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<title> The Colorful Ellen McIvor </title>
As soon as the author of the book 'Remembering Babylon', David Malouf, started telling about Ellen McIvor I wanted to know more. Even though she was only in the background I have chosen to write about her. I will give you a presentation of her colorful character, as well as go in deeper in her life with examples from the book, to show how the writer convey the character to the reader. I will also write about her role in the book and about what importance she has to it, if any.
Ellen McIvor is the wife and mother in the house where the lead character Gemmy is taken in. Scotland is her home country where she was the eldest child of five in a low-class family where her father and brothers were all working in the coalmines. She longed for a life beyond her life there and swore never to marry a miner. When Jock McIvor is introduced to her Malouf tells us that she is already twenty-four years old and on the way to being an old maid. She is easily persuaded to be his wife. He is a gardener with hopes and dreams of moving to a new country to start a new life. Their first time as married they live in Brisbane, Australia. They soon realize that nothing will be gained without hard work, so they move out to the bush, after Ellen has given birth to a daughter, then a son who she lost and then another daughter. When her favorite brother is killed in an accident in Scotland, they decide to take his oldest son Lachlan in to provide for as if he were their own son. It is Lachlan and her two daughters who later on discover Gemmy and bring him home. 
The community and the people living in it are suspicious of Gemmy, but Ellen is a kind and warmhearted person who does not mind taking Gemmy in, but her husband Jock does not approve. "When he had agreed that first afternoon to take the fellow in...he had done it out of embarrassment; because he did not want exposed before others a difference between Ellen and himself that was private and which he felt she ought not to take advantage of." Ellen tries to live with her own fears and prejudices against Gemmy without showing them to her family or her friends. The women living in the area get together regularly to sow, and since the day Gemmy arrived he is always the topic of their conversations. "She (Ellen) despises these attempts to undermine her. What especially enraged her was the suggestion that she might not have her children's safety at heart." This is one of many indications that people in her life do not approve of the McIvor family's choice of taking a 'savage' into their community, and feelings cast on her and her husband drive them together even more, which makes sparks between appear again. "But the sense of being wronged drew them together. She could not be sorry for that." Life has been tougher than they expected and Jock is often homesick, but she is the one who insists that it is not that bad. The thought of her and Jock being the first ones in their family buried on this continent is one of her very few concerns about Australia.
The fact that Ellen is a caring and loving person is conveyed to the reader on several occasions. "She had made the shirt he was married in out of pure sea-island cotton that cost her two shillings a yard, she had saved a whole six months for it", referring to her favorite brother back in Scotland. But the author also lets you know that she does not always show her affection to the people she loves. In one scene she kisses her oldest daughter, and the author lets the reader know by the daughter's reaction that this is very unusual: "The place where her mother's dry lips touched her brow glowed, and for a long time afterwards she was aware of it". 
Ellen McIvor is only a figure in the background of the story. However, you get strong indications from the author that many people rely and lean on her and she is always the strong person who sets her own worries aside to convince others that the life they have in Australia is something beautiful - even though at times she does not agree herself. She does not bring much to the actual events taking place in the story though. The reader does not even get to follow much of her life. We know from the last chapter that she has passed away - which is only natural since more than fifty years have gone by.
The warm, kind woman Ellen McIvor from Scotland is a person everyone can lean on, especially her husband. The wellbeing of her two daughters and her nephew is her first priority. The reader does not get to follow her life much, she remains a character in the background. Even if Ellen does not add much to the progress in the book, she adds a lot of color.
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