado, founder of New Norcia Monastery in Western Australia, had an idea. He would prove that Aboriginal people could be educated and 'civilised', by taking two Nyungar boys to be schooled in Europe.

And so it was that Conaci, aged seven, and Dirimera, aged ten, left their tribe to travel by sea to the racially-divided colony of South Africa, Ireland at the beginning of its nationalist uprising, the United Kingdom in the midst of its industrial revolution, France ravaged by civil war and finally a monastery in Naples.

The Grand Experiment is a remarkable - and timely - book. It is a colourful detective story of research through libraries and archives across the world, and very much a beginning of the 'stolen generations' story.

Format: 135 x 210 mm, 221 pages, paperback.

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