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y separately published work icon I Can Jump Puddles single work   autobiography  
Issue Details: First known date: 1955... 1955 I Can Jump Puddles
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

I Can Jump Puddles is Alan Marshall's story of his childhood, a happy world in which, despite his crippling poliomyelitis, he plays, climbs, fights, swims, rides and laughs. His world was the Australian countryside early last century: rough-riders, bushmen, farmers and tellers of tall stories, a world held precious by the young Alan Marshall. (Source: Trove)

Adaptations

form y separately published work icon Uz Zase Skacu Pres Kaluze Ota Hofman , Karel Kachyna , ( dir. Karel Kachyna ) 1970 Prague : Film Studio Barrandou , 1970 Z1046274 1970 single work film/TV

This cinematic adaptation of Alan Marshall's autobiography I Can Jump Puddles transfers the setting from the Australian outback to a stud farm in the picturesque countryside of Moravia at the turn of the century (when Moravia is still a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire). The narrative focuses on Adam, the energetic son of a horse trainer, who contracts polio and is hospitalised. His own courage and the love of his parents help him accept his inability to walk without crutches. But he is still determined to fulfil his dream of riding a horse, and he persuades his friends to help him in secret.

form y separately published work icon I Can Jump Puddles Cliff Green , Sonia Borg , Roger Simpson , ( dir. Kevin James Dobson et. al. )agent Sydney : ABC Television , 1981 Z1297737 1981 series - publisher film/TV

The inspirational boyhood story of Alan Marshall, born in rural Victoria in the early 1900s. As a young child, Marshall contracted poliomyelitis (polio), which left him crippled. He made it his goal to try to overcome his physical disability and live a normal life.

For a detailed, episode-by-episode synopsis, see Film Details.

Notes

  • Dedication: To my daughters, Hephzibah and Jennifer, who can jump puddles too
  • Also published in abridged form in a Reader's Digest Condensed Book (1972), and in a Spanish translation by Alberto Rumschisky in Selecciones del Reader's Digest (1975). Also abridged and simplified by Anne Kohler, in the series Longman Structural Readers (1980).

  • Adapted for a film in Czechoslovakia by director, Karel Kachyna, in 1970; and an ABC Television series in 1981.

Affiliation Notes

  • Writing Disability in Australia:

    Type of disability Poliomyelitis.
    Type of character Primary.
    Point of view First person.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Melbourne, Victoria,: Longman Cheshire , 1955 .
      image of person or book cover 2202568581665995539.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 225p.
      Description: illus.
      Reprinted: 1955 , 1956 twice , 1958 , 1961 , 1963 , 1964 , 1965 , 1967 , 1968 , 1970
    • Cleveland, Ohio,
      c
      United States of America (USA),
      c
      Americas,
      :
      World Publishing ,
      1957 .
      image of person or book cover 3695775267795392623.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 245p.
      Description: illus.
    • Berlin,
      c
      Germany,
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Seven Seas ,
      1966 .
      image of person or book cover 5538623236962507703.png
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 243p.
    • Melbourne, Victoria,: Longman Cheshire , 1971 .
      image of person or book cover 1289819161893715942.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 243p.
      Reprinted: 1972 twice , 1973 , 1974 , 1975 , 1977 , 1978 , 1979
      Note/s:
      • Redesigned and reset 1971.
      ISBN: 0701514027
    • Hawthorn, Camberwell - Kew area, Melbourne - Inner South, Melbourne, Victoria,: Lloyd O'Neil , 1972 .
      image of person or book cover 1101942918023595470.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 225p.
      Description: illus.
      ISBN: 0855503203
    • Harmondsworth, Middlesex,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Penguin Books ,
      1974 .
      image of person or book cover 1993953862075307068.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 243p.
      ISBN: 0140470794 (pbk.)
    • Melbourne, Victoria,: Longman Cheshire , 1979 .
      image of person or book cover 8477028091902955249.png
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 243p.
      ISBN: 0701514027
    • Ringwood, Ringwood - Croydon - Kilsyth area, Melbourne - East, Melbourne, Victoria,: Allen Lane , 1981 .
      image of person or book cover 5643161838204925114.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 225p.
      Description: illus.
      ISBN: 0713914270
    • Harmondsworth, Middlesex,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Puffin ,
      1983 .
      Extent: 243p.
      ISBN: 0140316515
    • London,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Penguin ,
      1983 .
      image of person or book cover 6953973269082175926.jpg
      This image has been sourced from online.
      Extent: 243p.
      Reprinted: 1989
      ISBN: 0140328629
  • Appears in:
    y separately published work icon Great Australian Writers [Vol. 1] London : Octopus Publishing Group , 1987 Z1291016 1987 anthology novel autobiography London : Octopus Publishing Group , 1987
    • Camberwell, Camberwell - Kew area, Melbourne - Inner South, Melbourne, Victoria,: Puffin , 2004 .
      image of person or book cover 602633126929184746.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 248p.
      ISBN: 0143003046
    • Melbourne, Victoria,: Penguin , 2013 .
      image of person or book cover 8655509287996247043.jpg
      Image courtesy of Penguin Books
      Extent: 314p.
      Note/s:
      • Published: 20/03/2013
      ISBN: 9780670076840
      Series: y separately published work icon Penguin Australian Children's Classics Melbourne : Penguin , 2012- 6153702 2012 series - publisher children's fiction
Alternative title: Ich bin dabei! : Aus dem Leben eines tapferen Australierbuben
Language: German
Notes:
This translation republished several times.

Other Formats

  • Sound recording.
  • Large print.
  • Braille.

Works about this Work

A History of Reading : Alan Marshall and Helen Keller Amanda Tink , 2019 single work essay
— Appears in: Sydney Review of Books , May 2019; Second City : Essays from Western Sydney 2021;

'On 9 May 1933, the day before the Nazis burned her book as part of their action against books of ‘un-German spirit’, Helen Keller wrote an open letter to them, which was published on the front page of the New York Times. ’You can burn my books and the books of the best minds in Europe,’ she said, ‘but the ideas in them have seeped through a million channels and will continue to quicken other minds.’ Today, if Helen Keller is thought of at all, it’s as the blind and deaf girl who, through the efforts of her teacher, learned to communicate. There’s scant acknowledgement that she was even capable of having ideas, and she’s often reduced to nothing more than testament to the ideas of others. However, Keller not only spoke, but read and wrote four languages, and was a prolific poet and essayist. The ideas that led to the Nazis burning her book Out of the Dark were contained in the essay ‘Why I Became a Socialist’.' (Introduction)

y separately published work icon Disability and Masculinities : Corporeality, Pedagogy and the Critique of Otherness Cassandra Loeser (editor), Vicki Crowley (editor), Barbara Pini (editor), London : Palgrave Macmillan , 2017 13810564 2017 collection

In recent years, attending to diversity in the cultivation of embodied identity has been given additional impetus as a result of intersectionality theory. Despite this, a key gap remains in terms of knowledge about masculinity and disability. This book addresses this lacuna through ten empirical chapters organised through the inter-related themes of corporeality, pedagogy and the critique of otherness. Each of the chapters positions the subject of masculinity and disability as a site of cultural pedagogy by affirming different ways of knowing of masculinity beyond dominant ideologies that normalise a particular masculine body and relegate disabled masculinities to the position of abnormal ‘Other’.

Part One focuses on pedagogy. Through the materialities of ‘medicalized colonialism’, imprimaturs of ‘relational genealogies’, ‘compounding differences’ and an analytical exposition of some of the neo-colonial conditions of the Global South within spatially-considered places of the Global North,  Chapter 1 examines the denial of human rights to the Indigenous Anishinaabe community of Shoal Lake 40 in Canada. Chapter 1 theorises masculine corporeality in terms that take seriously First Nations', national and transnational body politics seriously.  Chapter 2 examines the ways that movement and affect serve as a form of pedagogy for boys with autism spectrum in schools.

Part Two’s focus on corporeality includes an examination of the nexus of disability and diagnosis in the context of transgender men’s experiences of mental health, and a discussion of the ways that intersex individuals who identify as men and have experienced ‘genital normalising surgery’ actively negotiate pluralised masculinities. The focus on media in Part Three encompasses a study of the mis-interpellation of the disabled male subject in Australian male literature, research on the discursive strategies utilised in media representations of disabled veterans in Turkey, and an analysis of the political implications of depictions of masculinity, disability and sexualities in a variety television program. Part Four’s theme of self-stylisation takes up the questions of men’s reconstructions of masculinity in light of Lyme Disease, the potential pleasures of heterosexuality for young men with a hearing disability in the realm of Australian-Rules Football, and the diverse ways that disabled men negotiate patriarchal masculinity in intimate relationships.

More Than Puddles : Disability and Masculinity in Alan Marshall's I Can Jump Puddles Dylan Holdsworth , 2017 single work criticism
— Appears in: Disability and Masculinities : Corporeality, Pedagogy and the Critique of Otherness 2017; (p. 105-123)

Despite substantial literary and onscreen depictions of disabled men, there remains a dearth of scholarly critique regarding these representations. In this chapter, I analyse the negotiation of disability and masculinity in Alan Marshall’s first autobiographical novel I Can Jump Puddles (1955). Through adapting the work of Ghassan Hage (2010) on modes of interpellation of the racialised subject, this chapter examines how the disabled male subject is mis-interpellated, and how these interpellations are resisted. I contend that it is through mis-interpellation by hegemonic masculinity, and resulting negative interpellations, that Alan, the disabled male subject in Marshall’s novel, finds himself on the outskirts of masculine subjectivities. This chapter demonstrates Marshall’s complex representation of the relationship between disability and masculinity within an Australian context.

(Source: Springer)

26 Aussie Books You Must Read Blanche Clark , 2015 single work column
— Appears in: The Courier-Mail , 24 January 2015; (p. 18-19)
'With Australia Day upons us...26 great Australian Books that have helped shape and define our nation...'
Radical Nationalism and Socialist Realism in Alan Marshall's Autobiographical Writing John McLaren , 2012 single work criticism
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Studies , June vol. 36 no. 2 2012; (p. 229-244)
'Alan Marshall's work has either been neglected or has been discussed in the context of its contribution to the Australian identity or as an example of Australian autobiography. This essay examines his early novel and his three directly autobiographical works to argue that he uses his studies of popular Australian values to develop a basis for an inclusive Australian democracy. The argument of the essay is that the socialist realist doctrines of the Realist Writers Group and his bush background influence his choice of voice and form, but that the politics of his work has been overlooked. This, as well as his reputation as a popular author, accounts for the unjust critical neglect of his work.' (Publisher's abstract)
[Review] I Can Jump Puddles Alan Marshall Claire Bentley , 2004 single work review
— Appears in: Fiction Focus : New Titles for Teenagers , vol. 18 no. 3 2004; (p. 65)

— Review of I Can Jump Puddles Alan Marshall , 1955 single work autobiography
[Review] I Can Jump Puddles Alan Marshall Vance Palmer , 1955 single work review
— Appears in: Meanjin , Summer vol. 14 no. 4 1955; (p. 584-585)

— Review of No Roads Go By Myrtle Rose White , 1932 single work autobiography ; I Can Jump Puddles Alan Marshall , 1955 single work autobiography ; Beyond the Western Rivers Myrtle Rose White , 1955 single work autobiography
Alan Marshall's Story Judah Waten , 1955 single work review
— Appears in: Overland , Spring no. 5 1955; (p. 33)

— Review of I Can Jump Puddles Alan Marshall , 1955 single work autobiography
Portrait of Self-Reliance in the Bush A. A. Phillips , 1955 single work review
— Appears in: Voice , November vol. 4 no. 1955; (p. 28)

— Review of I Can Jump Puddles Alan Marshall , 1955 single work autobiography
Home-Made Miracles M. G. S. , 1955 single work review
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 21 December vol. 76 no. 3958 1955; (p. 2)

— Review of I Can Jump Puddles Alan Marshall , 1955 single work autobiography
Alan Marshall : Trapped in His Own Image John McLaren , 2004 single work criticism
— Appears in: Life Writing , vol. 1 no. 2 2004; (p. 85-99)
Alan Marshall ... wrote for a popular audience, to which he conveyed an image of the ordinary Australian as a decent, egalitarian battler, suspicious of authority but always ready to help his mates ... he also created an image of himself as one of them who had, helped by his rural community, overcome the particular disadvantage of infantile paralysis with courage and good humour ... Toward the end of his life, however, he published a collection of stories that show a dark underside of violence and brutality beneath the surface geniality. Far from destroying the earlier image of the Australian, however, these stories discover a strength by which his people endured their darkness.' (p.85)
Communicative Clashes in Australian Culture and Autobiography Susan Tridgell , 2006 single work criticism
— Appears in: Auto/Biography , December vol. 14 no. 4 2006; (p. 285-301)
'Some life-writing critics have pointed to a paradox in Australian autobiography: that of memoir writers paying tribute to their subjects in ways which those subjects would not understand or agree with. In this article, I focus on one facet of this paradox, looking at how various styles of communication are represented in autobiographies. What happens when a highly articulate autobiographer attempts to represent the communicative style of a subject who does not share or value the autobiographer's discursive style? This article surveys a variety of strategies which autobiographers have used, some of which are open to the possibility of valuing a minimalist style of communication, while others condemn it as inarticulate and inexpressive. These varying attitudes connect to a broader cultural debate in Australia. In this debate, an older rural style of communication, which values minimal verbal communication and emotional inexpressivity, is pitted against a more recent urban-based style of communication, which values emotional expressivity and expansive commentary. Intriguingly, this rural speech style (seemingly the antithesis of the autobiographer's art) is represented and valued as an art form by some Australian autobiographers.' -- Publication abstract.
Introduction - What's Your Disability? Glen Tomasetti , 2000 single work criticism
— Appears in: Oyster Grit : Experiences of Women with Disabilities 2000; (p. 7-9)
Surveillance : Manufactured Paranoia Antonia Hildebrand , 2005 single work essay
— Appears in: Polestar , December no. 11 2005; (p. 63-65)
Where Certainty Lies : His Father's World Chester Eagle , 2010 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Well in the Shadow : A Writer's Journey through Australian Literature 2010; (p. 177-197)
'Some thoughts about the values inherent in Alan Marshall's writing.' (Author's note.)
Last amended 1 May 2020 11:57:28
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