They're a Weird Mob

They're a Weird Mob is a popular Australian comic novel written by John O'Grady under the pseudonym "Nino Culotta", the name of the main character of the book. The book was the first published novel by O'Grady, with an initial print run of 6,000 hardback copies. In less than six months, the book had been reprinted eight times and sold 74,000 copies. In the first year of publication, over 130,000 copies were sold. By the time of O'Grady's death in 1981, They're A Weird Mob was in its forty-seventh impression, with sales approaching the one million mark. Published by Ure Smith in 1957, the manuscript had been earlier rejected by publisher Angus & Robertson, and is reputedly the result of a ten pound bet between O'Grady and his brother, novelist Frank O'Grady.

Giovanni 'Nino' Culotta is an Italian immigrant, who comes to Australia as a journalist, employed by an Italian publishing house, to write articles about Australians and their way of life for those Italians who might want to emigrate to Australia.

In order to learn about real Australians, Nino takes a job as a brickie's labourer with a man named Joe Kennedy. The comedy of the novel revolves around his attempts to understand English as it was spoken in Australia by the working classes in the 1950s and 1960s. Nino had previously only learned 'good' English from a textbook.

The novel is a social commentary on Australian society of the period; specifically male, working class society. Women mostly feature as cameos in the story with the exception of Kay (whose surname is not revealed in the novel), who becomes Nino's wife. In the novel, Nino meets Kay in a cafe in Manly and their introduction is effected by Nino trying to teach Kay that she cannot eat spaghetti using a spoon.

The final message of the novel is that immigrants to Australia should count themselves fortunate and should make efforts to assimilate into Australian society, including learning to speak Australian English. However, there is also a satirical undercurrent aimed at Australian society as a country of migrants.

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