Perhaps Australia's most significant and most famous 19th-century colonial novel, For the Term of His Natural Life is a narrative of great suffering-of whips, chains, and man's inhumanity.

There is no attempt to soften the truth of the degradation and cruelty in convict Australia. Yet the novel is peopled with vivid characters—Rufus Dawes, condemned to transportation for a crime he did not commit, is one of the most unforgettable characters in Australian literature.