Parramatta girls (A Play)

Valentine, Alana

2007

Currency Press

Strawberry Hills

81

Upwards of, and possibly more than 500,000 Australians experienced care in an orphanage, Home or other form of out-of-home care during the last century. As many of these people have had a family it is highly likely that every Australian either was, is related to, works with or knows someone who experienced childhood in an institution or out-of-home care environment. The inmates of Girls Training School, Parramatta had about as hard an upbringing as one can get in Australia. Based on the testimony of dozens of GTS old-girls, this play is about making good in tough times, a joyous and harrowing dramatisation of the experiences of eight inmates and their reunion forty years later. Interspersed with song and storytelling, this is a tribute to mischief and humour in the face of hardship and inequality.