Australia Has Few Writers of Great Fame.

Waikato Times, Volume 103, Issue 17411, 25 May 1928, Page 10

Australia Has Few Writers of Great Fame.

In these new lands under the South- ' ern Cross, literature is the Cinderella of ■ tho arts. Much of the talent which j might have produced real literature i spent itself in politics and journalism. | Many of the writers of Australasia j havo been men of affairs. Hitherto j Australian literature has expressed itsett in poetry rather than prose, following the universal precedent in the life of nations (writes the Melbourne correspondent of the “Christian Science j Monitor”). Marcus Clarke, an Englishman who I came to Victoria, wrote the most powerful, and perhaps the most popular of Australian works of fiction, “For the Term of His Natural Life.” This was J produced recently as a picture play, with marked success. Bushringing Stories. Perhaps the look which ranks next in esteem is “Robbery Under Arms, by Thomas Brown, who wrote under '.he pen name of “Rolf Boldrewood.” Like i Clarke’s story, it is .a picture of real life I in the early days. ! Of contemporary life, Henry Lawson | is by iar the best and also the most popular delineatr r. Ho was a bushman born, and wrote both in verso and prose. His prose sketches reveal a genius somewhat akin to that of Bret Harte. Ho had the gifts of humour, keen observation, and a racy style. His sketches of Australian life are unsurpassed for their fidelity. “While the Billy Boils” is the most popular of all his collection. As a poet he did not reach a high standard, but achieved a great popularity on account of ius thoroughly Australian outlook and abibty ’o'express tho soul of I tho working people. i Adam Lindsay Gordon. 1 In- Australian poetry the name oi J Adam Lindsay Gordon stiU holds pricje |of pltice. Born in England, of an aris- | tocratic family, he had a classical edu- | cation. Wayward in youth, he left i England for Australia as a young man, I and spent the rest of a roving ancj/ uni succeesful life in South Australia and j Victoria. As a poet bo was influenced

♦♦♦ ♦♦♦ ♦♦♦ V ♦♦♦ ♦»* Fiction Deals With Bush and Colonial Life Gordon's Poetry Leads .

largely by Byron. Browning and Swinburne. He had all the love of the English aristocrat for horses, and became famous in Australia as a horseman. His poetry is not distinctively Australian. Yet he became the favourite poet of Australia, chiefly on account- of his love of outdoor life ’and his sporting poems. Henry Kendall, a native of Australia, found his inspiration in the nature .around him. His work is finer as poetry than that of Gordon, but not so popular. Of living poets, Shaw Neilson, a native of South Australia, has won the foremost place by virtue of a sweet lyric strain, a delicate fancy and that quality of glamour which belongs to the Gael. Mary Gilmour has published several books of verse, revealing sympathy with human nature in all its varied expressions. A book of prose “The Hound of the Road” recalls ‘The Roadmcnder, of Michael Fairless. Another popular poet, who has a vogue as a singer of Australian life in the bush, is A. B. Paterson, one of the Bulletin School, so called from the famons Sydney weekly in which most of their work first appeared.