Osaka Keidai Ronshu, Vol. 60 No. 5 January 2010 215

The origin of Australian romance: and “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”.

Shuji Narita

Although the first Australiannovel, Henry Savery’s Quintus Servinton, was published in 1830, the Australian literary scene was relatively neitherrobust nor attracted much critical at- tention. Since theearliest settlers were primarily British, it is often said that Australian litera- ture grew out of English literary traditions. However, the writers who later were recognised as representative Australians did not appear until 1890s. During this period, Australian writers often wrote so called “Bush stories”, struggling to establish Australian identity, so that conven- tional romantic fiction seemed to be going out of the main stream. Nevertheless, and Miles Franklin are twoof the writers from the period who wrote romantic fiction. Both Lawson’s “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” and Franklin’s My Brilliant Career are among twoof theearliest works of romantic fiction in , and there is evidence thatthey display both conventional and unique Australian aspects.

In England, where romantic fictionhas always been a very popular branch of literature, 1890s is nearly theend of the Victorian period. The long Victoriannovels were gradually giving way to shorter fictions. Thomas Hardy wasstill actively writing romantic novels which were set in the countryside, but he stopped writing novels after the publication of Jude the Obscure in 1895. After this, romance grew less popular among many new genres, such as adventure, detective fiction, and science fiction. In terms of the development offiction, Australia is more comparable to America. America of course has a longer literary history than Australia, and America’s first literary upheaval was ap- proximately half a century before that of Australia, around 1850s. Richard Ruland and Malcolm Bradbury in their From Puritanism to Postmodernism termed this period “American Naissance”, rather than Renaissance, since this was not a rebirth butthe very beginning the whole thing. American writers from this period are said to have been largely influenced by Ralph Waldo Emerson and his transcendentalism. Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville and Walt Whitman all published works during this period. Hawthorne was probably the first American to attract much critical attentions overseas, and was known to be a romance writer. If 1850s were “American Naissance”, 1890sshould be called “Australian Naissance”. Many writers who later became to be considered “classic” are from this period, including Henry Lawson, “Banjo” Paterson, Miles Franklin and . John Barnes calls Lawson “the most Australian of Australian writers” (2), and today, he is probably regarded as the most rep- resentative Australian writer. Franklin, on the other hand, was perhaps the first female author to write romantic novels which later became classic. 216 Osaka Keidai Ronshu, Vol. 60 No. 5

Lawson’sshort stories are intended to be a “yarn”, in a casual oral style in which one ad- dresses more than one in the audience. He wrote about many scenes of the bush. Some of Lawson’sstories are descriptive “sketches”, rather thanhaving a well-constructed plot. Geoffrey Dutton inhis The Literature of Australia convincingly argues that Lawson’sseries of “Joe Wilson” stories are “as close as Lawson ever came to the scope of a novel”, and “are per- haps the height of his achievement” (167). “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”, together with “Telling Mrs. Baker”, “Brighten’s Sister-in-law” and “A Double Buggy at Lahey’s Creek”, form a literary mode called ‘discontinuous narrative’; they are loosely connected and the same characters ap- pearrepeatedly. They all have the theme of marriage, but not all are romance stories in the strict sense. Of all these, “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” most obviously deals with romantic love. Thisstory is “orally” told to youngsters as a reflection of Joe Wilson’s “happiest days”, whenhe looks back a time manyyears past. It is a heart-warming story and is overwhelmingly sentimental and emotional. Structurally speaking, asshort as it is, Lawson does not hurry to begin the main thread of narrative. Before Joe really begins the “story”, he spends a lot of time building a foun- dation which is not directly related to the main thread. The plot itself is very simple. Joe meets Mary where he obtains a temporary work. Jack, Joe’s mate, sets up things for them to fall in love. They find they likeeach other anddecide to get married before they have to go in separate directions. There are hardly any complications. The reader, or supposedly listeners, would know the tale would end happily, since Joe tells them in the beginning : “But, looking back, I didn’t do so badly after all. I never told you about the days I courted Mary” (252). So it is notthe plotthat makes “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” so pleasing to read. It is the characterisation of Joe and Mary that makes the story so emotional. Despite Joe’s evaluation that he “was reckoned wild”, he is one type of idealised Australian bushman. Thoughhe isshy, awkward, uncouth, he is good-natured and brave. He lacks the traditional masculine image of machismoor macho man, and thinks he “was born for a poet” (251), thoughhe wrote poetry only once, “I think that evening was the only time I ever wrote poetry down on a piece of paper” (264). Writing poetry symbolises Joe’s introversion and clumsiness with women. His shyness and clumsiness is apparent from his words and behaviour, and he goes out of his ways to stress these qualities to his listeners. When Mary offers Joe and Jack a cup of tea, flustered Joe accidentally kicks a cask-hoop and it hits hisshin and he stumbles. Hearing Mary’s kind words, his loses his composure:

I was aboutthe reddest shy lanky fool of a Bushman ...when I took the tray my hands shook so that a lot of tea wasspilt into the saucers. I embarrassed her too, like the damned fool I was ....I got away from the window in as much of a hurry as if Jackhad cut his leg with a chisel and fainted, and I was running with whisky for him....feeling like a man feels whenhe’s just made an ass of himself in public. (257)

Joe repeatedly says that he isshy, “I was alwaysshy with women ....whenever a girl took any notice of me I took it for granted that she was only playing with me” (253), “I didn’t know The origin of Australian romance: My Brilliant Career and “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”. 217 anything about women yet”, “I reckoned it was just going to a hopeless, heart breaking, stand- far-off-and-worship affair, as far as I was concerned” (259). He needs to be told by Jack what to do with Mary. When clothes-line broke and Mary’s clothes went down to the grass, Joe thinks nothing of it until Jack tells him, “Go and help her, you capitalidiot !” (260). His mate Jack complements just Joe lacks; he is an embodiment of Australian mateship. He is a clear antithesis to Joe; Jack is what Joe is not, anddoes what Joe does not do. Jack “did all the talking” (255) and is not shy and is “afraid of no woman” (253). Joe speaks of Jack’s way of setting things up behind : “He [ Jack] had aquiet way of working youup a thing, that made you wantto hit him sometimes” (256), “Then a thought struck me. I oughtto have known Jack well enough to have thought of it before” (258). He disappears from the narrative for good, as soon as he gets the two together after the dance night. Mary is also idealised from a male point of view. She is a typical man’s image of what a girl oughtto be like in the bush, rather than a woman’s image of what she likes to be like. First of all, the visualimage of woman carries much weight ; Mary is petite, and presented as a cute, pretty girl. In terms of characterisation, she is of innocent, chaste, home-oriented nature, sub- servientto male dominance. She never does anything rebellious, or anything to stand out from society, or from other women. When Joe first encounters Mary, he falls for her outward ap- pearance:

I saw a little girl, rather plump, with a complexion like a New England or Blue Mountain girl, or a girl from Tasmania or from Gippsland in Victoria ....She had the biggest and brightest eyes I’d seen round there, darkhazel eyes ...bright as a ‘possum’s. No wonder they called her “‘Possum”. I forgot at once that Mrs. Jack Barnes was the prettiest girlin the district. (255)

Similarly, Joe himself believes that his appearance is importantto attract Mary’s attention and tries to put his best foot forward : “I felt a sort of comfortable satisfaction in the factthat I was onhorseback : most Bushmen look better onhorseback” (255), “I squared up my shoulders and put my heels together and put as much style as I could into the work” (256). The implication of Mary’s naivety and innocence is well illustrated in the clothes hanging scene. Joe witnesses Mary’s clumsy way of trying to hold clothes up by the line:

She had the broken end of the line and was trying to hold some of the clothes off the ground, as if she could pull an inch with the heavy wet sheets and table-cloths and things on it, or as if it woulddo any good if she did. Butthat’s the way with women－especially little women .... (260)

Another example of Mary’s innocence is herrefusing to let Joe help : “Oh, those things are not readyyet ...they are not rinsed” (260). She is also given an imagery of chastity : “I don’t think it’s right for－for a girl to－to kiss a manunless she’s going to be his wife” (276). For Lawson, to be feminine is to be modest and bashful, which is probably what a typical bushman considers an archetype of a virtuous woman. Therefore, “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” is, as it were, 218 Osaka Keidai Ronshu, Vol. 60 No. 5 a dramatisation of three idealised images, seen from abushman’s point of view. Although Miles Franklin says My Brilliant Career is neither a romance nor a novel, it is most certainly a romance and novel. Contrary to whatthe most readers are led to expect from the author’s comment of “a yarn－real yarn”, it has a very straightforward narrative with a stable chronological progression. The plot follows a very conventional general pattern ; a girl meets aboy, complications arise and solved, they decideeither to marry or notto marry. There is also an element offairy-tale. The plot is roughly that of “Cinderella” or “Ugly Duckling”; a poor, plainnon-heroiccreature falls in love with a young, handsome and wealthy man, and they eventually marry each other and live happily ever after. Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre follows exactly this pattern, exceptthe factthat Mr Rochester is neither young nor handsome. However, My Brilliant Career’s troublesomeending largely deviates from a romance conven- tion. The fact Sybylla does not end up marrying Harry is not all that surprising by itself. What is puzzling to the reader is thatthough Sybylla initially accepts Harry’s proposal of marriage, she changes her mind right attheend. She constantly keeps assuring him that she would marry him whether he is rich or poor, then “abig surprise”. Harry also, is made unrealistic in attempting to throw away theengagement, just because he has lost money. Butthis time, it is Sybylla who prevents him from breaking theengagement :

‘Hal, don’t you think it isselfish of you to wantto throw me over just because youhave lost your money ? ....when I am twenty-one I will marryyou, and we will help each other....If you want me, I want you.’ (173)

She accuses Harry’s thinking of herrelinquishing theengagement on account of his financial loss. Then she vigorously emphasises that she does not care for money :

‘Do you think I am that sort, that cares for a person only because he has a little money ? Why ! that is the very thing I am always preaching against. If a man was a lord or a million- aire I would not have him if I loved him not, but I would marry a poor cripple if I loved him.’ (173)

When Harry’s rightful claim is rejected in theend, he has his reason to be resentful. Sybylla’s outrage is equal to stabbing him in the back ; the reader is no less surprised. But Sybylla’s at- titude of not wanting to marry him is ambivalent. Theexcusesshe gives to Harry and to the reader are not convincing. She tells the reader that she “wanted a man who would be masterful and strong, who would help me over the rough spots of life” (247), and that “My love must know, must have suffered, must understand” (249). Yet she says to herself that “He [Harry] was not distasteful to me in any way. What was the good for waiting for other ....Yes; I would be his wife” (249). However, unlike her usual outspoken self, this is not what she tells Harry. She tells him, “I am not good enough to be your wife, Hal, or that of any man” (247), then tells the reader, “it was impossible to make him see my refusal was for his good” (249). This ex- cuse is ridiculous by any standard. Who would believe a woman, to whom he has already been engaged for years, who says the reason for not marrying him is that she thinksshe is just not The origin of Australian romance: My Brilliant Career and “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”. 219 good enough for him ? Because of this Sybylla’s contradiction and irresoluteness, the reader is left alone all by himself to wonder why she did not wantto marry him. The film version of My Brilliant Career avoids this problem altogether, and makes the reason Sybylla’s not marrying him far too simple. First of all, Sybylla has never been engaged in this. It omits all the complication of Harry’s buying her an engagement ring and her accepting, and their agreement of waiting for a few years and nottelling anyone about it during thattime. Her decision to marry or notto marry sways to and fro. When Harry comes back years later to again askher to marry him, she makes it clear that she does not wantto get married because she wants freedom and wants to become a writer. The movie thus ends in a scene in which Sybylla is mailing a manuscriptto a publisher. This arrangementtotally destroys the unique- ness of My Brilliant Career. It now has a clear sense of ending of the plot, that Sybylla rejected Harry and she decided to go inher own way. In comparison with Lawson’s “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”, characters are not so idealised in My Brilliant Career. Yetthe reader is certain to be led to love its robust heroine, Sybylla. Since the story is narrated by Sybylla, everything isseen from her perspective. She cannot be com- pared on a same ground with Mary, who isseen from Joe’s point of view. Nevertheless, Sybylla is on the other extreme side of a continuum from Mary. First of all, according to her own judgement, she is ugly. She is ablack sheep of the family ; a square peg in a round hole. She hates domesticchores and isself-assertive, precocious and ambitious. My Brilliant Career is probably the first Australiannovel to have an ambitious, rebellious character as its heroine, thoughnotthe first in the world. It seems the Americans, rather than the British, preceded Australians in this genre. This type of energetic heroine often appears in children’s literature. Peter Hunt in An Introduction to Children’s Literature explains thatthis is “a genre which flourished in the USA ...from the mid-nineteenth century onwards: the do- mestic tale centring on a strong, often displaced, female hero” (23). Hunt argues that Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women, which was published in 1868, “was revolutionary in showing the clash between the wilful and energetic Jo and contemporary social standards” (75). A few other examples are to follow in the USA in the next few decades, but major ones in English speaking countries which later became classics, did not appear until around the turn of the cen- tury, such as Anne of Green Gables (1908) by Lucy Montgomery, The Secret Garden (1911) by Frances Burnette, Pollyanna (1912) by Eleanor Porter. Surprisingly, apart from Little Women, My Brilliant Career came out before all these. The way Franklin “un-idealises” Sybylla is carried outto such an extentthat Sybylla earns antipathy from her own mother. Sybylla not only possesses a plain appearance, but exhibits enough disagreeableness to be the source of grievance to her mother. The clash between the two comes to its climax whenher mother tells her to earnher own bread. Franklin also draws Sybylla’s morality less than impeccable; her ambitions are so high that she virtually refuses to do anything to help her family. She not only scorns to do domestic work, but even to become a pupil-teacher :

‘...there is nothing you can do. You are really a very useless girl for your age.’ ‘There are heaps of things I coulddo.’ 220 Osaka Keidai Ronshu, Vol. 60 No. 5

‘Tell me a few of them.’ I wassilent. The professions at which I felt I had the latent power to excel ...were in a sphere far above us, and to mention my feelings and ambitions to my matter-of-fact prac- tical mother would bring upon me worse ridicule than I was already forced to endure day by day....I might as well have named flying as the professions .... (32)

This Sybylla’sselfish characterisation is unique among otherrobust heroines in the novels mentioned above. For example, Anne Shirly in Anne of Green Gables is also high-minded, but she understands her less-than-wealthy circumstances and is quite ready to take up a teaching job. Though Anne is outspoken and is frowned upon by some of her neighbours, she is loved for the quality by her adopting parents, Marillaand Matthew. On the other hand, Sybylla’s high- mindedness is less liked by her mother than people outside her family. Notably, all of those novels with robust heroines mentioned were written by female authors. There are hardly any similar heroines created by a male author. It is probably fair to say that this type of heroine is much more likely to be created by female authors, even today. If the heroine is the manifestation of authors’ innermost dreams, a secret way to become a person she cannever be in reallife, the heroine is really an idealised woman, ostensibly “un-idealised”. Whatthen, could be said aboutthe idealised men and women innovels by male authors like Lawson, and those by female authors like Franklin ? Dutton treats Franklin, as well as Lawson, as a national-minded writer who grew out of the literary tradition of The Bulletin, and explains that she grew up with it, and it meant to her. While it issaid The Bulletin did not have a definite theory of literature, it “saw itself as the nurse andguardian of a nationalliterature”, and its achievement was to “encourage writers to be original, to ignore the current English fashions in fiction” (160). Thus it generated the general tendency towardssomethingdistinctively Australian, something not English. As Australian cities became more urbanised, people feltthat cites were theexten- sion of English city life, and the disappearing life in the bush was a “true Australian life”. Contrary to this attitude was that Australian writers “should take a lead from the modern American realists and write aboutthe middle-class society of the towns”, butthis urging “fell on deaf ears” (155). Dutton argues that “In the Bulletin fiction, the bushman’s viewpoint is kind of norm, a centre; and readers are constantly invited to share the bushman’s way of look- ing atthings” (160). The next question is then, if Franklin were supposed have grown out of this bush tradition, what do we make of My Brilliant Career ? Despite the factthat she declares My Brilliant Career to be “simply a yarn”, it is hardly a yarn. Unlike Lawson’s “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”, it lacks all theevidence to be a yarn, such as spontaneity, interruptions, digressions, awkward construction, and colloquilal words. It is a well-structured, carefully written autobiography of Sybylla, focusing mainly onherromantic life. As mentioned before, the plot follows that of English romance convention apart from its ending. Certainly, the setting is the bush, and the characters have nothing to do with aristoc- racy or middle-class. Their daily concerns are like “who doessuch and such domesticchores”, or “how they can pay for such and such daily necessities”, rather thanhaving nothing to do all day but joyful outings anddinner parties andgossiping “who earns or inherited how many The origin of Australian romance: My Brilliant Career and “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”. 221 pounds”, like those of Jane Austen’s novels. The “high-mindedness” of Sybylla does not fitthe idealised bushwoman’s image like Mary in “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” does, but Harry perfectly fits the Australian bushman’s image of what Dutton describes as “lacking somewhatthe graces of society, but rich in an air of native distinction, and in the chivalry which arises from intuitive good breeding” (156). All these descriptions of abushman applies just as well to Joe Wilson, and also to Jack Barnes in Lawson’s “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”. Christopher Lee in “Looking for Mr Backbone” argues that “women’s writing has resisted in- corporation into a[n Australian] literary tradition, and this resistance applies “especially to what has been called feminine romance, which traces the heroine’s quest” (227). Those novels written by female authors with a similar heroine type, Little Women, Anne of Green Gables, The Secret Garden, Pollyanna, together with Franklin’s My Brilliant Career, all seem to belong to this genre. If, on the other hand, masculine romance means more traditional romance repre- senting women as delicate, tractable, domestic type in male dominance, “Joe Wilson’s Court- ship” belongs to this type. Interestingly, if romance novels are divided into these two types, feminine romance seems to gain favors with female readers, but often is criticised as having resorted to gushy, melodra- matic devices, while masculine novels, many of which were written by female authors, seem to gain more critical ground. Lawson’s “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” is romance; therefore obviously it is not altogether free from sentimentalism. In fact, it is very sentimental by any standard, and perhaps it is his most emotional work. If “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” and My Brilliant Career are to be taken as repre- sentative masculinity and femininity respectively, there is a significant difference in the process of emotionalisation between them. In “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”, there are tricks and tactics to make the man’s romance bear fruit. Joe, together with the help of Jack, must “bend over backwards” to setthings up, hoping Mary will like him. He tries to put “style” into his appearance and work when Mary is around, or work atthe particular point so they can be in each other’ssight byvirtue of the window reflec- tion. The whole sequence of events is basically to setthings up. Jack pressures Joe to be more forward with Mary ; he himself keeps telling Mary about Joe to excite her interests. Joe puts up a fight on Mary’s account, and it is Jack again who arranges for the two to meet after the dance night. Joe and Jack are notthe only ones to set up for Joe and Mary. Joe’s first-person narration prevents the reader from knowing beyond Joe’s intelligence, but Joe suspectssome- thing is going on. When Black asks Joe to stay inhis place, Joe conjectures that Mary might have hinted Black : “Womenhave ways－or perhaps Jack did it” (262). It is made ironicalif the reader takes that Joe does not knowwho washed Joe’s handkerchiefs and collarssecretly. If it was not Mary, there is no reason she could notto tell him who did it. “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” basically revolves around this Joe and Jack’sstrategy and Mary’s responses to it. By contrast, in My Brilliant Career, Sybylla never does anything special to attract Harry or any other man’s attention. She only deals with whatever and whoever comes to her. Sybylla does not arrange “put-up job” or “setting up” forromance to work. Incidentsseem to happen accidentally, at least ostensibly. For Franklin, romantic strategies, if ever happens, are men’s job. Women are only to passively handle accidents and men’s action, never to actively stir men 222 Osaka Keidai Ronshu, Vol. 60 No. 5 romantically, even an energetic girllike Sybylla. Harry’s bringing in apples for Sybylla, even thoughhe has never seenher, is a woman’s dream to be made happy by the magic offate. Aunt Helen teases Sybylla :

‘Here comes Harry Beecham with some apples,’ she would say.‘No doubt he is far more calculating and artful than I thought he was capable of being. He is taking time by the fore- lock and wooing you ere he sees you, and so will take the lead....’(60)

Other than this, incidents are made tooccur naturally, rather than anyone “pushing” to make them happen. Aunt Helen observes the way Sybyllabecomes interested in Harry that “all the girls fall a victim to Harry’s charm at one” (93). Despite Sybylla’s assertion that she does not care for money, the novel’s overall climate issuch that a manhas to have money to marry a girl. Harry’s dramatic loss of money and quick regain of it by inheritance is just a convenient device to influence Harry’s “values”. So, My Brilliant Career is really that Sybylla’s life is a se- ries of accidents, and one day, a nice man shows up and sweeps off her feet. From these differences, the followinggeneralisations could be made. “Joe Wilson’s Court- ship” represents mythologised Australian bushmen’s life that life issomething he can control or manage to a largeextent. My Brilliant Careerrepresents women’s desire thatthey wantto be carried away by some pleasant surprise. Therefore, iffeminine romance is less likely to gain critical ground, it is probably because the process of romanticisation depends on coincidences and “convenient happenings” rather than mutual effort of nurturing love. Studying an overall survey of American romance fiction in light of this process of romanticisation, it could be divided into two strands: those which depict love assomething to be gained with much effort, and those which depict love as an accident. The majority of novels of 184050sseem to belong to the firsttype. Hawthorne, who is often regarded as a represen- tative romance writer, also seems to belong to the firsttype. His The Blithedale Romance is full of characters’ schemes and tactics in an attemptto make theirromance come true. The tradi- tion of the second type seems to have begun with above mentioned Alcott’s Little Women, and many others to follow from 1900s to 1930s. There is a striking similarity between My Brilliant Career and Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables in terms of characterisation and plot. Anne Shirley is also from a humble background, high-minded heroine who initially rejects Gilbert’s love in pursuit of her writing career. In terms of setting, Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House in the Big Woods and itssequels are also set in the outback, and their characters’ concerns are not unlike those of My Brilliant Career, butthe heroine Laura is not rebellious like Sybylla, or in discord with the others, and it was not published until 1932. Britain did not join this new liter- ary movement until Pollyanna was published in 1912.

As Australian literature developed as its contrastto British literary tradition, there is a ten- dency in fiction to be different and original. The Bulletin was largely responsible for this atti- tude. Nevertheless, byvirtue of the common language, it is not entirely insensitive to the movement of the UK and the North America. Henry Lawson occupies a very unique place in world’s literary history in the sense that he wrote many short stories mainly aboutthe “bush”. The origin of Australian romance: My Brilliant Career and “Joe Wilson’s Courtship”. 223

His “Joe Wilson’s Courtship” is a romantic story which encapsulates Australia’s disappearing bushman’s dream. Miles Franklin’s My Brilliant Career is the pioneer in Australian literary scene in the sense that introduced a robust, challenging heroine, while, like Lawson, cherishing the values of the bush. Both works endorsed The Bulletin’s contemporary literary attitude and established a distinctive romance field for Australian literary history.

Works Cited Barnes, John. Henry Lawson’s Short Stories. Melbourne: Shillington House, 1985. Dutton, Geoffrey. The Literature of Australia. Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England. 1964. Franklin, Miles. My Brilliant Career. 1901. Sydney : Angus & Robertson, 1990. Hunt, Peter. An Introduction to Children’s Literature. Oxford : Oxford UP, 1994. Lawson, Henry. Henry Lawson : Stories, Poems, Sketches and Autobiography. Ed. Brian Kiernan. Brisbane: University of Queensland, 1976. Lee, Christopher. “Looking for Mr Backbone: The Politics of Gender in the Work of Henry Lawson.” The 1890s : Australian Literature and Literary Culture. Brisbane: University of Queensland P, 1996. Ruland, Harold and Malcolm Bradbury. From Puritanism to Modernity. Harmondsworth, England : Penguin, 1991.

Works Consulted Argyle, Barry. An Introduction to Australian Novel : 18301930. Oxford : Clarendon, 1972. Clark, Manning. A Short . 4th. ed. Ringwood, Australia : Penguin, 1995. Docker, John. “Australian Literature of the 1890’s.” An Introduction to Australian Literature. Ed. C. D. Narasimhaiah. Brisbane: John Wiley & Sons, 1982. Mathew, Ray. Miles Franklin. Melbourne: Landsdowne, 1963. Mitchell, Adrian. The Short Stories of Henry Lawson. Sydney : Sydney UP, 1995.