Julie Watson Nungarrayi’s ‘Sorry!’ and the Representation of the Plight of Native People

This article discusses Julie Watson Nungarrayi’s poem ‘Sorry!’ and its representation of the subjugation and marginalization faced by native people. It also explores the connection between the poem and the author's personal experience at the Uluru National Park.

Running head: IMAGINATIVE NARRATIVE WRITING
JULIE WATSON NUNGARRAYI’S ‘SORRY!’ AND THE REPRESENTATION OF
THE PLIGHT OF NATIVE PEOPLE
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author’s Note:

1IMAGINATIVE NARRATIVE WRITING
Julie Watson Nungarrayi’s poem “Sorry!” was published in her famous anthology of
poems, named, “Inside Black Australia: An Anthology of Aboriginal Poetry”. A common
feature between the peom “Sorry!” and the other poems of this famous anthology of poems is
the common theme of the majority of these poems, that is, the subjugation as well as
marginals that the aboriginals have to receive at the hand of the settlers not only in the nation
of Australia but also in the other parts of the world as well. This becomes apparent from the
lines of the poem ‘Sorry!’ wherein the poet mourns the loss of the different ethic groups or
the tribes of aboriginals in the words “Gone are those proud hunters, the women digging
mata…..Tiny painted animals”.
The poem is primarily concerned with the representation of the subjugation,
oppression and the ultimate extinction that the different ethnic groups like the Nylyapali men
and others have to face in the nations in which they had dwelled for more than 60,000 years.
As a matter of fact, it is seen that the message which Nungarrayi is driving to convey to the
readers is both literal as well as figurative in meaning. In this regard, it needs to be said that
the poet has adopted both an angry tone as well as a mournful one in the poem because of the
content that he is shedding light on and the general mood of the poem is that of mourning or
loss. More importantly, it is seen that the poet takes the help of a nightmarish or a grotesque
imagery so as to highlight the inhumane acts which had been committed against the
aboriginals and the effect that this is on the same.
I would like to say that the poem under discussion and the theme that it highlights
reminds me of a personal experience or more appropriately of an afternoon that I spent at the
Uluru National Park with my parents. Firstly, I would begin by saying that I was very hesitant
about going to the Uluru National Park since the concerned park highlights the culture and
the traditions of the aboriginal people of the Australia. However, my parents insisted that I
would enjoy visiting the park and at the same time would be able to learn new things about

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the nation of Australia itself. As a matter of fact, although I was not very interested about
leaning new things regarding the aboriginal people, the idea of learning thing new things
about Australia was the factor which propelled me to undertake the trip. However, my
conception regarding the park and the indigenous or the aboriginal people of Australia
completely changed after visiting the park.
I would like to say that just like the poem “Sorry!” shows the narrator seeing the art
works of the aboriginals inside a cave I was also able to experience the different art works
which are representatives of the culture, social traditions, history and other aspects of the
aboriginal people of Australia. As a matter of fact, I was really amazed to see that the
indigenous people who actually have been the victims of so much hatred pain, suffering,
discrimination and even marginalisation in their own nation could produce such works of art.
More importantly, looking at the different art works or the souvenirs of the ancestors of the
present day aboriginal people I felt not only guilty as a member of the society or the race that
had perpetrated such monstrous torture on a particular group of people that the majority of
them within a span of less than 100 years had become extinct from the same nation wherein
they had lived for more than 60,000 years. On the other hand, I also felt sorry for these
people since despite the once glorious life that they once led, their life was cut short by the
inhumane acts of the European settlers in Australia and all that is left of them in the nation of
Australia are the artworks at the Uluru National Park. This in turn made me feel how small
human life has become when compared to the greed or the selfishness of the individuals and
also the evil nature of the human beings who are willing to perform any heinous act in the
name of civilisation and development.
The things that I experienced at the Uluru National Park came back to me when I was
reading Julie Watson Nungarrayi’s poem “Sorry!”. This can be explained on the basis of the
fact that the mental condition which I was in at the Uluru National Park or for that matter the

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emotions that I felt when the realisation came to me that all that is left of the different
ancestors of the aboriginal people in Australia are those artefacts at the Uluru National Park
just like the poet in the poem “Sorry!” who feels sorry for the aboriginals because all that is
left of them are the cave paintings. In this regard, I would say that the language and the
imageries that the poet uses are highly evocative and helps the poet to elevate the sadness or
the guilt that she on the score of the fate received by the aboriginals in the nation of Australia
and worldwide. This becomes apparent from the phrases of the poem like “The rocks hung
down like teeth”, “Teeth that tried to bite”, “Snake slithered” and others. However, at the
same time it needs to be said that despite the fact that in the majority of the sections of the
narrator or the poet is angry at the fate received by the aboriginals yet I think that the poet is
more mournful or sorry for the aboriginals. Robert Frost once said “Poetry is when an
emotion has found its thought and the thought has found words”. In the light of this line of
Frost, I would say that during the visit to the Uluru National Park my emotions found a
thought however it was not until I read Julie Watson Nungarrayi’s poem “Sorry!” that my
thought found words.