MASARYK UNIVERSITY IN BRNO

FACULTY OF ARTS

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN STUDIES

Jana Laszáková

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

Bachelor‟s Diploma Thesis

Supervisor: Mgr. Martina Horáková, Ph. D. Brno 2013

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

primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography.

2

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank my supervisor Mgr. Martina Horáková, Ph.D. for her valuable advice and comments, and for her patience, too. I would also like to thank my family and friends for providing priceless moral support and encouragement.

3

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION ...... 5

1.1. THE FORMATION OF AUSTRALIAN IDENTITY ...... 9

1.2. THE 1890S: THE BUSH, THE BUSHMAN AND WOMEN ...... 14

1.3. GENDER BIAS ...... 17

2. THE ANALYSIS OF THE DROVER’S WIFE STORIES ...... 19

2.1. HENRY LAWSON: “THE DROVER’S WIFE” ...... 19

2.2. MURRAY BAIL: “THE DROVER’S WIFE” ...... 22

2.3. BARBARA JEFFERIS: “THE DROVER’S WIFE” ...... 25

2.4. MANDY SAYER: “THE DROVER’S WIFE” ...... 30

3. VARIATIONS ON THE DROVER’S WIFE STORY ...... 35

3.1. BARBARA BAYNTON: “THE CHOSEN VESSEL” ...... 35

3.2. ANNE GAMBLING: “THE DROVER’S DE FACTO” ...... 38

CONCLUSION ...... 42

WORKS CITED ...... 44

CZECH RESUME ...... 47

ENGLISH RESUME ...... 48

4

1. INTRODUCTION

Australia has been connected with adventure and danger from the very beginning of its settlement. Therefore, it has often been perceived as a land of men, since in times of the colonization of Australia in the 18th century, attributes such as danger and adventure were usually associated with men. It had been assumed by the then society that Australia was not an appropriate place for women. The aim of this thesis is to show how different authors challenge this stereotypical point of view by placing a woman into the bush, a representative of typical Australianness. This thesis shows how these authors deal with the same motive of a lonely woman left in the bush along with her children, whose task is to make a living for herself and her children without any help from men. A close analysis of two stories from the end of the 19th century and of four more rewritings from the late 20th century will be used to reveal how women in Australia have been perceived.

This thesis analyzes the position of women in six different versions of the same story about the drover‟s wife. The first appearance of the drover‟s wife is in the short story written by Henry Lawson. His “The Drover‟s Wife” was published in The

Bulletin in 1892. It is a narrative about a woman whose husband is a drover and as a drover he spends a lot of time away from home. The home in the story is described as a small shanty in the middle of the bush, where the drover‟s wife lives with her children.

The bush is a very significant symbol of Australian land and so are the bush stories. But as far as the bush story is concerned, the man is usually involved. Therefore, situating the figure of the drover‟s wife in such a dangerous place is uncommon. One day, when the drover is away again, the danger appears in the presence of the snake. The story then deals with the drover‟s wife‟s “fight” against the snake on the one hand and with other 5 struggles of her life on the other. In Lawson‟s story, the bushwoman is an ambivalent figure. Her ability to cope with the bush environment and with difficult situations, such as fire or floods, is admirable; on the other hand, the need of a man is also recognizable.

Although her strength is emphasized in the first place, her vulnerability is present in the story, too. Lawson‟s story soon became legendary and the figure of the brave, but vulnerable drover‟s wife started to be a myth. But as Elder says, all stories “are open to response and perhaps change” (8-9), so the very first literary response to Lawson‟s story was not long in coming.

Lawson‟s contemporary, Barbara Baynton, wrote her own story about the drover‟s wife a few years later. “The Chosen Vessel” was published in The Bulletin, too, in 1896. It was Baynton‟s only story which appeared in this magazine. Unfortunately, A.

G. Stephens, the editor of the Red Page (a part of The Bulletin), changed the title of the story to “The Tramp” and the censorship cut an entire section from the story (Schaffer

154 – 155), since it did not fit the image of the then Australian ideals. In contrast to

Lawson‟s heroine, Baynton describes her drover‟s wife as a weak woman who does not like the surroundings of the bush. She is terrified, not brave, she cannot fight off the danger hidden in the figure of the swagman and eventually, she is killed by the swagman along with her baby. So not only the inability of the woman to defend herself and her baby against the danger of the bush symbolized by the swagman is emphasized in her story, but also the figure of a swagman who is, along with the bushman, considered to be a part of national heritage is described in an uncomplimentary way.

Thus, by changing the title, Stephens “shifted reader interest away from the woman‟s murder [...], and on to the character of the murderer, called a „tramp‟ – not bushman or swagman [...]” (Schaffer 155).

Lawson‟s story has inspired several other contemporary writers who have

6 rewritten the story by Lawson from different perspectives. In 1975, another “The

Drover‟s Wife” originated. The story was written by Murray Bail and in contrast to the previous two stories, which are told from the drover‟s wives perspectives, here the narrator is a man, supposedly the absent husband, giving his point of view. This time, the drover‟s wife is not married to the drover and her life is set in the city, where she lives with her husband. Her husband is a dentist, whom she left for a drover. Bail‟s story is then the husband‟s critique of the wife herself, of her choice and of the surroundings she has exchanged for the city – the bush. In 1980, Barbara Jefferis re-wrote “The

Drover‟s Wife” from a feminist perspective. She employs Bail and Lawson as characters in her story and comments on Bail‟s husband‟s misogynic point of view and

Lawson‟s indifference to the facts. In 1986, the version that is set in the contemporary period was written. Anne Gambling wrote “The Drover‟s De Facto”, giving the story a new setting and a new form of the legendary figure of the drover‟s wife. In her story, the main character is a university student who is attracted to the bush and the bushman. But eventually, when she discovers the roughness of the bush and sees the violence of the bushman, she cannot get used to it and in the end, she leaves the bushman. The last story I have chosen for my analysis was written by Mandy Sayer in 1996. Similarly to

Jefferis, Sayer shows her disagreement with Bail‟s husband‟s version of the story and as her drover‟s wife says, she “wants to set the record straight” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s

Wife” 66).

The thesis itself is divided into three chapters. Since a part of my argument claims that in Australia men were privileged to women and that women were in a much more difficult position, there is a short background of Australian history provided in the introductory part of my thesis. This section outlines what national identity means for

Australians, why men are important for Australian culture and why women did not have

7 such a strong position as men and were excluded from Australian history. It also introduces the aspect of gender difference in connection with gender bias, since the analytical part of this thesis is based on gender issues.

The analysis of the short stories is divided into two more chapters. The second chapter consists of stories in which the drover‟s wife is able to survive in the bush or she even chooses the life in the bush herself. The analysis starts with Henry Lawson‟s

“The Drover‟s Wife” and is followed by stories which are reactions to the original version from different points of view. Stories are ordered chronologically according to the date they were published, so there are stories by Murray Bail, Barbara Jefferis and

Mandy Sayers. The analysis is aimed at the position of bushwomen in the stories, it also tries to foreshadow the attitude of men in the stories towards these bushwomen and finally, it shows the feelings of bushwomen about their position and the men‟s attitude.

Though Lawson‟s story pictures the drover‟s wife as a strong personality, I argue that by describing also her fears and vulnerability, he also wants to stress the difference between men and women and that women are not as strong as men. Also by naming the story “The Drover‟s Wife”, he intentionally leaves his heroine nameless and he rather shows the attitude of the drover towards his wife as possessive. The other stories are rewritings which either support this point of view or fully reject it. The chronological order is supposed to show how the position of the bushwomen has changed since the original story was published.

In the next chapter, stories by Barbara Baynton and Anne Gambling are analyzed. In these stories, the main character does not cope with the bush or the bushman, which causes her death in the first story and the realization in the second one.

The drover‟s wife suffers from living in the bush or with the bushman and she is described as a victim. These two stories are counterparts not only to the original story,

8 but also to the versions mentioned. They openly criticize the position of women in

Australian society, in which women are perceived as subordinate to men and they rather advert to the fact that women are rather victims, which is often left out.

1.1. The Formation of Australian Identity

In the 17th century the first remarks about observation of an unknown land in the Pacific Ocean southwards Asia appeared. A century later, Terra Australis Incognita

(unknown southern land) is officially “discovered” by the British ship Endavour led by

Captain James Cook. On 22 August 1770, Cook landed on Possession Island under the

British colors and claimed eastern Australia under King George III, naming it New

South Wales (Ward, Concise History of Australia 43).

Every untutored corner of this land was full of danger and adventure and, as

Schaffer suggests, “[...] the idea of Australia had a long history as a land of desire, traversed in the imaginations of explorers, settlers and visitors alike” (1). It was not only the fauna and flora, but mainly the genius of this unknown place which tempted the newcomers. The native people, the Aborigines, were considered to be the part of this adventure, too. Thus, it did not matter whether the relationships between the new settlers and the Aborigines started well, sooner or later the Aborigines realized that the colonizers were not interested in the people, but in the place, thus the struggle for the land began (“European Discovery and Colonisation”).

After claiming New South Wales to be the British land, one of many questions needed to be solved – how the British would use the new land in the best way. Since the

British prisons were overcrowded, in 1787 the British government decided that New

South Wales would become a new penal colony in order to reduce the amount of

9 prisoners in the overcrowded gaols all over the kingdom (Ward, Concise History of

Australia 50). In May 1787, the First Fleet of transport ships landed in Botany Bay. The convicts sent to Australia varied, from those being arrested for minor offences to those committing more serious crimes. Though they had to work in bondage, there was an opportunity to become a free man again. In fact, there were three ways – an absolute pardon, conditional pardon and the ticket-of-leave. While pardons could give the convicts all rights or citizenship within the colony, the ticket-of-leave released the convicts from the governmental labor and allowed them to work for themselves, wherever they wanted to within the colony (Hughes 307), which laid the foundations for existence of a new colony.

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

Gold Rush. In 1851, the gold was discovered in Summerhill Creek in the Blue

Mountains (Ward, Concise History of Australia 139). As Ward implies, there had been earlier discoveries, but the presence of the convicts was a reason for concealing these earlier findings (Concise History of Australia 139). Analogous to the Gold Rush in

America, this discovery started a wave of immigration from Europe, America and, in particular, China. As a result, “[b]etween 1851 and 1861 the population of all Australia nearly trebled, growing from 405, 356 to 1, 145, 585” (Ward, The Australian Legend

137). It is obvious then that the population of the land started to increase very quickly and with increasing population, people began to think about new future, where they could decide themselves about their destiny.

After years of the British supremacy, people in Australia started to be dissatisfied with the dependency on the United Kingdom. There was a feeling that it was important to “think of Australia as a new world, having as few links as possible with the Europe [...] left behind” (Palmer 15). For such a disconnection, the location of

10 the continent was a great advantage. As Palmer mentions, it was the geographical and mental isolation of Australians that supported the construction of a new exemplary free society (10). And as people living in the same country, sharing common features, cultural and historical background, they realized that it was the high time to think about their own freedom as a new nation. As Palmer points out, “[a] scattered people, with origins in all corners of the British Islands and in Europe, had a sudden vision of themselves as a nation, with a character on their own and a historic role to play, and this vision set fruitful creative forces to motion” (Palmer 9). Australians wanted to establish an independent nation with its own power and own history and those “creative forces” that Palmer mentions should have helped this purpose. It was not the history itself that was the most important part of the process, but it was rather the people who helped to create this history. But to establish the country and create the nation meant to establish the national 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. Thus, in the 1890s, a group of people who called themselves radical nationalists “decided that the history of Australia was the history of those influences that produced what they saw as an „essentially‟

Australian character, and that truly Australian literature was that which gave expression to this character” (Walter 13). So it was the so-called Australian “intelligentsia” such as writers, painters, historians, critics and journalists who participated in creating

Australian identity and mainly the character of typical Australian (White 24). But it was not easy to determine who was Australian and who was not.

Firstly, there were Aborigines. Though the oldest nation in the continent and in fact, one of the oldest cultures in the world, the Indigenous people were not considered to be a part of Australian life. As Palmer implies, “[their] culture, [their] imaginative

11 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” (17). Thus, Aborigines started to be pushed aside and slowly omitted from Australian history.

Secondly, there was a settlement of convicts. 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 provided the basis for the process of nation building, they were not considered to be “true” Australians either. The reason was that “new” Australia wanted to disengage from the British Empire, “[...] thus early was there being formed a conception of the old world as the principal source of evil” (Palmer 33). Since the convicts were perceived as a part of the old world, it was unacceptable that such people could create a nation.

Even the wave of immigrants that came during and after the Gold Rush did not consist of people who could, according to radical nationalists, form an Australian prototype. Especially Chinese immigrants were seen as the most problematic. Chinese were coming to Australia on ships in hundreds and they tried to stay together so that their minority would not get infiltrated. “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 for opium-smoking was also not very popular and generally their way of live was seen to be very vicious.

According to Palmer, “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” (16). At first, Chinese were not allowed to participate in creating a new nation, since they were perceived as a threat to desired

Australianness. Eventually, they did not want to jeopardize their own community, so

12 they voluntarily avoided the process of nation building.

There still remained a question: Who could form the Australian nation?

Eventually, there were a few groups of people who began to create an Australian type.

The important fact is that these groups had three significant features in common. It was whiteness, maleness and European, or rather Anglo, origin. Though the British convicts had been excluded from people who could potentially fit the Australian prototype, their children were perceived in a more positive way. According to Palmer, there was a

“theory of rebirth” that suggested that there would be a great change in the behavior and features of the convicts‟ children. According to this theory,

[t]he 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)

In contrast to their parents, the children of convicts were no longer perceived as an evil and as a part of the old world, since they were growing up in different settings and under different conditions. Thus, they started to be considered as a part of a new nation.

There was also a group of people living in the outback. According to Ward,

“the „true‟ or „typical‟ Australians were the men of the outback” (The Australian Legend

95). Bushmen and bushrangers inspired not only the new immigrants coming to the country, but eventually, they emblemized the national type. Today‟s Australian most important values, such as a solidarity, unity or mateship, have their origin in the outback

13 people‟s ways of living. Palmer describes bushrangers as “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”, while the bushman is “the only powerful and unique type yet produced in Australia” (47). The word “produced” is very important here, because as it was mentioned earlier, the Australian prototype was an invention of the then artists, politicians and intellectuals. As Elder emphasizes, Australianness was created through narratives in the process of “narrating the nation” (8). Thus, the privilege of masculinity, whiteness and European origin appeared, when the artists of

1890s‟ Australia created a myth of the bush and the bushman.

1.2. The 1890s: The Bush, the Bushman and Women

As mentioned earlier, the 1890s were the milestone in the formation of

Australianness. A very important part was played by the authors of The Bulletin and by the Heidelberg School of painters (White 26), who both helped create a national prototype which gave basis to the new Australian identity. Since “Australians generally became actively conscious, [...], of the distinctive „bush‟ ethos, and of its value as an expression and symbol of nationalism” (The Australian Legend 34), it was no surprise that the 1890 Australian intelligentsia turned to the bush.

The bush is considered to be one of the symbols of Australia representing it around the world. This is confirmed by Schaffer who suggests that “the central image against which the Australian character measures himself is the bush” (52). It was constructed as an endless place, where danger is hidden and where one of the most difficult tasks is to survive. Though the proponents of this myth usually lived in the city and often had never been to the bush (White 33), they managed to create such a

14 powerful image that it survived to these days. As Elder points out, “for many years the bush was seen as the archetypal Australian place and the bushman as the archetypal

Australian” (73-74). The bush was described as a dangerous, but romantic place and the bushman was ascribed features of a romantic gentleman of such an inhospitable place.

Even today the image of Australia rooted in the minds of many people around the world and promoted by tourism industry involves the picture of the bush, kangaroos and a strong rough man.

When the bush was constructed as a typical Australian place, the figure of an

Australian character also had to be adjusted. The men of the outback were usually considered to be rude, violent and drunkards, so it was the task of the writers and painters to create a new, more suitable image for their national purposes. As White mentions, the man of the outback was elevated to “the Bushman” and his negative features, such as drunkenness and violence, were neglected or eventually forgotten (37).

He was an idealized version of a man created by the artists of the city who had never seen the real bushman as well as the bush. It was easier for them to invent such a prototype who would represent Australian nationality by providing him with the features that the radicals considered important for the national identity, such as comradeship and freedom (White 36). Thus a myth was created according to which:

[t]he „typical Australian‟ is a practical man, rough and ready in his

manners and quick to decry any appearance of affectation in others. He is

a great improviser, ever willing „to have a go‟ at anything, but willing too

to be content with a task done in a way that is „near enough‟. Though

capable of great exertion in an emergency, he normally feels no impulse

to work hard without good cause. He swears hard and consistently,

gambles heavily and often, and drinks deeply on occasion. Though he is

15

„the world‟s best confidence man‟, he is usually taciturn rather than

talkative, one who endures stoically rather than one who acts busily. He

is a „hard case‟, sceptical about the value of religion and of intellectual

and cultural pursuits generally. [...] He is a fiercely independent person

who hates officiousness and authority, especially when these qualities are

embodied in military officers and policemen. Yet he is very hospitable

and, above all, will stick to his mates through thick and thin, even if he

thinks they may be in the wrong. (Ward, The Australian Legend 16 – 17)

All the groups of people already mentioned and the above description of the typical Australian implies that such an Australian type is a man. Not only was the

Australian prototype constructed as a man, but also the creators of this type were mostly men, for example writers, such as Henry Lawson, A. B. Peterson or J. F. Archibald, and painters, such as Tom Roberts or Arthur Streeton (White 27). The reason is that women were left out both from the national history and from participating in the building of the nation. There was no reference to women explorers, the vast majority of convicts were men and digging was also not a suitable work for women, thus diggers were also a male community. As White explains, “both the radical nationalists and the historians who engaged with them at the time, [...], wrote histories of man‟s experience in Australia as if that were the whole story” (18, emphasis in the original). The same situation took place in artistic movements. Women were usually not taken seriously, for example

Louise Mack, who infiltrated the Dawn and Dusk Club (Australian bohemian club), where majority of members were men, was taken as a joke (White 35). The women writers of the 19th century, such as Barbara Baynton and Mary Gilmore, also tried to compete with men, but even if their stories were on a comparable level, their gender made them and their stories invisible. Women were also often seen as unprofessional.

16

Thus, “women artists, [...], were not awarded the major prizes or scholarships, and generally failed to break into the professional bohemia of the period” (White 36).

Though “new” Australia wanted to get rid of the dependency on British

Empire, they adopted Western stereotypes concerning women. Their place is at home; their only task is to be good mothers and housewives. This attitude was supported by the artists of that period in the same way as they wanted to strengthen the image of the bushman. For example, The Bulletin, which had a great influence on people‟s minds, was edited by J. F. Archibald, who was considered to be an excellent editor by his contemporaries, but on the other hand, he was “unhappily married, childless misogynist” (Lake 159).

Although important groups of women appeared during the history, such as convict women or wives of the military (“Women in Colonial Times”), their importance was overshadowed either by leaving them out or by stereotyping them. Schaffer says that “women, according to Anne Summers‟ analysis, have been stereotyped into the frustrating roles of „damned whores‟ or „God‟s police‟” (31), the first being “identified with the Irish, the ex-convicts, the uncivilized”, the latter being “connected with

England, the law, Christianity and ruling-class respectability” (Schaffer 31). Thus, not only were women not given a chance to participate in building a nation, but also their position in the history was constructed to be perceived from the negative point of view.

1.3. Gender Bias

Since this thesis is closely connected to gender issues, the task of this section is to outline the relationship between gender and society, which helps to better understand the attitude towards women in Australia. Gender inequality is a world-wide

17 phenomenon, which appears in most of the societies, thus in modern sociology, the term gender bias exists to describe the inequality between genders. According to Rotchild,

“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). In other words, men have a better position than women, which was proved in the previous chapters and it will be later proved in the analysis of the short stories. This gender division goes further; as Rotschild suggests, gender determines social expectations and roles for both men and women: “Specifically, [...] women are socially expected to demonstrate feminine behaviour, [...] men are expected to act masculine” (1843). Duncan and Pfau-Effinger share the same opinion of these expectations. They claim that “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” (12). So, for example, when the drover‟s wife in Bail‟s story sweats and chops the wood, her husband looks at her with disgust (Bail 60). In her husband‟s opinion, sweating and chopping are male attributes. This stereotypical point of view is rooted in the society and in fact, such a point of view is a starting point in making differences between genders. Patil shows that “while masculinity was to consist of rationality, autonomy, activity, aggression and competitiveness [...], femininity was defined in contrast as emotionality, dependency passivity and nurturance [...]” (1871).

Such a role division considers women to be inferior to men and excludes them from nation building in Australia.

18

2. THE ANALYSIS OF THE DROVER’S WIFE STORIES

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

Lawson‟s story begins with a 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. She has four babies, thus the living space for such a family is very limited. The bush is also 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 causes frustration and, as Moore suggests, “[...] it was sometimes so powerful that it induces strains of madness” (152). Lawson often utilizes this fact. In his stories, it is women that usually do not withstand the bush surroundings and go mad

(Schaffer 121). The figure of the drover‟s wife is a good example. Though there is nobody in the bush who would appreciate her effort, she “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). She creates her own world, since she wants to escape the routine, because not only “all days are much the same to her” in the bush, but also because

“there is nothing to see, [...], and not a soul to meet” (H. Lawson 6).

On the other hand, the expression of madness shows her desire to live an ordinary live in an ordinary place. Though “all her girlish hopes and aspiration have long been dead” (H. Lawson 6), this desire is deeply embedded in her mind and is revealed by her initiative to make her life unusual. By dressing up herself and all the children, she feels again like that girl with those “usual castles in the air” (4) which she used to have as a young woman. Her youth and womanhood are also emphasized by mentioning the Young Ladies’ Journal, in which “she finds all the excitement and

19 recreation she needs” (4). It keeps her realizing that there is still a world outside the vast emptiness, which is more shiny and colorful that the gloomy bush.

There are two main situations that drive the plot of the story. The first one is the absence of her husband and the second one is a dramatic night when the snake is present in the house, both of them revealing the difficult position of the drover‟s wife.

As the title implies and the story reveals, the husband is a drover. He is away droving because he lost all his property. As Wilding implies, the husband “is an ex-squatter who has lost his land, either to the banks or through alcohol or both” (50). This aspect of separation is the important part of the story, because it exposes the vulnerability of the drover‟s wife in the bush, as she is, due to her life in the isolation, open to all kinds of danger from both nature and humans. There is another aspect to this separation. She is alone, but in fact “she is used to being left alone” (H. Lawson 4), since it is not the first time her husband has left her in the bush, so she is able to put up with such a situation.

Years in the bush and months of being alone make her used to her contemporary situation. The time spent in such conditions strengthens her in the sense of developing masculine attributes. Even Schaffer points out that “[...] 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‟”

(14). Here Lawson may be suggesting 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 to be a problem any longer. The bush and its emptiness become a part of her life, since “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 also criticizes this resigned attitude to the bush and to the feeling of solitude,

20 when he says that “her surroundings are not favourable to the development of the

„womanly‟ or sentimental side of nature” (6). By taking care of the cattle or fighting floods and fire, tasks which usually need a man‟s hand, she suppresses the feminine part of her. Thus, Lawson also mentions 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. It is not only the black color, which is usually “associated with fear and the unknown (black holes)” and “usually has a negative connotation” (“Color Meaning”), but also the word brute, which is a very uncomplimentary description of an animal likely to present a danger. The symbolism here goes much deeper. According to Schaffer, “[t]his description, [...], metonymically links the black snake/beggar/native with the forces of threat to white civilization” (134).

Basically, the black snake represents the poor people and, especially, the native, which both menace the formation of the new nation. The snake can also be connected with the similar threat described in the Bible. But the same way the drover‟s wife manages to deal with the absence of the male character, the presence of the threat in the embodiment of the snake does not represent a big problem for her. 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. As Sayer points out, “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” (“The

Drovers‟ Wives”). The story also reveals that there were other difficult situations that she had to solve with the help of masculine traits – the great fire, during which she puts

21 on the man‟s clothes, which symbolizes her supposed masculinity, the flood, breaking of the dam or the death of her child (Lawson 4 – 5). Schaffer refers to the fact that through the whole story “the woman‟s heroism is established textually through a flashback reminiscence structured to build suspense as she maintains her all-night vigil awaiting the confrontation with the snake” (134). Her ability to survive in the bush is expressed by another symbol. The presence of the “she-oaks “(H. Lawson 1) in the story stresses the woman‟s capability of survival. She, as well as the tree, stands in the middle of the bush. And she, as well as the tree, fits into this environment, though the common view may be different. The strength hidden inside is much bigger that it may seem. As Moore explains, “she has vitality, pluck and endurance. It is in these human qualities, too, that she trusts in her struggles with death and disasters” (26). At this point, Lawson shows the possibility of the self-confident and self-contained woman. He also shows that a woman can equate a man and at the same time try to preserve her womanly behavior, which is represented by the dressing up and by Young Ladies’ Journal.

2.2. Murray Bail: “The Drover’s Wife”

Bail‟s story about the drover‟s wife is told from a different perspective. As the only one from analyzed stories, it is told from the man‟s point of view. The narrator of the story is the supposed drover‟s wife‟s husband but in this version, he is a dentist. So not only the author of the short story, but also the narrator in it is a man. But despite this fact, Bail ridicules the husband, which, in fact, strengthen the position of the drover‟s wife. For the better understanding of the story, it is also essential to mention that this story is based on the famous painting by Russel Drysdale painted in 1945. In Drysdale‟s picture, there is a woman standing in the foreground who is supposed to be the drover‟s

22 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 within a desolate Australian landscape” (“Russel Drysdale”). In fact, he makes the drover‟s wife look like a strong person who is able to take care of herself no matter what place surrounds her.

The story is told by a dentist who claims that a woman in the picture happens to be his wife Hazel, which left him for a drover. For the first time, the mystical figure of the drover‟s wife has a name. But this time, 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. In Bail‟s story as well as in Lawson‟s, the drover‟s persona remains mysterious. While Lawson‟s story shows the life of the drover‟s wife in the bush, Bail deals with her life before she meets the drover. He describes the transition from the dentist‟s wife to the drover‟s wife. He also shows the husband‟s attitude towards his wife as well as towards her decision to leave the family.

Though Bail‟s version is not a typical drover‟s wife story, since the bush and the life in such surroundings are not part of the narration as in Lawson‟s story, it describes well the stereotypical attitudes towards the femininity. Since it is more or less a confession of the husband, it acts as very subjective point of view, when the husband provides a negative and critical portrayal of his wife. On the other hand, Bail presents his husband as a ridiculous person who is not able to face the fact that his wife left him.

From the very beginning, he is very critical towards his wife. He points out how she hides her wedding ring; he criticizes her face expression and even her weight (Bail 58).

And what is most important, he cannot understand her choice of the drover over him.

He, as a dentist, which is considered to be an upper-class profession, cannot understand

23 why she left him for a drover, which he does not perceived as a proper profession.

When he looks at the painting of supposedly his wife, he tries to persuade himself and the reader that she is not happy. He claims that he can “see she is having second thoughts. Distance=doubts. They‟ve had an argument” (Bail 59). To feel even more consoled he makes fun of the drover she run away with and tries to put the drover down in the reader‟s eyes: “It is my opinion, however, that he is a small character” (Bail 59).

On the other hand, the husband tries to find out more information about the drover, since he “want[s] to know all about him” (Bail 59). Both his attitude towards the drover and his curiosity have a very simple reason. According to Sayer, “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” (“The Drovers‟ Wife). The masculinity hidden in the character of the drover is closely connected with the bush, thus the bush is not spared the critique either. The husband emphasizes the sameness of the bush, which for him is the symbol of such a place: “The picture gives little away though. It is the outback – but where exactly? South Australia? It could easily be Queensland, West

Australia, the Northern Territory. We don‟t know. You could never find that spot” (Bail

58). He cannot understand why his wife chooses the bush instead of the city, since it is his opinion that there is nothing attractive in the bush at all. He also tries to imply that the myth of the bush and the bushman (the drover) is not as ideal as it was constructed in the 1890s.

The dentist‟s image of his wife is that she is “shy, even with [him]: quiet, generally non-committal” (Bail 59). But it does not mean that she does not have another side, a side, which she is forced to suppress because of her husband. Such suppression cannot be held forever, so eventually, while Lawson‟s drover‟s wife is resigned with her life situation and does not want to change it, Hazel reveals her true self, which her

24 husband does not understand. It starts on the trip to Mountain Barker, where, according to him, she is acting “like a schoolgirl” (Bail 59), throwing snowballs on him, kneeling in the snow. After that, he notices other changes in her behavior, which involve notions of male attributes such as sweating, chopping the wood or lugging the ice to their fridge

(Bail 60). Her behavior makes him say that Hazel “had a silly streak” (Bail 59). As

Sayer explains, it means “she is not a „real woman‟ and it was this very quality that motivated her to do unfeminine things” (“The Drovers‟ Wives”). But the most shocking event for him comes during their Christmas at the beach, when she kills the snake. All these acts “somehow made her less attractive in my eyes. I don‟t know why” (Bail 60).

Even though the husband says he does not know why, the reason is apparent. He cannot cope with the idea that a woman can enjoy typically men‟s activities. His attitude towards her leads to the issue of gender bias, which focuses on the assigned gender roles. It implies that she is imperfect in his eyes, since she is able to take care of tasks not appropriate for a woman. By chopping the wood or killing the snake, she stops behaving womanly for him.

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

In contrast to Bail‟s narration, where the burlesqued husband gives a misogynic point of view, Barbara Jefferis‟ story is told from different perspective, which is more feminist. Her story is in fact a reaction to the previous stories and as Sayer clarifies,

“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‟” (“The

Drovers‟ Wives”). Jefferis‟s drover‟s wife mentions Lawson‟s and Bail‟s stories, and she

25 also refers to the painting by Drysdale. This story can be perceived as a feminine manifesto against prejudiced and dominant male society. The very first sentence of the story is that “it ought to be set straight” (Jefferis 265). Jefferis‟ story implies that all that has been written so far about the drover‟s wife is not true or accurate and that all existing stories are created by male authors who use their stereotypical point of view of the femininity and facts which fit their stories. The drover‟s wife continues criticizing 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 her difficult life situation, the drover‟s wife tells her life story from her childhood to her life with the drover. She explains that her father was a drover, points out that her life is full of drunken men and that she had to live without parents (Jefferis

265 – 266). But she gets over all these difficulties, which shows how strong personality she is.

As already mentioned, Jefferis “corrects” the previous authors‟ inaccuracies in the drover‟s wife stories from the drover‟s wife‟s perspective. Firstly, the drover‟s wife deals with the original story by Henry Lawson, who becomes a character in Jefferis‟ story. On the one hand, she likes him as a person, because “he really listened” (Jefferis

266). On the other hand, she is not satisfied with the way in which he processes her story. She cannot fully understand why he makes 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). Here Jefferis shows how Lawson participated in the creating of the myth by mixing various facts and fiction, which led to the permanent invisibility of women and their stories. In her version, the night of the snake incident was not as dramatic as Lawson is describing. Jefferis‟ drover‟s wife narrates that there have been

26 other, more difficult situations in her life than the snake night, one of them being the death of her baby (Jefferis 266). But it seems to her that Lawson as a character in the story is not much interested in her real trouble, when she points out that “funny the way he was more taken by a snake story, the sort happens to everyone two or three times in a year” (Jefferis 267). Essentially, it is suggested that even though men write about women, they dismiss women‟s problems, since along with their problems they would have to write 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). They rather use what they need to strengthen the power of their own stories, whereas the women‟s voices are utterly left out. The drover‟s wife goes on saying that Lawson is “[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). And again, she suggests that Lawson adjusted reality, this time to the needs of the nation. As one of the most important writers of the

1890s, Lawson took part in the nation building and as it was suggested in the introductory part, this nation building was proceeding due to the contemporary artists, who, by degrees, created the Australian identity.

Another issue the drover‟s wife finds not appropriate relates to her intellect.

According to Jefferis, the “girlish hopes and aspirations” that Lawson mentions in his story are not dead at all (267). What Jefferis‟ drover‟s wife tries to point out is that women must not give up their fancies; they should keep trying, believing and doing what they used to like. As she suggests, “even the hardest times don‟t stop fancies, don‟t stop a woman being broody, [...]” (Jefferis 268). The only problem, she explains, is that

“hardest thing of all women is that everything they do is for un-doing” (Jefferis 268). It basically means that whatever women do, it lasts only a short time to disappear

27 eventually: “You have to laugh sometimes at the way your hard work goes down people‟s throats or under their dirty boots” (Jefferis 268). Firstly, Jefferis hints at the stereotypes anchored in gender bias, where women are connected with passivity and nurturance and where the activity and rationality is connected with men. And secondly, she tries to show that it does not matter how much women try to make their voices heard, since there are other voices superior to them which make them invisible. Thus,

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, i.e. The Bulletin, has been a very famous and important Australian magazine since the 1890s related to intellectuals. The reason why Jefferis mentions this magazine is that it was The Bulletin where Lawson‟s “The Drover‟s Wife” appeared for the first time. It was this magazine which helped to create the Australian nationality and which excluded women from this process. But it is also here to show that the drover‟s wife is an educated woman who can read and, in fact, enjoys reading such a magazine; and is able to appreciate literary texts which appear in it.

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 drover‟s 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).

And again, she points out the ignorance of Lawson‟s character, 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 indicates that women do not enjoy reading as men, since their duties at household do not allow it. But Jefferis contradicts this, when she tries to disprove this view by the drover‟s wife‟s knowledge of at least 73 poems and of various writers not only of Australian origin, but also Christina Rossetti, an English poet

28

(268-269).

Apart from alluding to Lawson‟s story, Jefferis also refers to Bail along with his husband‟s point of view on the situation. As already written, Bail tells the story from the man point of view (the dentist) and Jefferis does it from the drover‟s wife‟s perspective. While Bail tries to defend women symbolically by ridiculing the husband‟s character, Jefferis fulfils this task directly. And her drover‟s wife is as critical towards

Bail, who also figures as a character in Jefferis‟ story, as towards the character of

Lawson. She points out his 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). The character of Bail does not think about all the harm and consequences that such a story can have. She also mentions

Bail‟s character of the dentist when she says that “[h]e 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 the drover‟s wife criticize his personality, she also points out that he is not used to reading in a way she is. 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.

In the very last page, there is one more issue, which refers to the stereotypical perception of women. The drover‟s wife mentions that men “talk about women as though they were animals [...]. Reason‟s plain enough; these are things you can own, use, brand [...]” (272). As the previous quote shows, 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. The stories about the drover‟s wife suggest that a woman is nothing more than an object to the man. But as Jefferis‟ drover‟s wife

29 explains: “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, [...]” (72). By her story,

Jefferis tries to deny this characterization and show that women are equal to men, since they have the same rights and desires as men.

2.4. Mandy Sayer: “The Drover’s Wife”

As there is Bail‟s story told from the men‟s perspective, where the husband directly blames the woman, Sayer‟s story is the complete opposite. It is told by a woman who is considered to be the drover‟s wife who gives her own point of view on the events that happened. As Sayer points out, she “felt the need to tell the story from the woman's perspective, to give her a voice, a name, a history” (“The Drovers‟Wives”).

At the very beginning of the story, Sayer‟s drover‟s wife, as well as Jefferis‟, tries to call attention to the supposed “mistakes” that appeared in previous stories.

Two men are mentioned at the beginning – Gordon (the dentist) from Bail‟s story and Russell (Russell Drysdale, the painter). Sayer‟s narrator makes an implication in the story that the famous painting by Drysdale is in fact painted by the dentist (“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). Sayer makes it sound as if 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.

Again, Sayer, as well as Jefferis, points out how the myth of the bush was created and spread over the country. According to the narrator, Gordon painted that painting in anger and published it to humiliate his wife. He tries to hide the truth that she left him, since it is a part of his personality to create various fictions about his person (Sayer, “The

Drover‟s Wife 66). It also shows his ignorance towards his wife, since the woman in the

30 painting cannot defend herself, she cannot provide her testimony, which is exactly what he intended, to tell the story without any opportunity of her disclaiming such affirmation. The woman in the painting simply cannot speak.

The supposed drover‟s wife mentions that there are certain “mistakes” in the stories and this time 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 her. The clothes, her weight, the suitcase, all of these change her actual look, because as she points out, “all art, perhaps, is motivated by an imperceptible thread of revenge” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 66).

The husband makes her look “plain, harsh and undesirable in 1945, just like the „rotten landscape‟” (Sayer, “The Drovers‟ Wives”). But as the story reveals, it is the husband who is plain, harsh and undesirable, since he lacks the sexual interest in his wife, which leads to the end of their marriage (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wives”). The drover‟s wife also points out that she did not run away with a drover, since Liam, the character from the camping trip, is not a drover, but a snake charmer and she did not run away with him

(Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife 68). The drover‟s wife goes on explaining that the falsehood is embedded in Gordon‟s mind and that it is not the first time he is making up. Namely,

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). 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). 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. As Sayer explains in her story, “people only pretend to be other

31 people when they don‟t like who they are” (“The Drover‟s Wife” 66). And it also 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. Gordon is a manipulator who needs to have every situation under control.

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

67), in the drover‟s wife opinion, he is the one doing silly things. In the first place, there is the made up painting. Secondly, there is the change of his personality in different situations by means of various cards. 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. Gordon divides the tents as well as gender bias strictly divides male and female attributes between genders. Next evidence of his “silly streak” can be seen when he decides about the side for their camps, which turns out to be “alongside the Adelaide-Port Augusta railway line” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife” 67). While his wife “was in [her] element”

(Sayer, The Drover‟s Wife 67), Gordon is absolutely lost in nature, which shows his narrow mind concerning the outer world.

The biggest imperfection of his is the attitude towards his wife‟s behavior and needs. Though the drover‟s wife probably loves his husband, because as she herself says, “there were, [...], things [she] loved about her husband” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s

Wife” 67), she is not happy in this marriage. He is not able to understand why she bought the silk night tie and he cannot fulfill her desires, since he finds them disgusting.

As Sayer explains, “Gordon desires a sensible wife, not a sensual one” (“The Drovers‟

32

Wives). The only time she can show her feelings is when she is alone at home, dancing seductively in front of the mirror (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife 66). The crucial incident happens during their camping trip, where they meet Liam, the snake charmer. Although the tents were divided according to the gender, the children fell asleep in the car, so

Hazel shared the tent with Gordon. When Hazel and Gordon fall asleep, one of Liam‟s snakes crawls into their tent. Hazel describes how she “allows it to slide around her body as she performs one of the sensual dances she choreographed at home” (Sayer,

“The Drovers‟ Wives). In her words, 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 for a long time and as she remarks, “when you deny a need, it grows into an illness” (Sayer, “The Drover‟s Wife 68). She is having an erotic experience, 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 danger. But this time it is rather a symbol of phallus, which reflects her sexual desires her husband is not able to fulfill. For her, it is a representation of a “real man”, which the husband is not, which Bail mentions in his story, too. But Gordon perceives is more as a symbol of 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

33 differs from the '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.

34

3. VARIATIONS ON THE DROVER’S WIFE STORY

3.1. Barbara Baynton: “The Chosen Vessel”

Barbara Baynton, one of the “invisible” women writers of the 1890s, felt the urge to write her own story about a woman living in the bush, but from the very different perspective in comparison to Lawson‟s narration. As Kossew explains,

Baynton “offers a woman‟s perspective on women in the bush which sees them as victims of white men, and of the stereotypical notions of womanhood held by such men” (26). Her story is a reaction to Lawson‟s drover‟s wife and shows that a woman is not able to survive in the bush. But the bush itself is not dangerous. The danger is represented by the men living there. She refers to the fact that the biggest enemy of the woman is a man. Thus, Baynton denies her character such qualities as bravery or strength to prove that a woman is primarily a victim of men. As Kossew suggests,

“Australian women can be seen to have been „caged‟ not simply by their physical isolation and privations, [...], but also by masculinist representations that confined them to captivity in the domestic sphere, in marriage and in nationalist discourse” (26). By her story, Baynton tries to demonstrate what the position of women in Australian society of the 1890s was.

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 compared to the typical drover‟s wife story 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

35 fact, points out the same issue in it – the struggle of women against established stereotypes in male dominated society. But in contrast to previous stories, here the drover‟s wife is a woman who does not defeat, but who is defeated. As Barrett explains,

“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”. Thus, 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 that

Barrett mentions.

At the very beginning, the story reveals that the 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 deal with everyday tasks, but mainly because of her husband. And it is the husband who is the first male threat waiting for her 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 is a tyrant, who is mean to her. And what is more, he often mocks her, so “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 about what can 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. Barrett points out that “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), which is one of the established views of the male dominated society.

The second threat is the persona of a swagman, a person wandering in the bush

36 and asking for needed supplies from time to time. As a woman living in the bush, the woman is used to meeting strangers who stop at her house with the plea of help. And as she explains, “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 feels an urgent need to pen up the calf much earlier than usual to stay safe inside of the house; but she also pretends that her husband is at home, but sick (Baynton 133). Thus, as she still feels the possible threat coming from the swagman, she barricades in her house, so nobody can get in. She is nervously waiting for her doom inside the house, holding her baby tight.

But the swagman represents an inevitable end regardless of what she does. Eventually,

“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 throat, that the cry of “Murder” came from her lips” (Baynton 137). So the swagman is presented as a coldblooded murderer, by which means Baynton contradicts the myth of the bushman. In this narration, similarly to Lawson‟s story (the snake under the house), there is a brute threatening her life, but in contrast to Lawson, 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 the character of Peter Hennessey. At first sight, he does not seem to be a threat for the woman, but 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). He has a chance to save her life, but he does not do it. So he does not help the woman in emergency, but he rather turns his vision into a sign from heaven. A. Lawson suggests that “the woman in "The Chosen

Vessel" is a victim of the patriarchal tendency to turn 'woman' into symbol, to

37 depersonalize her and make her the recipient of male fantasy, whether sexual or religious”. So the biggest sin he commits is the act of indifference. Hennessey 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. Instead of admitting the real situation of that woman, he invents his own explanation of what he sees.

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

Gambling gives her version of the drover‟s wife story a modern format. The supposed drover‟s wife is a university student and the mythological bushman (the drover) is a drunkard and a redneck. This contradiction of the myth appears also in

Baynton, where the bushman is presented as a murderer. In Gambling‟s story, the drover and the woman are not married, but they are only living together as a couple. She is his girlfriend, not his wife. As Sayer points out, “the title of the story, "The Drover's De

Facto" puts a contemporary spin on the tale, hinting at tensions between traditional bush culture and the protagonist, a modern city woman” (“The Drovers‟ Wives”). But

Gambling, as well as Baynton, wants to prove that the bush is “no place for a woman”

(Schaffer 62) and along with Baynton, Bail, Jefferis and Sayer she tries to show that the myth of the bush and the bushman is only a creation of that period and it does not reflect the reality. Despite the modern settings in which the story takes place, the main point remains – the struggle of the stereotyped femininity in the male dominated society.

As a university student, Gamblin‟s drover‟s wife is assumed to be clever and educated. She has a university degree and she is working on her thesis (Gambling 150).

She is supposed to be self-confident and self-sufficient. But at the very beginning,

Gambling shows that despite her education, she still “wanted to be wooed and bought

38 expensive drinks” (Gambling 149) and therefore wants to be treated as an ordinary woman. Similarly to Jefferis‟ and Sayer‟s story, the narration also reveals that just as any other woman, she has various desires. In this story, the university girl‟s dream is a real man – “big, bold, brash” (Gambling 149). As the drover‟s wife explains, “she was sick of all those emaciated city boys with their thin bodies and thin ties” (Gambling

149), so when she meets the drover, she is satisfied, for her dreams come true. Sayer points out that she “is seduced by myths of „the bush‟ and by country man who represents it” (“The Drovers‟ Wives”). So even though she and the drover do not live in the bush, but in a small town, she still feels the magic of the bush in the presence of the rough drover. But “the romance of the bush overtook her sensibilities” (Gambling 150) and she is blind to what the drover‟s true personality is. She also finds out that she is

“uneducated and unprepared” for such life (Gambling 150), since she has to do things that she does not learn in school. She cannot cook and she has never chopped the wood, which she has to do when the drover is away. In contrast to Bail‟s drover‟s wife, she does not enjoy it, since her hands “turned to red blisters and open sores” (Gambling

151). The life in the harsh conditions and the loneliness makes her realize that “it wasn‟t like in the books and that make her sad” (Gambling 151). Gambling‟s story contradicts the myth with the reality, showing that the ideals of the bush and the bushman are at variance with the facts, since the drover does not reflect the personality, which was established for the bushman in the 1890s.

The persona of the drover seems very attractive to the drover‟s wife at first and she probably feels sorry for him because of his unsuccessful marriage (Gambling 150).

But as the time goes on, the drover shows his real personality and starts to treat her like his property, exactly as the stereotypes shows in previous stories. Every time he is gone

“droving” (, he is not the real drover, but he drives a track in Gambling‟s story), she is

39 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” (Gambling 151). He is mean to her, cheats on her and his behavior towards her starts to be brutal, even violent, especially regarding 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 similarly to Baynton, Gambling suggests that the threat for women is not the surrounding bush, but rather the presence of men living there. In “The Drover‟s De Facto”, it is the physical and psychical torturer that represents the threat for the drover‟s wife. And analogous to “The Chosen Vessel”, the man also mocks her, since the drover strongly underestimates and ridicules the woman, when he says she is “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, which makes her stop writing the thesis (Gambling 153). But after a huge fight with the drover, she is able to get over it and start to live again, which makes her stronger and more courageous than before. She points out that “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). He notices her newly gained self-confidence. “She started going out more.

Looked up some elementary psych texts and decided to do something about her situation” (Gambling 155). And that gives the drover the reason to control her. He needs to know what she is doing and where she is going. The crucial moment occurs, when she is out one night and meets an engineer (Gambling 156 – 157). Even though they only spend a nice evening in the town together, when the drover gets to know about it from the neighbors, he is furious and does not want to listen to her, since as he claims

“[he] heard all [he] wanna hear from the blokes in town” (Gambling 157). Just as

40

Gordon symbolically makes his wife silent in the painting in Jefferis‟ story, so the

Gambling‟s drover refuses to listen to the woman out. He does not trust her and he even slaps her. He wants her to get out of his house. Eventually, she leaves him, despite his apologies and pleas, “because [he] questioned [her] fidelity” (Gambling 157). All his behavior reflects the stereotypical views of women and the drover‟s wife then represents the struggle of women against those stereotypes. Gambling uses an educated woman and an uneducated drunkard to imply that the education is not a matter of gender. She also shows what the Australian men look like. By depicting the drover in an uncomplimentary way, Gambling points out that the stereotypes related to the myth of the bushmen are also mistaken.

41

CONCLUSION

Since Australian people longed to gain independence on the British Empire and so become an independent nation, in the 1890s, the intelligentsia started to create the myth which would henceforth represent Australia in the world. Thus, the myth of the bush and the bushman was brought forth and became an essential part for the nation building. Authors, such as Lawson, Paterson or Archibald, celebrated the bush and the bushman in order to strengthen the patriotism in the people by creating an image of the typical Australianness, whereas they used a person from the outback as a model and invented a new personality for this prototype, which would reflect typically Australian features such as mateship or solidarity – those desirable for radical movement.

This process of the nation building had a huge influence on the position of

Australian women, especially those involved in artistic movements. These women were often disregarded and eventually, their voices were left out. Even though Australia was the first country in the world where women were allowed to vote, they were often made invisible during the history. Though Barbara Baynton is considered to be one of the biggest authors in Australian history in these days, her contemporaries often neglected her efforts, since the position of women in the society was subject to the Western stereotypes, which set women into the role of mother and wife, whose place is at home.

And these stereotypes appeared not only in the history, but also in literature.

A man as a head of the family and its breadwinner and a woman as a housewife and a mother were stereotypical views that appeared in majority of Western societies.

While a man could hold any position in the society, a woman had her place at home. In

Australia, the created myth of the bush and the bushman made the position of women even harder, since the typical Australian was constructed as a man. The analysis of the 42 drover‟s wife stories showed that women were perceived through various stereotypes concerning their subordination to men and their emplacement at home, where they were supposed to take care of their family and the household. On the other hand, the characters of the stories challenge these stereotypes and suggest that their meaning is exaggerated. The analysis proved that women were able to deal with difficult life situations. On the contrary, the authors, starting with Bail, try to lower the men. The character of Gordon is depicted as an unworthy, ridiculous person, who tries desperately to discredit his wife, since he is not able to accept the fact that his wife could be more than a housewife or a mother and that she leaves him. As the analyzed stories revealed,

Lawson, Bail, Jefferis and Sayer tries to point out that all stereotypes concerning the position of women in the society are mistaken and that women in fact can equate men in most situations and that the bush is not as terrifying for women as it is often imagined.

In their stories, Baynton and Gambling show that it is not the bush which is dangerous for women, but it is the man who is the biggest threat in women‟s lives. Both of them deconstruct the mythical figure of the bushman. Whereas in Baynton‟s story he is a murderer, Gambling depicts him as a violent tyrant. In both stories, the fate of women is represented by a bushman (in Gambling impersonated by the drover). They also dispute the fact that the bush is a suitable place for a woman and show that a woman is not satisfied in such conditions and that she is not able to deal with them.

43

WORKS CITED

Bail, Murray. “The Drover‟s Wife.” The Drover’s Wife And Other Stories.

London: Faber and Faber, 1986. 57 – 61. Print.

Barrett, Susan. "No Place for a Woman? Barbara Baynton's Bush Studies."

Journal of the Short Story in English 40 (Spring 2003): 85-96. Rpt. in

Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Vol. 211. Detroit: Gale, 2009.

Literature Resource Center. Web. 6 May 2012.

Baynton, Barbara. Bush Studies. Sydney: Harper Collins, 2001. Print.

“Color Meaning.” Color Wheel Pro. Color Wheel Pro, n.d. Web. 16 Nov 2012.

Duncan, Simon, and Pfau-Effinger, Birgit. Gender, Economy and Culture in the

European Union. London: Routledge, 2002. Print.

Elder, Catriona. Being Australian: Narratives of National Identity. Crows Nest,

N.S.W.: Allen & Unwin, 2007. Print.

"European Discovery and Colonisation." Australian Government. Australian

Government, n.d. Web. 10 May 2012.

australia/australian-story/european-discovery-and-colonisation>

Gambling, Anne. "The Drover's De Facto". Latitudes: New Writing from the

North. ed. Susan Johnston, St. Lucia: UQP, 1986. 149 – 159. Print.

Hughes, Robert. The Fatal Shore. Frome: Butler & Tanner Ltd., 1986. Print.

Jefferis, Barbara. "The Drover's Wife". The Bulletin. Dec 1980. Print.

Kossew, Sue. Writing Woman, Writing Place. London: Routledge, 2004. Print.

Lake, Marilyn. “The Politics of Respectability.” Images of Australia. Ed.

Gillian Whitlock and David Carter. Queensland: Queensland UP, 1993.

44

156 – 165. Print.

Lawson, Alan. "Barbara Baynton." Australian Literature, 1788-1914. Ed.

Selina Samuels. Detroit: Gale Group, 2001. Dictionary of Literary

Biography Vol. 230. N.p. Literature Resource Center. Web. 6 Apr 2012.

Lawson, Henry. “The Drover‟s Wife.” Henry Lawson’s Best Stories. Ed. Cecil

Mann. Augus and Robertson, 1980. Print.

Moore, T. Social Patterns in Australian Literature. 1st pub. Berkeley:

California UP, 1971. Print.

Palmer, Vance. The Legend of the Nineties. Melbourne: Melbourne UP, 1954.

Print.

Patil, Vrushali. “Gender Oppression.” Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology.

Ed. George Ritzer. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2007. 1871 – 1872.

Print.

Plante, Rebecca F., and Kimmel, Michael S. “Sexuality, Masculinity and.”

Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology. Ed. George Ritzer. Malden:

Blackwell Publishing, 2007. 4272 – 4275. Print.

Rotchild, Jennifer. “Gender Bias.” Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology. Ed.

George Ritzer. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2007. 1843 – 1845. Print.

“Russel Drysdale.” National Gallery of Australia. National Gallery of

Australia, n.d. Web. 12 Nov 2012.

Sayer, Mandy. “The Drover‟s Wife.” Australian Book Review. May (1996): 66

– 68. Print.

---. "The Drovers' Wives." Southerly 68.2 (2008): 193+. Literature Resource

Center. Web. 6 May 2012.

45

Schaffer, Kay. Women and the Bush. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1988. Print.

Walter, James. “Defining Australia.” Images of Australia. Ed. Gillian Whitlock

and David Carter. Queensland: Queensland UP, 1993. 7 – 22. Print.

Ward, Russel. Concise History of Australia. Queensland: Queensland UP,

1992. Print.

---. The Australian Legend. Melbourne: Oxford UP, 1978. Print.

White, Richard. “Inventing Australia.” Images of Australia. Ed. Gillian

Whitlock and David Carter. Queensland: Queensland UP, 1993. 23 –

58. Print.

Wilding, Michael. Studies in Classic Australian Fiction. Sydney : Sydney

Studies, 1997. Print.

"Women in Colonial Times." Australian Government. Australian Government,

n.d. Web. 14 May 2012.

australia/australian-story/women-in-colonial-times>

46

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 v roce 1892 pro časopis The Bulletin. Povídka vypráví příběh ženy, která žije v buši se svými dětmi, zatímco její muž pracuje mimo domov. O pár let později napsala Barbara Baynton povídku “Vybrané plavidlo”, která se snažila vyvrátit původní příběh. 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 identity a pozice žen v tehdejší společnosti. Úvod je rozdělen do tří podkapitol, přičemž se jednotlivé podkapitoly zabývají jednotlivými problémy souvisejícími s australskou identitou, vytvořením této identity a se zastíněním žen v průběhu historie.

Následují dvě kapitoly. Druhá kapitola se zabývá analýzou čtyř příběhů o předákově ženě. Nejprve je rozebrán původní příběh Henryho Lawsona, dále pak následují příběhy od Baila, Jefferisové a Sayerové. Všechny čtyři příběhy jsou propojeny a reagují na sebe. Ukazují, jak fungují sterotypy týkající se žen a mužů. Třetí kapitola se zabývá analýzou dvou příběhů, přičemž se tyto dva příběhy od předchozích liší, neboť je v nich předákova žena popsána jako oběť.

47

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 and it was published in 1892 in the

Australian magazine The Bulletin. The story is about a woman living in the bush with her children, while her husband is away working. A few years later, Barbara Baynton published the story “The Chosen Vessel”, whereby she contradicted Lawson‟s narration.

Many authors also consequently published short stories with the same or very similar theme as a reaction on Lawson‟s 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 identity and the position of women in then society is provided. The introduction is divided into three subchapters, whereas individual subchapters deal with issues connected to Australian identity, its creation and the extinguishment of women from history.

Two more chapters follow. The second chapter analyzes four stories about the drover‟s wife. The analysis starts with Lawson‟s original story and then Bail‟s, Jefferis‟ and Sayer‟s stories are analyzed. All four stories are connected and react on each other.

They show how the stereotypes concerning femininity and masculinity work. The third chapter deals with two more analyses, whereas those two stories differ from the previous ones, since the drover‟s wife is depicted as a victim. 48