UNBINDING THE BUTTERFLY: A Fictocritical Biography contemporising Amalie Dietrich, a nineteenth-century Collector of Nature
Creators: name: De Groot, Deborah
Publisher: name: University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland
Year: 2017
Subjects: fictocriticism
biography
fictocritical biography
Amalie Dietrich
botany
female naturalists
Siebenlehn
Brisbane
Bowen
Lake Elphinstone
butterflies
taipan
Germans in Australia
1863

description: The following Doctorate of Creative Arts (Creative Writing) submission is entitled, Unbinding the Butterfly: A Fictocritical Biography contemporising Amalie Dietrich, a nineteenth-century Collector of Nature. The writing weaves exegetical information with creative fiction to form a fictocritical biography that encompasses Preface and Afterword sections. (Konkordie) Amalie Dietrich (1821-1891) was a pioneering, female, German naturalist-collector during the nineteenth century. A village girl, with no formal education and deserted by her husband, Dietrich rose to prominence as the only female to collect natural history specimens for Hamburg's Museum Godeffroy. Dietrich amassed more than 20,000 plants (Sumner 1989: 9), thousands of birds, animals and insects, and a variety of ethnographic and anthropological materials during her nine-year sojourn in Queensland, Australia. Dietrich won prestigious awards in the (then) male-dominated profession of science, many specimens being first records of Australian biological species or instrumental in populating current reference books. Presently, Dietrich's significant work remains obscure in nonscientific communities and is shadowed by rumour pertaining to her anthropological collecting. In consequence, this biography endeavours to empower Dietrich with humanity through methodologies encouraged within a fictocritical writing mode. In tandem with Dietrich's biography, the writing follows the progress of Deborah, a twenty-first century student, as she accomplishes the task of writing her Doctorate of Creative Arts (Creative Writing), that being the fictocritical biography of Amalie Dietrich. Parallel to tracing Dietrich's geographical trail, Deborah attempts to explore the phenomenological trail of Dietrich's life path in both Germany and Australia. The fictocritical form of the biography employs multiple genres and references from seminal texts, while poetry and images are interpolated throughout. Set in both the historical timeframe of the subject's lifespan (1821-1891) and the contemporary context of the narrator (2013-2015), the work utilises meta-fictional techniques to interweave not only past and present but also the lives of both Dietrich and Deborah as the subjects and narrators of the biography. To accomplish this, the writing is structured as an anachronistic dialogue between the voices of Dietrich as subject and that of Deborah as author. Dietrich voices her own narrative comments regarding the biographical writing of the 'author' Deborah, addressing both Deborah and reader. Deborah addresses her examiner and her reader, as well as Dietrich as biographical subject. This structure enlivens Dietrich within Deborah's world. In keeping with the self-reflexive and semi-autobiographical ethos of fictocriticism, aspects of Deborah's life are also interwoven with those of Dietrich in the writing. Preface and Afterword components of the biography encompass epistolary accounts directed toward the doctoral examiner. Letters are further interspersed between research findings, which both introduce Dietrich's life to the reader prior to exposure of the biographical section, and reveal Deborah's reflections on the writing process and doctoral submission challenges.