HENRY LAWSON'S PORTRAYAL OF AUSTRALIANISM by Mayumi Miyamoto 宮本まゆみ A Dissertation Presented to The Graduate School of Language, Communication, and Culture Kwansei Gakuin University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy March 2012 Doctor of Philosophy Dissertation Henry Lawson's Portrayal of Australianism by Mayumi Miyamoto Members of Evaluation Committee Major Advisor: Associate Advisor: Associate Advisor: Associate Advisor: 1 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First, I would like to express my deep gratitude to the late Professor Emeritus Gen Ohinata for accepting me as his student and providing me with valuable advice even though my theme, Australian literature, was not very popular in Japan. I also thank Professor Kazuhiko Tamura for taking over the role of "major advisor", and Professors Naoto Sugiyama and Kazuhiko Sekitani, for their appropriate advice. I am very grateful to Associate Professor Jun Nagatomo for his kind help. I give my many thanks to Assistant Professor Shirley Leane of Tottori University for her help in checking my English and giving useful advice. I would like to convey special thanks to Doctor Peter Kirkpatrick of the University of Sydney for sharing his time with me in his office and the important advice he gave at that time. Many thanks to my family, including my mother, uncle, and sister-in -law for their kind cooperation. Thanks also to my friends who often encouraged me to continue my study, especially when I felt weak and tired. Finally, I would like to say "THANK YOU!" to my own family, my husband and two sons, for their patience and support during the almost ten years of my study about Henry Lawson. 11 ABSTRACT Henry Lawson's Portrayal of Australianism by Mayumi Miyamoto Henry Lawson (1867-1922) is a well-known Australian writer. In his time, his poems and short stories describing the Australian bush and the people who lived there, were very popular. When he started his writing career in 1887, Australia was celebrating the centenary of its first European immigration, and the growing numbers of Australia-born citizens had already developed their own characteristics and mannerisms. Lawson illustrated "Australianism" or what it is that characterises people in Australia, through not a few bush characters who appear in his writings. For Lawson, the Australian bush, an embodiment of the Australian climate and environment, was the primary source of "Australianism". It was where he was born and lived in his younger days, and later, where he matured as a writer as well as a person. In his writings, Lawson defines the bush as the cause of three main woes: solitude, madness, and death. The characters in his poems and stories, on the whole, suffer from these woes as a result of the harsh environment, and they are usually unsuccessful in their lives. In Lawson's writings, the bush is an absolute entity that people never overcome, nor 111 escape from, no matter where they live. Lawson highlights "mateship", a unique form of friendship among men living in the bush, as a way of getting relief from their hardship. He also shows how to enjoy life, even in hard circumstances, in his humorous stories, and suggests a human relationship for people living in the bush, separate from "mateship", in his family stories. No Lawson character becomes a winner in the bush. These are all important factors which characterise the people living in Australia to be "Australian". The beginnings of the nation with convict transportation and Irish immigrants, as well as the Australian bush were also major factors which gave Australians their own characteristics. However, Lawson did not positively write about either the convicts or the Irish immigrants. His lack of characters representing these two important groups conveys far more about typical Australians of his time, than if he had actually written about them. Lawson insists in his poem, "The Men Who Made Australia", that the bush people are those who really made their country and should be praised for their exertions. People, in turn, would have become more aware of their characteristics as Australians by reading Lawson's poems and short stories. Henry Lawson appeared during a time of transition when Australia changed from a British settlement to a federated nation, and he contributed to the awareness of the people as new citizens independent of their native country. Today, Australia has greatly changed from Lawson's times and has become a multi ·cultural country, however, Lawson and his literature will live on and be remembered whenever the Australians have a need to know where they come from and what they should aim for in the future. IV Contents Members of Evaluation Committee ...................................................... i Acknowledgement ........................................................................... ii Abstract ........................................................................................ iii Introduction ..................................................................................... 1 Chapter I ...... oo .............................................. oo • ... ••• ... ... ... ... ... .. •• .. 10 Change of the Characters in Lawson's Writings Chapter II .................................................................................... 25 The Australian Bush and Lawson's Bush Characters Chapter III ................................................................................. 43 Deaths in "The Hero of Redclay" Chapter IV. .. .. ... .. .. .. ... ... ... ... .. ... ... .. ... .. ... ... ... .. ... .. ... .. ... 56 Mateship Described in Lawson's Writings Chapter V ........................... oo ........... oo • oo .OO to •• oo oo •• to oo •• oo ................. 70 Humour in Lawson's Bush Stories Chapter VI ................................................................................. 91 Joe Wilson, a Family Bushman Chapter VII ................................................................................. 110 Convicts and the Irish for Lawson's Literature Conclusion .................................................................................. 127 Notes ..................................... t. t •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 131 Bibliography ................................................................................ 147 v Introduction Henry Archibald Lawson (1867-1922) started his writing career almost a hundred years after the first landing of the British fleet in Australia. That was also the time when Australia started to have her own characteristics and foster the culture, apart from Britain.1 This thesis will explore the ethos of Australia or the "Australianism", expressed in Lawson's writing. In particular, some characters in his poems and stories, which seem to represent Australian characteristics with their words, deeds, and thoughts, will be examined. This thesis is not about Australian identity, but rather is about character. Identity is established, or created by the person concerned, whereas character is often more accurately assessed by an onlooker. Generally speaking, character is acquired unconsciously· and people are not always aware of the habits they have developed. Character traits are sometimes grasped more clearly when observed from a distance. Henry Lawson was an important literary figure in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century Australia. He was born in 1867 to an Australian mother, Louisa, and a Norwegian father, Peter, in the small town of Grenfell in the state of New South Wales. He wrote his first poem in 1887, when Australia was still a colony of the British Empire, which began in 1788 when the first British fleet arrived in Sydney. Lawson wrote many works, in both verse and prose, including masterpieces and failures, during his thirty-five-year writing career. Lawson is generally thought to have been prosperous only for about the first fifteen years of his writing career. In particular, his successful years virtually coincided with the final vital years before Australian 1 Federation. 2 In the new, twentieth century, he continued to write poems and stories, but unfortunately, he could not produce as many masterpieces as in the early period. In his later years, he separated from his wife and children, was hit with several lawsuits, and was in and out of gaol and mental institutions. In the end, he became a penniless drunkard, and even with support from his friends, barely survived until his death from cerebral hemorrhage in 1922. During the time Lawson was in his prime as a writer, Australia was in the final period of colonisation. The demographic structure of the country at that time was completely different from today. The total population of Australia, excluding Aborigines, by the end of 1900 was approximately 3,765,000, and by 1901, almost 77.1% of the population was Australian -born. 3 Some of the ancestors of the Australian·born people had been immigrants, others were convicts, mostly from Britain and Ireland. There were also immigrants from other European and Asian countries, but the numbers were very small at that time.4 New South Wales, where Lawson was born and lived, had a population of over 1,350,000 in 1901.5 The percentage of the state's population who were Australian-born was similar to that of the whole country.6 In 1891, in New South Wales, 52.2% of the immigrant population were English born, 13% were Scottish, 26.3% Irish, 1.8% Wales. Other Europeans included Germans (3.3%), and Scandinavians (1.6%). 7 The situation was