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In 2010, 24-year-old Sydneysider Adele Dumont volunteered to teach English to men in immigration detention on Christmas Island. She didn’t expect to find the work so rewarding or the people she met so interesting. So when she was offered a job working at Curtin detention centre near Derby in Western Australia, she took it.
Working at Curtin required a fly-in fly-out lifestyle. Adele lived in a donga in WA, her life full of bus trips to the detention centre; back home in Sydney, she was overwhelmed by the choices and privileges people had. What kept her returning to Curtin were her students: men from many lands who had sacrificed all they knew for a chance to live in Australia; men who were unfailingly polite to her in a situation that was barbarous. Men who were looking for an opportunity for a better life.
NO MAN IS AN ISLAND is a unique personal story that takes a humanitarian stance on immigration detention. It makes the issue of immigration detention accessible to far more interested Australians than newspaper articles. It is a vividly told story full of characters and humanity. It is the story about immigration detention all Australians need to read.
Working at Curtin required a fly-in fly-out lifestyle. Adele lived in a donga in WA, her life full of bus trips to the detention centre; back home in Sydney, she was overwhelmed by the choices and privileges people had. What kept her returning to Curtin were her students: men from many lands who had sacrificed all they knew for a chance to live in Australia; men who were unfailingly polite to her in a situation that was barbarous. Men who were looking for an opportunity for a better life.
NO MAN IS AN ISLAND is a unique personal story that takes a humanitarian stance on immigration detention. It makes the issue of immigration detention accessible to far more interested Australians than newspaper articles. It is a vividly told story full of characters and humanity. It is the story about immigration detention all Australians need to read.
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Reviews
It is a vividly told story full of characters and humanity. It is the story about immigration detention all Australians need to read.
...quietly draws the reader into that world hidden away from our eyes, so that we feel what Dumont felt, and gain some insight into the harm that is being done.
Dumont's writing is evocative but never obtrusive
[an] elegant and moving memoir
the book focuses on the honour she felt at being a part of the detainees' lives and the lasting friendships she made
Review
No Man Is an Island is essential reading for anyone who assumes they understand what the asylum seeker issue is all about, regardless of their opinion
NO MAN IS AN ISLAND should be compulsory reading for all our politicians - their eyes might well be opened by this insightful account of the results of Australia's immigration policy. It certainly opened mine.
Dumont has a way of demonstrating the humanity of the refugees, but also of the Australians who have them in their charge, in a way that could reach the naysayers in ways the stereotypes of political discourse cannot.
a rare insight into the realities of life in a detention centre