MASARYK UNIVERSITY IN BRNO

FACULTY OF ARTS

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN STUDIES

Jana Laszáková

The Position of Women in : the Analysis of the Drover’s Wife Stories

Bachelor‟s Diploma Thesis

Supervisor: Mgr. Martina Horáková, Ph. D. Brno 2012

I declare that I have worked on this bachelor thesis independently using only

primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography.

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Acknowledgement

I would like to thank to Mgr. Martina Horáková, Ph. D. for her helpful insights and her inexhaustible

patience.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION ...... 5

1.1. FORMING AND AUSTRALIAN IDENTITY ...... 7

1.2. BUSH AND THE BUSHMAN VS. WOMEN ...... 11

1.3. GENDER BIAS ...... 13

1.4. THE ROLE OF LANGUAGE ...... 14

2. THE ANALYSIS OF THE DROVER’S WIFE STORIES ...... 16

2.1. : “THE DROVER‟S WIFE” ...... 16

2.2. MURRAY BAIL: “THE DROVER‟S WIFE” ...... 19

2.3. BARBARA JEFFERIS: “THE DROVER‟S WIFE” ...... 22

2.4. MANDY SAYER: “THE DROVER‟S WIFE” ...... 26

3. VARIATIONS ON THE DROVER’S WIFE STORY ...... 30

3.1. BARBARA BAYNTON: “THE CHOSEN VESSEL” ...... 30

3.2. ANNE GAMBLING: “THE DROVER‟S DE FACTO” ...... 32

CONCLUSION ...... 36

WORKS CITED ...... 39

CZECH RESUME ...... 42

ENGLISH RESUME ...... 43

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1. INTRODUCTION

This thesis analyzes the position of women in six different versions of the same story about the drover‟s wife coming from Australian literature. Australia has often been perceived as a land for men, since from the very beginning of its existence, it is connected with adventure and danger, which are usually attributes ascribed to men. As a place with such attributes, it is supposed that Australia is not appropriate place for women. The aim of this thesis is to show how different authors deals with the same motive of an alone woman abandoned in the bush along with her children, whose only, but difficult task is to survive. I would like to make a close analysis of these six stories and show how women have been seen and perceived since the remote past.

The bush is a very significant symbol of Australian land and so are the bush stories. But as long as the bush story is mentioned, the man is connected. The drover‟s wife stories are exceptional. In these stories the main character is a woman. The original one, “The Drover‟s Wife” was written by Henry Lawson in 1892. It is a story of a bushwoman who is left alone in the bush with her children and she has to deal with a dangerous situation when a snake crawls into the house. While there is a description of her fight with the snake, other fights of her life are being mentioned. In other versions the theme is very similar, but the stories are told from different points of views and from different perspectives.

First work of my analysis is “The Drover‟s Wife”, a short story written by

Henry Lawson in 1892 published in The Bulletin. Then the story by Murray Bail follows. His “The Drover‟s Wife” was published in 1986. Third story with the very same name was written by Barbara Jefferis in 1980. The last traditional “The Drover‟s

Wife” was written by Mandy Sayer in 1996. Next story was written by Barbara Baynton

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It is called “The Chosen Vessel” and was published in 1902. The very last story is “The

Drover‟s De Facto” by Anne Gambling published in 1986.

The thesis itself is divided into three chapters. Since as a part of my argument there is a claim that Australia is more connected with men than with women, there is a short background of Australian history provided in the introductory part of my thesis that is supposed to support that claim. It outlines why men are important for Australian culture, what independent identity means for Australians and why women did not have such a position as men in Australian history. There is also a short mention about gender difference, since the analytical part of this thesis is based on gender issues.

In the following chapter, four stories about the drover‟s wife are analyzed; each analysis aimed at the gender issues. The order of these stories has already been mentioned above. The analysis starts with Henry Lawson‟s “The Drover‟s Wife, which is in this thesis perceived as an original story of this kind. The following stories are ordered chronologically according to the date they were published after the first one had come out, so there are stories by Murray Bail, Barbara Jefferis and Mandy Sayers. Each of these stories copies Lawson‟s model of the story with slightly different changes and their analysis is aimed at the similar issues from different points of view by different authors. Single analysis shows the position of women in Australian society, the attitude of men towards women and feelings of women caused by the given position and the unanimous attitude.

In the next chapter two more stories are analyzed. These are variations on the primary story about the drover‟s wife. Though the theme and sense is very similar, the presentment is different in the settings, time or situation. The first one was written by

Barbara Baynton who was contemporary of Henry Lawson and the second one was written by Anne Gambling giving modern point of view on the drover‟s wife story.

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1.1. Forming Australia and Australian Identity

After first observations of unknown land in the Pacific Ocean southwards Asia in the 17th century, the „official‟ discovery of Australia, known as Terra Australis

Incognita (unknown southern land), is credited to the ship Endavour led by Captain

James Cook in 1770. The new British colony was about to be established, when “Cook claimed the east coast under instruction from King George III of England on 22 August

1770 at Possession Island, naming eastern Australia ''” (Australian

Government).

Every untutored corner of this land was full of danger and adventure, so “[...] the idea of Australia had a long history as a land of desire, traversed in the imaginations of explorers, settlers and visitors alike” (Schaffer 1). It was not only the fauna and flora which attracted, but mainly the genius of this unknown place. The native people, the

Aborigines, were considered to be the part of adventure, too. Though the relationship between newcomers and the Aborigines started well and for some time kept on good terms, based on mutual agreement of exchange various kinds of goods, “these relations became hostile as Aborigines realized that the land and resources upon which they depended and the order of their life were seriously disrupted by the on-going presence of the colonizers” (Australian Government). Thus the struggle for the land began.

When the British arrived at the coasts of Australia and claimed it to be their land, only one question remained – how the British would use the new land in the best way. Since British prisons were overcrowded, the British government decided that New

South Wales would be “settled as a penal colony – a place where Britain could send convicted criminals” (Australian Government). Many convicts were arrested only for minor offences and in fact, their life got better when sent to Australia. Instead of being

7 imprisoned in the small cell with other convicts, in the penal colony they were „given‟ a piece of land where they could work for the British Empire and also bring their families.

After some years of service there was a possibility to apply for the „freedom‟ and so to be able to work on own piece of land with minor or no duties toward the Empire.

“Convicts continued being sent to New South Wales until 1823, although as time went by, convicts were increasingly seen as a source of labor to build the colony, [...]”

(Australian Government). The foundations for the new colony were laid.

Another inflow of immigrants started during the era in Australia known as a

Gold Rush. “In 1851, Edward Hargraves discovered a 'grain of gold' in a waterhole near

Bathurst. The discovery marked the beginning of the Australian gold rushes and a radical change in the economic and social fabric of the nation” (Australian

Government). Analogous to the Gold Rush in America, this discovery started a wave of immigration. There was a daydream of finding gold and of the successive enrichment.

Australia started to be filled by the immigrants from the whole Europe, and also from

America. “The majority of these new arrivals were British but also included Americans,

French, Italian, German, Polish and Hungarian exiles. The largest foreign contingent on the goldfields was the 40,000 Chinese who made their way to Australia” (Australian

Government). The population of the land started to increase quickly, since “the number of new arrivals to Australia was greater than the number of convicts who had landed here in the previous seventy years” (Australian Government).

Later people in Australia started to dislike the dependency on the United

Kingdom and so started to realize that it is the high time to think about their own freedom. After centuries of being just a subject, there was ambition, or rather need, for independence. “A scattered people, with origins in all corners of the British Islands and in Europe, had sudden vision of themselves as a nation, with a character of their own

8 and a historic role to play, and this vision set fruitful creative forces to motion” (Palmer

9). Australians wanted to be an independent nation with its own power and own history.

There was a feeling that it is important to “think of Australia as a new world, having as few links as possible with the Europe [...] left behind” (Palmer 15). And for such disconnection, the location of the continent was a great advantage. “Isolated by geography and their own will, Australians were to construct a society that would be a pattern for free men everywhere” (Palmer 10). But to establish the country and create the nation meant to establish the identity. That meant to specify who the people of

Australia were, or rather who deserved to be considered „the true Australian‟. With the need for independence the need to define the Australian identity appeared. But it was not easy to determine who was Australian and who was not.

Firstly there was the nation of Aborigines. Though the oldest nation in the continent and in fact, one of the oldest nations in the world, the native people were not considered to be the part of Australian life. “[Their] culture, [their] imaginative life, had so little concrete form, it was so much a matter of primitive habits and observances, that it had small chance of being taken seriously by people whose minds were preoccupied with a particular kind of progress” (Palmer 17).

Secondly there was a settlement of the convicts. “It was not forgotten that the settlement had first been planted for the sole purpose of providing an asylum for British criminals [...]” (Palmer 15). Despite the fact that the British convicts were the most numerous group of white settlers on the continent along with their families and that they gave the base for forthcoming nation, they were not considered to be Australian people either, because “England was where all the thieves and rogues came from, thus early was there being formed a conception of the old world as the principal source of evil”

(Palmer 33)!

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Even the wave of immigrants that came during and after the Gold Rush did not consist of people sufficient enough to become an Australian prototype. Especially

Chinese immigrants were seen as the most problematic. Chinese were coming into

Australia on ships in hundreds and they tried to stay together as much as possible.

“They moved about in groups, [...], working abandoned claims on the goldfields, dollying the old mullock-heaps, clustering in tin or hessian shelters on the edge of settlements” (Palmer 16). Their love to opium-smoking was also not very popular and generally their way of live was seen very vicious. “All through the period between the gold rushes and the end of the century it was the Chinese migrant who symbolized the evil bird of the old world seeking lodgment to rebuild its fatal nest” (Palmer 16).

After sorting out all inhabitants that did not fit the Australian assumptions there remained a few groups of people who started to form Australian type. There was a theory of rebirth concerning the convict settlers. According to this theory “from influences of climate, new ways of living, racial admixture of Saxon and Celt, it is plain that the children of these convicts, together with those of the free emigrants, soon began to form a type” (Palmer 32). The theory suggested that there would be a great change in the behavior and features of the convicts‟ children:

The class of inhabitants that have been born in the colony affords a remarkable exception to the moral and physical character of their parents: they are generally tall in person and slender in their limbs, of fair complexion and small features. They are capable of undergoing more fatigue, and are less exhausted by labour than native Europeans; they are active in their habits but remarkably awkward in their movements. In their tempers they are quick and irascible but not vindictive; [...], they neither inherit the vices nor the feelings of their parents. (Palmer 32) Secondly there was a group of diggers of non-Chinese origin that actually gave an opportunity to Australian identity to coming to existence. An image of a “typical

10 digger” (Palmer 37) appeared and that was another push towards Australian identity.

“The camaraderie and 'mateship' that developed between diggers on the goldfields is still integral to how people in Australia [...] perceive themselves as Australians”

(Australian Government).

Finally there were two very similar types, which helped create the Australian type as it is known today. On the one hand there was a bushranger, “often spirited men of robust physique and dare-devil gaiety – men who took risks [...] and were on good terms with the smaller settlers around them” (Palmer 47). On the other hand, there was the bushman, “the only powerful and unique type yet produced in Australia” (Palmer

47). Thus a mythical prototype of Australia was created – “true Bushman, the Bushman pure and simple, the man of the nation” (Palmer 47).

1.2. Bush and the Bushman vs. Women

The important observance has to be pointed out. That in all the groups mentioned in the previous subchapter the main role was played by man. There was no reference about women explorers, the vast majority of convicts were men and digging was also not suitable work for women, thus diggers were also a male community. But it was absolutely unimaginable that the role of the bushman, the most important character in Australian history, would be represented by a woman. For in those times, it was considered that the bush “is no place for a woman” (Schaffer 62).

The presence of the bush in Australia represents one of the important aspects of masculine Australia. That is why “the central image against which the Australian character measures himself is the bush” (Schaffer 52). The bush is considered to be a symbol of Australia, which represents Australia around the world. The bush is an endless space, where danger is hidden and only the man is able to survive in such a

11 place. So it is the bush which represents the Australian masculinity. On the other hand,

“the bush is typically imagined as a feminine landscape – one that is imagined as particularly harsh and unforgiving” (Schaffer 4). So when it comes to positive view of the bush, the man is mentioned, since in the bush the true man is born and only he is suitable for pitfalls of this inhospitable place. But when the pitfalls themselves are mentioned, the feminine side of the bush is preferred.

And this negative feminine side also supports the stereotypes of the past concerning women. “Women, according to Anne Summers‟ analysis, have been stereotyped into the frustrating roles of „damned whores‟ or „God‟s police‟” (Schaffer

31). This usage of stereotyping is very common in Western societies and once there is a label given, the stereotypical attitude starts to spread around the country and later around the world. These stereotypes then influence the view as such and it is very difficult to fight and disclaim it. “As God‟s police, the women, [...], are identified with

England, the law, Christianity and ruling-class respectability [...]” (Schaffer 31). This stereotype originates in colonial time when certain women were appointed to spread

Christianity and to take care of keeping order among convict men and women. These women were seen as an evil in the sense of the Orwell‟s Big Brother, since their task was to watch people in everyday situations and to refer to any inappropriate behavior.

On the other hand, there was the group of damned whores, who were “identified with the Irish, the ex-convicts, the uncivilized, the feared despised others – that is, the unregenerate feminine” (Schaffer 31). Again, these women were in the position of evil, in this time in the sense of spoiled tempter. But in fact, there were at least three important groups of women in Australian history.

The first and by far the largest group were convicts. The new colony gave some convict women the chance to develop their skills and improve their situation. The next group were the wives of military responsible for

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policing the convicts. The third group, the free settlers, were enticed by the opportunity and freedom a 'new' country like Australia could offer. Women became an influential and hardworking part of colonial Australia. (Australian Government) But despite this fact, “for many years the bush was seen as the archetypal

Australian place and the bushman as the archetypal Australian” (Elder 73 – 74). And not only Australians themselves consider a man as one of their main symbol. The typical image of Australia rooted in the minds of many people around the world and promoted by tourism industry involves the picture of bush, kangaroos and a man who is hunting crocodiles or any other animals. “The Australian character is a construction which has taken a variety of forms through the national history. One of his latest manifestations is in the character of Paul Hogan, hero of the film Crocodile Dundee [...]” (Shaffer 11).

Not only the roughness and manliness hidden in the bushman, but also the romance and danger of such a place as the bush surely is attracts the heroin of that movie as well as the heroines of the drover‟s wife stories. Thus “though Australian live in a nation that has over ten million women, when they are asked about typical Australian, many people still imagine a man” (Elder 65). It is not about the meaning of the particular person of the bushman, but more likely about the dream that the bushman represents.

1.3. Gender Bias

To better understand the relationship between genders and thus the attitude to the women, it is important to stress the basic difference between the two terms – masculinity and femininity and to mention the term gender bias. “When we use the term gender, we mean constructed expectations and roles for women and men [...].

Specifically, [...] women are socially expected to demonstrate feminine behaviour, [...] men are expected to act masculine (Blackwell Encyclopedia 1843). These are the basis

13 for the gender inequality which appears in most of the societies. “Each society, at any time, develops a contract between the genders, which sets up any particular gender coding – what people of different genders should do, think and be” (Duncan and Pfau-

Effinger 12). Thus the first step for emergence of inequality is starting to make differences. So “while masculinity was to consist of rationality, autonomy, activity, aggression and competitiveness [...], femininity was defined in contrast as emotionality, dependency, passivity and nurturance – all qualities that deemed women‟s place in the private sphere” (Blackwell Encyclopedia 1871). This role division considers women to be inferior to men, since women‟s attributes such as passivity or dependency in contrast to men‟s autonomy and activity do not fit the theory of the fittest. “Note that the notion of a contract does not imply equality; men and women are not equals and so the contract is an unequal one” (Duncan and Pfau-Effinger 12). That is why women are automatically ranked as the weaker gender.

In modern sociology the term gender bias exists to describe the inequality between genders. According to Blackwell Encyclopedia, “gender bias is a behaviour that shows favouritism toward one gender over another. Most often, gender bias is the art of favouring men and/or boys over women and/or girls” (1843). This says that men have better position than women, since in the society they are generally perceived as a preferred gender. “Man is not only not-woman, the term „man‟ is privileged over the term „woman‟” (Elder 66). Thus not only are women not allowed to equate men, but also they are not allowed to compare with men.

1.4. The Role of Language

As Schaffer suggests, this gender difference and consecutive inequality is

14 deeply anchored in people‟s mind and so in societies. It goes deep down to the very childhood and it is connected with the importance of language and its meaning, since

“what we think we know about men and women, [...], comes to us through codes of meaning embedded in language and other forms of representation” (Schaffer 8).

Without language there would be no distinction between men and women and no higher or lower qualities would be ascribed. It is language which in fact creates the world as we know it. Schaffer also talks about the refusing of women in childhood, when “the pre-linguistic imaginary unity with the mother must be repressed. It is replaced by an identity formed through language which takes the masculine as the norm for the self. In a phallocentric culture the masculine is valued, the feminine exists in an inferior relation to the masculine” (Schaffer 10). This view forms the child‟s mind from the very beginning of its capability of understanding and so “as the child speaks it assumes a subjective place in language as either male or not-male” (Schaffer 10). So before a child even knows about such a thing as a gender bias, the predominance of the male is inscribed in its mind.

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2. THE ANALYSIS OF THE DROVER’S WIFE STORIES

2.1. Henry Lawson: “The Drover’s Wife”

The story begins with a close description of the living conditions of the drover‟s wife and her family. They are living in a shanty consisting of two rooms and a kitchen greater than the rooms themselves. She has four babies so the living space for such a family is not convenient at all. Since it is mainly the bush story, the bush itself is described at the very beginning. “Bush all around – bush with no horizon, for the country is flat” (H. Lawson 1). It is this view of vast distance along with the emptiness that can seem frustrating for a woman and can make her mad. “[...] it was sometimes so powerful that it induces strains of madness” (Moore 152). This is obvious when the drover‟s wife “takes as much care to make herself and the children look smart as she would if she were going to do the block in the city” (H. Lawson 6), since there is nobody in the bush who would appreciate this effort. But she still wants to look good and she dresses herself and her children nicely every Sunday just for her good feeling, no matter there is nobody who can ever see them in the bush. “In Lawson‟s fiction generally female rather that male characters go mad in the bush” (Schaffer 121) and this story is a good example. It is also this dressing that expresses her desire to live an ordinary life in an ordinary place. Nevertheless it is a desire deeply embedded in her mind, since “all her girlish hopes and aspirations have long been dead” (H. Lawson 4).

On the other hand, this madness and secret desire concerning Sundays shows her inventiveness how to make their life unusual from the routine, because in the bush “all days are much the same to her” (H. Lawson 6). She, in fact, creates her own world, because, as it is pointed out, “there is nothing to see, [...], and not a soul to meet” (H.

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Lawson 6). But in her mind, by dressing up herself and all the children, she feels again like that girl with that “usual castles in the air” (H. Lawson 4) which she used to have as a young woman. Her youth and her womanhood are reminded in one more way, by mentioning the Young Ladies’ Journal. “She finds all the excitement and recreation she needs” in this journal (H. Lawson 4). It also reminds her that there is still a world outside this vast emptiness, which is more shiny and colorful than the gloomy bush.

There are two main life situations mentioned in the story, the first one being the absence of her husband and the second one being the presence of the snake, both of them showing the difficult position of the drover‟s wife through symbolism. As the title implies and the story reveals, the husband is a drover. He is away because he lost all his property. “He is an ex-squatter who has lost his land, either to the banks or through alcohol or both” (Wilding 50). This aspect of separation is the important part of the story, since it is connected with the position of the drover‟s wife in the bush. There is another part of this separation, which is the breakup of the family, which also shows the difficult situation the woman is experiencing. She is alone. But in fact, “she is used to being left alone” (H. Lawson 4). Apparently this is not the first time it has happened

(it will be discussed later in this subchapter), so she is able to put up with such a situation. Years in the bush and months of being lonesome make her used to her contemporary situation. The time spent in such conditions strengthens her in the sense of being a woman with masculine attributes. “Here Lawson suggests that „the bush woman can stand in place of her husband, lover or brother and take on masculine attributes of strength, fortitude, courage and the like in her battle with the environment‟”

(Schaffer 14). He states that women in odd circumstances can equate men. That is the reason why the drover‟s wife is capable of taking care of her children and herself without any help of men. She does not consider the absence of a male element any

17 longer to be a problem. The bush and its emptiness become a part of her life. “This bushwoman is used to the loneliness of it. As a girl-wife she hated it, and now she would feel strange away from it” (H. Lawson 6). On the other hand, Lawson criticizes this attitude, since “her surroundings are not favorable to the development of the

“womanly” or sentimental side of nature” (H. Lawson 6) and the woman partly stops being a woman, since the task she has to do, such as taking care of the cattle or fighting floods and fire, need a man‟s hand. Here again the important role is played by the already mentioned Young Ladies’ Journal, which refreshes the female side of her personality.

As she manages to handle the life without a husband in such an inhospitable place, there are other dangers hidden in the bush. In the current story of her life the biggest one is the threat of the snake. Depicted as a “black brute” (H. Lawson 8), it is obvious that in this symbol of the snake harm is hidden. Black is supposed to be a color of evil. “It is a mysterious color associated with fear and the unknown (black holes). It usually has a negative connotation” (Color Wheel Pro). It is the color of darkness. Also the brute is very uncomplimentary word used for description of an evil animal which is likely to cause suffering. But the same way she manages to deal with the absence of male character, the presence of threat in the embodiment of snake does not represent such a big problem. She takes care of her children, prepares the kitchen for spending a night and is awake all night on duty to guard her family in case the snake appears. Here

“Lawson allows her to assume a masculine role in order to survive and by the time she kills the snake, with the help of her son and dog, she has overcome danger and has become heroic” (Sayer, “The Drovers‟ Wives”). The story reveals that there were other difficult situations that she had to cope with – the great fire, the flood and breaking of the dam or the death of her child. In the whole story “the woman‟s heroism is

18 established textually through a flashback reminiscence structured to build suspense as she maintains her all-night vigil awaiting the confrontation with the snake” (Schaffer

134). Her ability to survive in the bush is expressed by another symbol. The presence of the she-oaks in the story stresses the woman‟s capability of survival (H. Lawson 1). She, as well as the tree, stands in the middle of the bush. And she, as well as the tree, fits into these conditions, though the common view may be different. The strength hidden inside is much bigger than it may seem. “She has vitality, pluck and endurance. It is in these human qualities, too, that she trusts in her struggles with death and disasters” (Moore

26). Thus Lawson, despite the fact that he is a man, supports the idea of the self- confident and self-contained woman. He shows in such a masculine country as Australia with no doubt is that a woman can equate a man and at the same time she tries to preserve her womanlike behavior.

2.2. Murray Bail: “The Drover’s Wife”

Another story about the drover‟s wife told from a different perspective is written by Murray Bail. As the only one from analyzed stories this one is told from the man‟s viewpoint, in this case it is the viewpoint of the so-called drover‟s wife husband

(the dentist). So not only the author of the short story is a man, but also the narrator in the story is being of a male gender. And in fact this seems to be crucial concerning the interpretation of the story. For better understanding of the story it is essential to mention that this story is based on the famous painting by Russell Drysdale from 1945. In

Drysdale‟s picture you can see a woman standing in the foreground who is supposed to be the drover‟s wife. In the background the vast space of the bush with the small dark figure and the carriage is depicted, which makes the woman in the foreground much bigger. By this size contrast Drysdale “presents [...] an iconic image of female stoicism 19 within a desolate Australian landscape” (National Gallery of Australia).The story is told by a dentist who claims that a woman on the picture happened to be his wife Hazel. So for the first time, the mysterious drover‟s wife has a name. The reason is that in contrast to Lawson‟s story, Hazel is not a drover‟s wife in the first place, but rather she is a dentist‟s wife. The drover‟s persona remains in Bail‟s story mysterious. While Lawson shows in his story life of the drover‟s wife in the bush, Murray Bail deals with her life before. He describes her transition from the dentist‟s wife to the drover‟s wife and what is more, it shows her husband‟s attitude towards her as well as towards her decision to leave the family.

As already mentioned, this story is told by a man who was left by his wife. He, as a dentist, which is considered to be an upper-class profession, cannot understand why she left him for such a low-class person as a drover, which cannot almost be called a profession in his eyes. Though this is not a typical drover‟s wife story, since the bush and the life in such surroundings is not involved, it well-done describes the situation of women in Australian literature.

Since it is more or less a confession of the dentist, it acts as very subjective man‟s point of view without any positive notion for the woman. From the very beginning of the story, he is very critical towards his wife. He adverts to hiding her wedding ring, he criticizes her face expression and even her weight; he cannot understand the choice of the drover over him (Bail). And not surprisingly, when he looks at the painting, where his wife is supposed to be, he tries to persuade himself that she is not happy. He claims that he can “see she is having second thoughts. Distance = doubts. They‟ve had an argument” (Bail). It is typical man behavior – if I am not happy, you are not happy either. To feel even more consoled he makes fun of the drover she fell in love with and tries to take him down in the reader‟s eyes: “It is my opinion, however,

20 that he is a small character” (Bail). This has a very simple reason, since “in the Bail story, the husband views the drover as a threat to domestic equilibrium and existing gender roles. He fears that she will leave him for a 'real' man” (Sayer, “The Drovers‟

Wives”). The masculinity hidden in the character of the drover is closely connected with the bush and so the bush is not spared from the critique either. For the dentist the sameness of the bush is the symbol for such a place: “The picture gives little away though. It is the – but where exactly? South Australia? It could easily be

Queensland, West Australia, the . We don‟t know. You could never find that spot” (Bail). He cannot follow why his wife chose the bush instead of the city.

But it is only because he is a man with very conservative opinions concerning the women.

The dentist‟s image of his wife is very simple – a woman being at home, waiting for her husband, making dinner for him, and taking care of their children. It is this very opinion which makes him say that Hazel “had a silly streak” (Bail), which

“means she is not a „real woman‟ and it was this very quality that motivated her to do unfeminine things” (Sayer, “The Drovers‟ Wives”). In his eyes, she was “shy, even with

[him]: quiet, generally non-committal” (Bail). But it does not mean that she did not have another side, a side which she was forced to suppress because of her husband.

Such suppression cannot be held forever, so eventually when she reveals her true self, her husband does not like it. It starts on the trip to Mount Barker, where according to him she was acting “like a schoolgirl” (Bail), throwing snowballs on him, kneeling in the snow. After that he notices changes in her behaviour, especially these involving notions of male attributes – sweating, chopping the wood, lugging the ice to their fridge

(Bail). But the most shocking event for him is the killing of the snake during their

Christmas at the beach, which “somehow made her less attractive in my eyes. I don‟t

21 know why” (Bail). Even though he is saying he does not know why, the reason is altogether obvious. He cannot cope with the idea that a woman can enjoy the man‟s way of living. That is all because of the typical view of Australia that all these activities connected with the man‟s way of living should be done only by men, not women.

2.3. Barbara Jefferis: “The Drover’s Wife”

Barbara Jefferis‟ story is told from the very feminist point of view. Her story is in fact a reaction on the previous stories, since “here is no yarn spinner or tall-tale teller: the tone is serious and didactic. Apart from the fact that the narrator is a combination of all three drovers' 'wives', the style is realistic and, with little trace of irony, the story attempts to tell 'the truth'” (Sayer, “The Drovers‟ Wives”). Jefferis‟ drover‟s wife mentions Lawson‟s and Bail‟s attitudes, and she also reacts on the painting by Drysdale.

This story can be perceived as a woman manifest against the prejudiced male society.

The very first sentence of the story is that “it ought to be set straight” (Jefferis 265).

Jefferis implies that all that has been written so far about the drover‟s wife is not true and that all existing stories are based on men-made lies and their depraved point of view of the female gender. She continues in her critique towards men: “You wouldn‟t think of all the countries the one where women are the fewest would be the one where they don‟t exist, [...]. Small wonder the Eyetalian got his facts wrong and said there weren‟t any women in the country for the first 100 years” (Jefferis 265). To stress the difficult life situation of women in Australia the so-called drover‟s wife tells her life story from her childhood to her life with the drover. She describes how her father was a drover, how her life is full of drunken men, how she had to live without parents (Jefferis 265-

266).

As already mentioned, Jefferis criticizes the previous authors for their

22 inaccuracies concerning their drover‟s wife stories, doing it from the perspective of the drover‟s wife. Firstly, she deals with the original story by Henry Lawson. On the one hand, she likes him as a person, as a “good listener”, because “he really listened”

(Jefferis 266). On the other hand, she is not satisfied with the way in which he processes his story. She cannot fully understand why he is making up so much: “some of it he took and turned into that story about the snake, as though what I‟d really told him wasn‟t true or wasn‟t fit” (Jefferis 266). In her version, the night of the snake incident was not as bad as Lawson is describing. There have been other more difficult situations in her life than the snake night, for example the death of her baby (Jefferis 266). But it seems to her that he is not much interested in her real trouble. “Funny the way he was more taken by a snake story, the sort that happens to everyone two or three times in a year. [...]. A nervous man who could never write about things as they really were but only about how they would have seemed to be if he‟d been what he would have liked to be” (Jefferis 267). Essentially, it is suggested that men do not like to write or speak about women and their problems, because along with their problems they would have to write or speak about their ability and strength to deal with such problems. “They don‟t understand the strength women have got – won‟t see it, because they think it takes away from them” (Jefferis 267).

Another aspect that she thinks is not appropriate relates to her intellect. The

“girlish hopes and aspirations” (Jefferis 267) that Lawson writes about in his story are not dead at all according to Jefferis. “Even the hardest times don‟t stop your fancies, don‟t stop a woman being broody, [...] (Jefferis 268). What she tries to point out is that women must not give up their fancies; they should keep trying, believing and doing.

The only problem as she tried to show is that “hardest thing of all women is that everything they do is for un-doing” (Jefferis 268). In the man world as Australia is there

23 is nobody who appreciates anything a woman does, because it is a common view that men support that women are not able to think, or to take care of themselves. In men‟s eyes a woman is a „bimbo‟ with no ambitions at all. For men do not like emancipated women at home, they are satisfied with the housewives they have. Jefferis tries to refute this view by the symbol of Bushman‟s Bible, the paper all over the hut from the floor to the roof (Jefferis 268). Bushman‟s Bible aka The Bulletin has been a very famous and important Australian magazine since the 1890s. The reason why Jefferis mentions it is that it was The Bulletin where Lawson‟s “The Drover‟s Wife” appeared for the first time. The function of Bushman‟s Bible is very simple. It shows that women, too, aspire to get deeper knowledge and that they are able to enjoy the same type of pleasure as men. As the wife says, “they were all pieces that were worth keeping to read again, and because they were the best thing I had for teaching the boys” (Jefferis 268). Even there she points out Lawson‟s ignorance, when she mentions that he either did not notice The

Bulletin on the walls, or he thinks that the primary purpose of it is the covering (Jefferis

268). It stresses the view that women and reading do not fit together in the men‟s minds.

And again Jefferis tries to invalidate this conception by the wife‟s knowledge of at least

73 poems and by her knowledge of various writers not only of Australian origin, but in fact by mentioning Christina Rossetti, an English poet, her knowledge is extended to worldwide (268-269).

The next version that Jefferis‟s story criticizes is that of Marry Bail and his point of view on the situation. The clash of Jefferis and Bail is in fact the clash between female and male point of view. As already written, Bail is a male author telling the story from the man point of view (the dentist) and Jefferis is a female author, telling the story from the wife‟s perspective. As well as Bail tries to strengthen male‟s position, which in fact is not necessary when considering the fact of Australia as a fully male society, so

24

Jefferis fulfils the task of defending the woman‟s side. The very first critique of him refers to his entire blindness towards women. “He could never tell the truth. He‟d never come right out and tell an honest lie, just say enough to give the wrong idea and then never a word to put it right” (Jefferis 269). He does not think about all the harm and consequences that such a story can have; what more he does not care. She also criticizes

Bail‟s character of the dentist. “He was a dirty man, the dentist [...]. There were times I thought he was more that a bit mad. He was very ignorant [...]. He couldn‟t read more than half a page of a book without getting bored and coming on words that were too big for him” (Jefferis 269). Not only does she criticize his personality, she also points out his non-availability to read in a way she is used to. It does not matter to her that he has

“letters after his name and brass plate (Jefferis 269), she feels more educated than he ever will be.

Another anti-feminine aspect of the story is hidden in the very last page, where it is said that “they talk about women as though they were animals [...]. Reason‟s plain enough; these are things you can own, use, brand [...]” (Jefferis 272). She tries to show that men do like the feeling that a woman is their property, they have them in their possession and have the right to do with them whatever they want to. This appropriation is hidden in the usage of the „s genitive in the word connection the drover‟s wife. By the genitive to the drover and by not using a proper name, the authors want to emphasize the fact that a woman is nothing more than an object joined to the man. Jefferis by her story tries to deny this characterization and show that women are human beings, too; and that they have the same rights and desires as men: “What I meant was to tell not so much about me and the drover the dentist and the rest of them but about how women have a history, too, [...] (Jefferis 72).

25

2.4. Mandy Sayer: “The Drover’s Wife”

As there is Bail‟s story told from the men‟s perspective directly blaming the woman, Sayer‟s story is the complete opposite. It is a story told by a woman who is considered to be the drover‟s wife, giving her own point of view on the events that happened. She “felt the need to tell the story from the woman's perspective, to give her a voice, a name, a history” (Sayer, “The Drovers‟Wives” ). It is the latest of all stories and it is very attached to women. At the very beginning of the story, Sayer tries to call attention that there are mistakes in previous stories, the same being done in Jefferis story. After analyzing all the stories it is easily recognizable how much these stories are connected, on the other hand they give very different points of view on the matter.

Two men are mentioned – Gordon (the dentist) and Russell (Russell Drysdale, the painter). It is claimed that the famous painting by Drysdale is in fact painted by the dentist (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 66). She says that “this painting wasn‟t the first hoax they‟d pulled off” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 66). So it is caused by her husband that the drover‟s wife is famous and that her story is spread, though it is not a true story.

But such behavior is typical for her husband, as it is suggested later in the story. He painted that painting in anger; let it published to humiliate his wife as she, in his eyes, humiliated him; according to him it is a heroic action, in fact it acts more as an act of despair. The reason is that the woman in the painting cannot defend herself, she cannot provide her testimony, which is exactly what he intended, to tell the story without any opportunity of her to disclaim such affirmation. To wit, the woman in the painting cannot speak.

As suggested earlier, there are mistakes in the stories and she “wants to set the record straight before time makes [her] silent as that woman in the painting (Sayer, “The

Drover‟s Wife”66). At first she explains that the painting of her does not look much like

26 her. The clothes, her weight, the suitcase, all these change her actual look, because “all art, perhaps, is motivated by an imperceptible thread of revenge” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s

Wife” 66). But this falsehood is embedded in Gordon‟s mind. It is not the first time he is making up, for example there is the incident in the restaurant with the health inspector

(Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 66) or the meeting of Liam, the so-called drover of this story, and the veterinary surgeon (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 68). To explain this closer, Gordon has a lot of cards with different names and different professions, so every time he has an opportunity he “pulls out his wallet and produces one of his cards”

(Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 66). In the restaurant he pretends to be the health inspector to get free food, during the conversation with Liam he pretends to be a veterinary surgeon to feels in the higher position in comparison with Liam. “People only pretend to be other people when they don‟t like who they are” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 66).

And what is more it gives him the occasion to trick people, then to boast and make the best account of it. Though he is a dentist, an honored profession, he wants to get higher; he wants to feel the power over the people around him.

Though he declares that she has “a silly streak” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife”

67), according to her, he is the one doing silly things. In the first place, there is the case with the painting, when Gordon made the picture up in his mind and sent it forth with the fancied story about his wife who left him. Secondly, there are the cards incidents involving the change of his personality in different situations to work on his behalf.

Another silliness happens during their camping trip, when he decides that there will be two tents, male and female (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 67). Not only it can be perceived as a silly decision because it is a camping trip for his own family, so there is no problem when children sleep together, but also the strict attitude concerning gender roles is hidden in his behavior. Next evidence of his inability can be seen when he

27 decided about the side for their camps, which turned out to be “alongside the -

Port Augusta railway line” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 67).

The biggest imperfection of his is the attitude towards his wife‟s behavior and needs. Though she probably loves his husband, because “there were, [...], things [she] loved about her husband” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 67), she is not happy in this marriage. He cannot fulfill her desires, since he finds them disgusting. He is not able to understand why she bought the silk night tie and when she has the dream on their camping trip, he cannot believe his eyes. To better understand, Hazel has a dream during their camping trip while sleeping in the tent. Although the tents were divided according to the gender, the children fell asleep in the car, so Hazel shared the tent with Gordon.

She describes very lively dream about her dancing in the night unrestrained. It is “a most unusual experience, almost hypnotic. My hips began rocking to the music, circling current. I did not quite recognise myself” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 68). What happens next is a proof that her desires have not been answered. She is having an erotic dream, where an important symbol appears. “The black head slid on, like an inquisitive finger” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 68). It is this animal that captures her lust by inappropriate movements along her whole body. This “black-headed python” (Sayer

“The Drover‟s Wife” 68) has already appeared in drover‟s wife stories as a symbol of evil. But this time the evil is not the snake itself, but rather it is hidden in this symbol as a tempter who leads her to a sin of lechery. When she wakes up, “it was the only time

[she] ever saw [her] husband lost for words. He had no cards to produce, no alias to help him cope” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 68). He cannot basically deal with her behavior, though her passionate night dance, which seems inappropriate to her husband, shows who she really is and the rest of the dream about the snake satisfying her sexual needs shows her unfulfilled desires. It is her true personality, but according to her husband, it

28 differs from 'standards'. It cannot be his wife, not the woman behaving as a lascivious lady, making these indelicate moves. And for a man who, for his whole life, pretends to be someone else, a woman who cannot pretend who she is not, is unacceptable.

Therefore “he simply turned and ran. He got in the car and drove away with the kids still in the back” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 68). It is him who leaves and he does it from the very selfish reason of not being able to reconcile with his wife‟s real personality.

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3. VARIATIONS ON THE DROVER’S WIFE STORY

3.1. Barbara Baynton: “The Chosen Vessel”

Apart from typical drover‟s wife stories, unusual variations of the story have appeared which also try to show women living in the bush, but from the very different point of view. Firstly there is “The Chosen Vessel” by Barbara Baynton who is the contemporary of Henry Lawson. By her story she reacts on the Lawson‟s “The Drover‟s

Wife” showing that woman does not belong to the bush no matter how strong she is.

Baynton‟s bushwoman is not in fact a drover‟s wife, but her husband is a shearer, which is another typical profession in the bush. But her life situation remains the same. She is a mother living alone in the bush with her child, while her husband is away for work. The important fact, in comparison with typical drover‟s wives stories is that this particular woman is not satisfied living in the bush and being alone. Though

Baynton‟s story may seem very different from the previous ones, she, as a matter of fact, points out the same issue in it – struggle of female gender in a purely male society as Australia used to be perceived. In her story, it is a woman who does not defeat, but who is defeated. “Baynton's character, [...], dislikes being alone and the story shows the extreme vulnerability of women, not at the hands of Nature, but at the hands of men”

(Barrett). So this time it is not the bush which is the real danger, but the men who live there. In “The Chosen Vessel” there are three male characters representing the male danger Barrett mentions.

At the very beginning, there is a reference that the struggling woman “had been a town girl and was afraid of cow” (Baynton 132). She probably has to move into the bush along with her husband who is, as already mentioned, a shearer. She also has to get used to the conditions that her new life has prepared for her; not only to be able to

30 survive, but mainly because of her husband. In fact, the husband is the first male threat waiting in the bush. When she shows her fear of cows, “the woman‟s husband was angry, and called her – the noun was cur” (Baynton 132). So there is a figure of tyrant, which is mean at her. And what is more, in his character also the figure of mocker can be found: “when she had dared to speak of the dangers to which her loneliness exposed her, he had taunted and sneered at her” (Baynton 132). He is absolutely blind to her fears and does not care what can ever happen to her, since “she need not flatter herself, he had coarsely told her, that anybody would want to run away with her” (Baynton 134).

This underestimation along with other acts of his behavior gives him the absolute power over her. As one of the typical views of male society, “this interpretation is confirmed by the fact that the woman does not exist as a person in her own right in the eyes of any of the male characters” (Barrett).

The second threat coming from men‟s world is symbolically hidden in the persona of a swagman, a person wandering in the bush, from time to time asking for needed supplies. As a woman living in the bush, she is used to meeting strangers who stop at her house with the plea of help. And “she was not afraid of horsemen; but swagmen, going to, or worse, coming from the dismal, drunken little township, [...], terrified her” (Baynton 133). So when a swagman appears in front of her doors, not only does she pretend that her husband is at home, but sick; but she also feels an urgent need to pen up the calf much earlier than usual to stay safe inside of the house (Baynton 133).

As she still feels the possible threat coming from the swagman, she barricades in her house, so nobody can get in. Inside the house she nervously waits for her doom, holding her baby tight. But the swagman represents an inevitable end regardless of what she does. “She knew he was offering terms if she ceased to struggle and cry for help, though louder and louder did she cry for it, but it was only when the man‟s hand gripped her

31 throat, that the cry of “Murder” came from her lips” (Baynton 137). So there is a figure of coldblooded murderer as another threat from male society. In this story, similarly as in Lawson‟s (the snake under the house), there is a brute threatening her life, but on the contrary, Baynton gives the woman no chance to win this battle, since such a weak person is not able to fight the monster.

Finally there is a character of Peter Hennessey. Though at the first sight he does not seem to be a threat for a woman, he is the worse of them, since although he has a chance to save her life, he does not do it. When he is passing by the scene of the torment of the mother holding her baby, he explains this view as a revelation of Mother the

Virgin and Child and ascribes it to superstitions of his people: “All the superstitious awe of his race and religion swayed his brain” (Baynton 138). So not only does he not help the woman in emergency, but he also turns his vision in his profit as a sign from heaven.

But the biggest sin he commits is the act of indifference. He passes by that woman presuming that finding threatened woman in the bush cannot be real and it has to take place only in his mind as an imaginary. “The woman in "The Chosen Vessel" is a victim of the patriarchal tendency to turn 'woman' into symbol, to depersonalize her and make her the recipient of male fantasy, whether sexual or religious” (A. Lawson).

3.2. Anne Gambling: “The Drover’s De Facto”

A story by Gambling is another variation on the Lawson‟s original one. All analyzed stories considered, this one differs the most. Nevertheless, the main point remains the same – formidable position of a woman imprisoned in an explicitly male society. Probably the biggest difference is the modern settings. Gambling‟s woman supposed to be a drover‟s wife is a university student writing her thesis. Also “the title of the story, "The Drover's De Facto" puts a contemporary spin on the tale, hinting at

32 tensions between traditional bush culture and the protagonist, a modern city woman”

(Sayer, “The Drovers‟ Wives”).

As a university student, she is assumed to be clever. She should not be added to ordinary „bimbos‟ who are liked by men the most. She is supposed to be self-confident and self-sufficient. But at the very beginning the author includes her in the group of ordinary women by stating that “she wanted to be wooed and bought expensive drinks”

(Gambling 149). This attitude makes her the prototype of the unthinking, stupid woman who is easily controlled by the man. So later in the story, the drover treats her in the appropriate way. He is mean to her, starts to be brutal to her and also cheats on her.

Here, similarly as in Baynton, is shown that women and the bush do not belong together, no matter how strong or clever they are.

This incompatibility of a woman and the bush is confirmed else in the story.

No matter how clever the woman is, she still has certain desires. The university girl‟s dream is a real man, since “she was sick of all those emaciated city boys with their thin bodies and thin ties” (Gambling 149). So when she meets the man of her dreams, she is satisfied, for her dreams come true. And though not living in the bush, but in the city, she still feels the magic of the bush in the rough drover partner. She “is seduced by myths of „the bush‟ and by country man who represents it” (Sayer, “The Drovers‟

Wives”). And what is more, when “the romance of the bush overtook her sensibilities”

(Gambling 150) at the beginning, she is blind to what the man is really like. After she is forced by her life situation to live in hard conditions, especially when the drover is away, she realizes that “it wasn‟t like in the books and that make her sad” (Gambling

151).

Concerning the drover, he seems very attractive to her at first and she probably feels sorry for him because of his unsuccessful marriage (Gambling 150). But as the

33 time goes on, the drover shows his real personality and starts to treat her like his property, exactly according to experienced stereotypes. Every time he is gone droving, she is waiting for him. When he gets back; the first demand is the meal. “He‟d ask about dinner and would sit and drink stubbies until he‟d lost his appetite while she laboured and stoked and it hissed and spat back at her” (Gambling 151). So not only does he treat her like a food machine, but he also very clearly shows his dissatisfaction towards her cooking abilities. When spitting at her. it can be said that his behavior towards her starts to be violent. This violence continues concerning their sexual intercourse. “He‟d arrive home at whatever time it was and want to lay her. At first she thought it romantic until it came to the physical torture” (Gambling 152). So as well as Baynton, Gambling suggests that the threat for women is not hidden in the bush, but in the presence of men living there. In “The Drover‟s De Facto”, the figure of physical and psychical torturer plays the main role. Analogous to “The Chosen Vessel”, the figure of mocker is also present, since the drover strongly underestimate and ridicule the woman: “yeah a good lay an‟ not a bad cook. A man can live with that pretty well, ya know” (Gambling 153).

All these kinds of terror make her drinking and she becomes a wreck. But still she is able to get over it and start to live again, which makes her stronger and more courageous than before: “Things went on as before but she felt new enthusiasm for making it work and he noticed a subtle change in her, hair not unkempt and face exhibiting traces of blusher and a little lipstick” (Gambling 154-155). And that is the reason for the man to have more control over her than before, since he notices her newly gained self-confidence. He needs to know what she is doing and where she is going. For him a woman capable of self-thinking is unacceptable. When there is an incident with the other man, practically involving only a nice evening spent together in the town, which the drover gets to know from neighbors, he is furious and does not want to listen

34 to her: “Can‟t I tell my side of it?”, but he answers that “[he] heard all [he] wanna hear from the blokes in town” (Gambling 157). He does not trust her and finally he even slaps her. He wants her to get out of the house. Finally she goes despite his apologies and pleas, “because [he] questioned [her] fidelity” (Gambling 157). All this happens only because in his eyes she breaks the rules of being a typical woman.

35

CONCLUSION

The aim of this thesis, of the analytic part in particular, was to show position of women in Australian literature presented by the various drover‟s wife stories. The

Drover‟s Wife story can be seen as a representation of men‟s attitude towards women throughout the history, for different versions have appeared since the publication of the original one in 1892. The views playing the main role in stories vary from the very feminist one to the very misogynistic one.

Firstly, there was an introductory part. Its purpose was to provide background information which showed consecutively the development of Australian society that ended by emergence of Australian identity deeply hidden in the male part of the population. There was also short information about gender difference and its origin. The second and third part was the analysis of the stories, whereas the second part analyzed more traditional concepts of the story and the third part dealt with its variations.

In the past, especially in the Western culture, women were in a very difficult position. They were considered to be the weaker gender, thus they were supposed to be less clever and less educated. The result of this attitude was the emergence of Western stereotype of a man as a head of the family and of a woman as a housewife. In

Australia, this issue seemed to be more problematic, since the land itself and the living conditions were more difficult in contrast to developed Europe or America.

Australia has been perceived as a rough country, mainly due to the presence of the bush which represents a place so inhospitable for human beings that it is unimaginable in Australian‟s man eyes that such a weak gender as women would be ever able to survive or live in such a cruel place. For many years a man has been the symbol of this wild country. In the past, the man only was considered to be able to

36 survive in the inhospitable surroundings of the bush. So a struggle began between these two genders, since women tried to equate men, and men wanted women to stay the same. Any attempt of women to get on the same level as men was seen as unacceptable.

Even though Australia was the first country in the world where women were allowed to vote, women there had been seen for a long time as a weak gender, which need protection and this is the position of women men like the most. Women who were able to work, to take care of themselves and to think were seen as a lunatic. In men‟s view a woman is not able to live without man. She needs his protection, because the world is so dangerous. She needs his money, because she has an urgent need to spend money for unnecessary things and the idea that she earns her own money is ridiculous for the man.

But what is more important, the man needs her, too; because somebody has to feed him, listen to him, respect him and pander him. Men considered women as a subject to him, who is next to him to do his ego better. That is the role deeply wedded with women and that is everything men need to be satisfied.

Even the analysis showed that women were treated according to various stereotypes concerning the fact that women are the property of men and that their place is at home as housewives. But no matter this fact, according to the analysis, even women are able to deal with difficult life situations, and sometimes they are able to do that better than men, which Bail‟s story showed, when the dentist tries desperately to discredit the drover‟s wife. To sum up the analysis, it is not the bush which is dangerous for women, but the biggest threat in women‟s life is the man. And what also was proved is that as the time went on, the progress could have been seen in the position of woman in Australian society. Even in the original story the woman is no longer a useless creature dependent on the man. The wife is able to survive in the bush alone and to provide security to her children. She also copes with activities so far accredited to man.

37

And the most important is that by giving the woman the voice, the prejudice that women are less important was broken.

38

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41

CZECH RESUME

Bakalářská práce s názvem Postavení žen v australské literatuře: Analýza příběhů o předákově ženě se zabývá postavením žen v australské společnosti, a to pomocí analýzy krátkých povídek o předákově ženě. Původní povídku “Předákova

žena“ napsal Henry Lawson pro australský časopis Bulletin, kde byla publikována v roce 1892. Mnoho dalších autorů následně publikovalo povídky se stejným nebo velmi podobným motivem jako reakci na původní verzi. Práce se na základě těchto povídek snaží popsat situaci žen v Austrálii a poukázat na nerovnost pohlaví, která byla pro Austrálii velmi typická, a to nejen ve skutečném životě, ale i v literatuře.

V úvodu práce jsou poskytnuty základní informace týkající se australské historie. Úvod je rozdělen do čtyř podkapitol, přičemž se jednotlivé podkapitoly zabývají jednotlivými problémy souvisejícími s australskou historií a okolnostmi, které vedly k zastínění ženského pohlaví. Jako první je zde diskutován problém osídlení

Austrálie a jeho dopad na pozdější vývoj. Dále pak práce poukazuje na vývoj Austrálie jako samostatné země a na problém právoplatných obyvatel. Třetí a čtvrtá část je věnována problematice nerovnosti pohlaví z hlediska sociologie.

Následující kapitoly se zabývají detailní analýzou jednotlivých vybraných příběhů o předákově ženě. Nejprve je rozebrán původní příběh Henryho Lawsona, dále pak následují příběhy, které na něj reagují. V další kapitole se pak objevují analýzy dvou příběhů, které nejsou typickými příklady příběhu o předákově ženě, ale spíše variacemi na toto téma. Všechny příběhy se snaží zmapovat postavení ženy ve společnosti, která je založena na mužské nadřazenosti.

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ENGLISH RESUME

Bachelor thesis called The Position of Women in Australian Literature: the

Analysis of the Drover’s Wife Stories deals with the position of women in Australian society by analyzing short stories about the drover‟s wife. The original story “The

Drover‟s Wife” was written by Henry Lawson for Australian magazine called The

Bulletin, where it was published in 1892. Many other authors consequently published short stories with the same or very similar theme as a reaction on the original version.

The thesis based on these stories tries to describe the situation of women in Australia and to point out the inequality of genders, which was so typical for Australia, not only in the real life, but also in literature.

In the introductory part of the thesis basic information concerning Australian history is provided. The introduction is divided into four subchapters, individual subchapters dealing with single issues connected with Australian history and circumstances, which led to extinguishment of female gender. Firstly the issue of settling Australia and its consequences on the following development is discussed.

Secondly the thesis points out the development of Australia as an independent country and the issue of valid inhabitants. The third and the fourth part are dedicated to the issue of gender inequality from the sociological point of view.

Following chapters analyze individual chosen stories about drover‟s wife in very detail. At first the original story by Henry Lawson is analyzed, then stories being a reaction on the original one follow. In the next chapter two more analysis appears.

These are not typical stories about the drover‟s wife, but rather they are variations on the topic. All the stories try to map the position of women in society, which is based on male superiority.

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