Oscar and Lucinda
# Oscar and Lucinda

Oscar and Lucinda is a novel by Australian author Peter Carey which won the 1988 Booker Prize and the 1989 Miles Franklin Award. It was shortlisted for The Best of the Booker.

## Plot introduction

The book tells the story of Oscar Hopkins, the Devonian son of a Plymouth Brethren minister who becomes an Anglican priest, and Lucinda Leplastrier, a young Australian heiress who buys a glass factory. They meet on the ship over to Australia, and discover that they are both gamblers, one obsessive, the other compulsive. Lucinda bets Oscar that he cannot transport a glass church from Sydney to a remote settlement at Bellingen, some 400 km up the New South Wales coast. This bet changes both their lives forever.

## Inspiration

The novel partly takes its inspiration from Father and Son, the autobiography of the English poet Edmund Gosse, which describes his relationship with his father, Philip Henry Gosse.

## Film

A film version released in 1997 was directed by Gillian Armstrong and starred Ralph Fiennes, Cate Blanchett, and Tom Wilkinson.

