by Jill Roe
32P. R. Stephensen to SMF, 1/3/1952, FP vol. 28, and SMF to J. K. Moir, 10/3/1952, FP vol. 34, also 14/3/1952, J. K. Moir Colln.*
33SMF to J. K. Moir, 14/3/1952, J. K. Moir Colln;* SMF to P. R. Stephensen, 21/6/1951, FP vol. 28.
34‘The Hansom Cab Mystery’, Bulletin, 17/12/1952, p. 35, repr. A Gregarious Culture. Author Fergus Hume (1859–1932) left Australia permanently for England in 1888 (ADB vol. 4).
35Pixie O’Harris, Bulletin, 5/10/1963, p. 53, and Was It Yesterday?, p. 72. A marked-up ts. of Childhood at Brindabella with the original photographs survives, Angus & Robertson Archive, ML MSS 314, Box 38, also a fair copy of ‘I remember’ made by Ruby Bridle (presently in my possession); but the original has not been sighted, nor the possible draft foreword, dated 14/8/1952 mentioned in the Publisher’s Note, Childhood at Brindabella, 1987 edn.
36SMF to Pixie O’Harris, letter cited in the Publisher’s Note, Childhood at Brindabella, 1987 edn.
37SMF to Ian Mudie, 5/7/1951, FP vol. 36.* Dr Anderson to SMF, 10/3/1951, FP vol. 43. Douglas Joseph Anderson, MD (1907–70), was a prominent Macquarie St physician, with expertise in tuberculosis (ADB file).
38Jean Devanny to SMF, 28/4/1952, FP vol. 32; SMF to Les Woolacott, 28/4/52, FP vol. 44.
39PD, 9/4/1952, 19/6/1952, SMH, 19/6/1952, p. 15; SMF to Dymphna Cusack, 21/6/1953, repr. North, Yarn Spinners; SMF to Rex Ingamells, 3/6/1952, Ingamells Colln. Edouard Borovansky (1902–59), ADB vol. 13.
40Gertrude Kinred to SMF, 19/2/1952, FP vol. 49; SMF to Ethel Ruby Bridle, 10/2/1954, FP vol. 47.
41SMF to J. K. Moir, 2/4/1952, J. K. Moir Colln; SMF to Henrietta Drake-Brockman, 15/4/1952, FP vol. 33;* SMF to J. K. Moir, 26/5/1952, FP vol. 34; SMF to Ian Mudie, 9/5/1952, FP vol. 36; SMF to J. K. Moir, 14/8/1952, J. K. Moir Colln (‘a new Australian’).
42J. K. Ewers to SMF, 7/8/1952, FP vol. 42; KSP to SMF, 25/8/1952, FP vol. 12;* SMF to Rex Ingamells, 14/6/1952, Ingamells Colln. The ‘academic practitioners’ she had in mind were probably Inglis Moore and Fred Robinson.
43Angus & Robertson Royalty Statements 1951–52, FP vol. 86; SMF to J. K. Moir, 19/10/1952, J. K. Moir Colln; SMF to Dymphna Cusack, 12/1/1952 and 26/10/1952 (the cheque filed there). The female basic wage (NSW) for 1952 was £403.
44(Dame) Eadith Walker (1861–1937), ADB vol. 12.
45SMF to J. K. Moir, 7/7/1952, J. K. Moir Colln.
46Arnold Dresden to SMF, 23/2/1952, FP vol. 35.
47‘Sequel’, ML MSS 445/22.
48SMF to unident., n.d., FP vol. 46, p. 125; Vida Goldstein to Edith How-Martyn, 26/1/1944, VG Papers.
49SMF to Mary Fullerton, 5/2/1946, FP vol. 19; David Myton, ‘Miles Franklin and Religion’, 2001, unpub. paper 2001, copy in my possession.
50Charles Graham to SMF, 27/3/1928, and SMF to Ted Graham 9/7/1938, FP vol. 49. SF Notebook, FP vol. 107, pp. 40, 30. SMF to Farquhar Fraser, 5/8/1952, FP vol. 44, mentions a phone call from John, ‘who had a week’s leave, whatever that may mean’ (though he did not call by as arranged).
51Eris O’Brien to SMF, ‘Dear Miss B of B Bin’, 3/2/1952, FP vol. 44;* SMF to David Martin, 3/2/1952, FP vol. 41.*
52Les Woolacott to SMF, 6/4/1952, SMF to Les Woolacott, 6/5/1952, FP vol. 44. Miles steered well clear of Woolacott’s marriage troubles (Leila Woolacott to SMF, 7/5/1952, and reply 9/5/1952, FP vol. 39).
53Viera Jones, ‘Australian Imprint’, PhD thesis, passim; Beatrice Davis, ‘An Enigmatic Woman’, Overland, 1983, p. 26; Florence James to SMF, 20/10/1952, FP vol. 30; SMF to P. R. Stephensen, 21/6/1952, FP vol. 28.
54Diary excerpts, 1952, cited Mathew, Miles Franklin, 1963, Appendix II.
55Ray Mathew to SMF, 17/12/1952,* and SMF to Ray Mathew, 7/2/1953, FP vol. 44.
56OCAL, p. 522; Myfanwy Horne, ‘Literary Wit with the Brown Wavy Hair’, SMH, 25/6/2002, p. 27.
57Mathew, Miles Franklin, p. 23.
58P. F. McDonald, Marriage in Australia: Age at Marriage and Proportions Marrying 1860– 1971, ANU Press, Canberra, 1974, pp. 133–4, Table 40.
59ibid., pp. 131, 134, Table 40.
60Hera Cook, The Long Sexual Revolution: English Women, Sex, and Contraception 1800– 1975, and ‘“Unseemly and Unwomanly Behaviour”: Comparing Women’s Control of their Fertility in Australia and England from 1890 to 1970’, J. Population Research, 2000, vol. 17, no. 2.
61‘Divorces Demarest Lloyd’, NYT, 20/1/1937, p. 19.
62SMF to Jean Devanny, 13/1/1954, FP vol. 22, and Ferrier, As Good as a Yarn with You. The ‘utterly revolting’ behaviour was probably sex with children (though age of consent was variably defined in the US, J. Gathorne-Hardy, Alfred C. Kinsey: Sex the Measure of all Things, Chatto & Windus, London, 1998, p. 377).
63SMF to J. K. Moir, 17/8/1953, J. K. Moir Colln. Henrietta Barnett (1851–1936), ODNB.
64SMH, 2/6/1953, p. 6 (medal); PD, 18/3/1953.
65SMF to Rex Ingamells, 9/9/1953, Ingamells Colln; Roe, ‘Miles Franklin: Bush Intellectual’ explores these concepts.
66D. S., ‘The New Brent of Bin Bin’, Bulletin, 14/1/1953, ‘Red Page’. ‘E.’, ‘Study of Spacious Days’, SMH, 1/11/1952, p. 10. The contract for Cockatoos was finalised Jan. 1954 and returned in Jun. (Angus & Robertson to SMF, 21/1/1954, FP vol. 86, and Angus & Robertson to SMF, 8/6/1954, Angus & Robertson Corres., ML MSS 3269, vol. 274, p. 39).
67Angus & Robertson Royalty Statements, FP vol. 86, and Angus & Robertson Corres. files, ML.
68O’Harris, Was It Yesterday?, p. 72.
69SMF to Winifred Stephensen, 16/1/1954, FP vol. 39; SMF to Bruce Sutherland, 18/3/1954, FP vol. 44;* Jane Connors, ‘The 1954 Royal Tour of Australia’, Australian Historical Studies, 1993, vol. 25, no. 100; SMF to Dymphna Cusack, 23/3/1954, FP vol. 30; Ethel Ruby Bridle to SMF, 15/2/1954, FP vol. 47. The Statute of Westminster provided for the sovereignty of the parliaments of the self-governing dominions within the emergent British Commonwealth (but Australia did not ratify it until 1943).
70SMF to ‘Dear Things’ [the Crosses], Tuesday, Cross Papers; SMF to Jean Devanny, 17/2/1954, FP vol. 32, and SMF to KSP, 13/3/1954, FP vol. 21; SMF to Winifred Stephensen, 1/5/1954, FP vol. 39; SMF to J. K. Moir, 1/5/1954, J. K. Moir Colln.
71SMF to Mary Alice Evatt, 24/4/1954, Evatt Colln;* SMF to J. K. Moir, [31/5/1951], FP vol. 34; SMF to Eris O’Brien, 15/5/1954, FP vol. 44.* Robert Manne, The Petrov Affair: Politics and Espionage, Pergamon Press, Sydney, 1987, p. 96. Vladimir (1907–91) and Evdokia (1914–2002) Petrov. Henry Parkes (1815–96) was the best known politician of nineteenth-century Australia, five times premier of NSW, and leading advocate of federation (ADB vol. 5).
72SMF to L. & R. G. Howarth, 26/5/1954, FP vol. 43; SMF to Magdalen Dalloz, 2–4/6/1954,* Magdalen Dalloz to SMF, 28/12/1953, Magdalen Dalloz to SMF, 11/6/1954, FP vol. 41; SMF to Beatrice Davis, 24/8/1954, Angus & Robertson Corres., ML MSS 3269, vol. 274, p. 447 (‘a grand dictionary’).
73Joan Lampe to SMF, 20/6/1954, FP vol. 49.
74Helena Lampe to SMF, 23/6/1954, FP vol. 49; SMF to Vance Palmer, 23/7/1954, Palmer Papers* (‘I was taken with a heart attack five weeks ago’).
75Delys Cross to KSP, ‘Sunday’, Cross Papers; SMF to Dymphna Cusack, 18/8/1954, James Papers, repr. North Yarn Spinners.
76Delys Cross to KSP, ‘Sunday’, Cross Papers; Rex and Mabel [Florence] Knox, 28/6/1954, FP vol. 45.
77SMF to Beatrice Davis, n.d. [28/6/1954], Angus & Robertson Corres., ML MSS 3269, vol. 274, p. 393; Delys Cross to Beatrice Davis, Monday, ibid., pp. 415–17.
78Beatrice Davis to SMF, 29/6/1954, Cross Papers, and SMF to Dear George, Angus & Robertson Corres., ML MSS 3269, vol. 274, p. 419. ‘S. H.’, ‘That Bin Bin Bird’, Sun-Herald, 25/7/1954, p. 48; ‘More Brent of Bin Bin’, Bulletin, 8/9/1954, p. 2.
79Delys Cross to Beatrice Davis, ‘Monday’, Angus & Robertson Corres., ML MSS 3269, vol. 274, p. 417; Delys Cross to Henrietta Drake-Brockman, 22/8/1954, NLA MS 1634/3/5; Rex Ingamells, ‘Miles Franklin’, ts., 1954, Ingamells Colln.
80SMF to Beatrice Davis, 24/8/1954 and [27/8/1954], Angus & Robertson
Corres., ML MSS 3269, vol. 274, pp. 447, 449, also ‘Sun’, Angus & Robertson Corres., ML MSS 3269, vol. 274, p. 451; SMF to Delys Cross, 30/8/1954, Cross Papers.
81SMF to Beatrice Davis, ‘Sun’, Angus & Robertson Corres., ML MSS 3269, vol. 274, p. 451; SMF to Marjorie Pizer, Beecroft, and SMF to Marjorie Pizer, Thursday (p.m. 2/9/1954), Holburn Papers,* and SMF to Pixie O’Harris, 3/9/1954, ML Doc. 3233.* Overland magazine began publication in Melbourne in 1954 (motto ‘Temper democratic, bias Australian’), and is one of Australia’s major literary magazines.
82SMF to Marjorie Pizer, Thursday (p.m., 2/9/1954), and SMF to Pixie O’Harris, 3/9/1954, ML Doc 3233.*
83Beatrice Davis to Rex Ingamells, 22/10/1954, ML MSS 3269, Box 35, no. 1.
84KSP to Dymphna Cusack, 28/9/1954, repr. North, Yarn Spinners.
85O’Harris, Was It Yesterday?, p. 79.
86PD, 14/9/1954, and especially letters by Florence Knox, KSP, Delys Cross and Beatrice Davis.
87ADB file; Florence Knox to Dymphna Cusack, 20/9/1954, James Papers, ML 5877, repr. North, Yarn Spinners.
88Bridle family cuttings ML MSS 3732/2, vol. 2, and Leslie Bridle to J. K. Moir, 19/9/1954, J. K. Moir Colln, Box 32/4. Edmund Keith Cole, b. 1919 (ADB file).
89Leslie Bridle to J. K. Moir, 19/9/1954, J. K. Moir Colln, Box 32/4.
90All That Swagger, 1936 edn, pp. 598–9.
Afterlife
1Beatrice Davis, ‘A True Australian’, Southerly, 1955, vol. 16, no. 2, pp. 83–5; David Martin, ‘Miles Franklin’, and Jean Devanny [untitled], Overland, 1954–55, no. 2, pp. 17, 18; Florence James, Times (London), 19/11/1954, p. 10, repr. with additions, Miles Franklin by Some of her Friends, p. 30; O. C. R[oberts], ‘Miles Franklin and our Literature’, Age Lit. Supp., 9/10/1954; R. J. B., ‘Miles Franklin’, Voice, Jan. 1955, p. 26; Vance Palmer, ‘Miles Franklin’, ABC Weekly, 11/12/1954, p. 11.
2‘Writer’s Death Has Left Literary Mystery Unsolved’, SMH, 21/9/1954, p. 2; Zelie McLeod, ‘Miles Franklin: Our Literary Enigma’, DT, 25/9/1954, p. 19; Nigel Muir, ‘Miles Franklin Confesses’, SMH, 16/7/1966, p. 15. The kindest review of Gentlemen at Gyang Gyang (1956) was by Norman Strachan, ‘fiercely Australian . . . and very readable’ (DT, 19/5/1956, p. 12), cf. Kenneth Slessor, ‘artificial’ (Sun, 23/5/1956, p. 37); ‘D. S.’ (Bulletin, 2/10/1957, p. 2) conceded ‘some merit’ to Back to Bool Bool, but for Sidney J. Baker it was ‘repetitious twitterings’ (SMH, 24/8/1957, p. 12).
3Miles Franklin, deceased estate file, SRNSW, B 104683; Roderick, Miles Franklin, p. 179; ‘Franklin Fund for Novelists’, SMH, 19/1/1955, p. 4; Official Year Book of the Commonwealth of Australia, 1964, ch. xiii, s. 5. See ch. 13 for further details of the will; North, Yarn Spinners, has a copy. Harry Heseltine, The Most Glittering Prize: The Miles Franklin Literary Award 1957–1998, Permanent and Australian Defence Force Academy, Canberra, 2001, is the authoritative account.
4‘Here We Go Again’, Australian Book Review, May 2006, p. 1 (re ongoing failure to appreciate the terms of the award). The award has not been made for a play.
5Judith Armstrong, The Christesen Romance, Melbourne Univ. Press, Carlton, Vic, 1996, p. 27; Marjorie Barnard to C. B. Christesen, 27/4/1955, and ensuing corres., MA; Marjorie Barnard, ‘Miles Franklin’, Meanjin, no. 63, vol. 14, no. 4, 1955, pp. 483, 487.
6Barnard, Miles Franklin: A Biography, Twayne, New York, 1967 (and a new edn, Miles Franklin: The Story of a Famous Australian, Univ. of Qld Press, St Lucia, Qld, 1988), reviewed by Kylie Tennant, SMH, 2/12/1967, p. 21; Marjorie Barnard to C. B. Christesen, 14/8/1955, 16/3/1963, 1/1/1964, MA; Roderick, Miles Franklin.
7‘The Mysterious Miles Franklin’, ABC Weekly, 24/6/1959, p. 4; SMH, 21/11/1960, p. 26 (sale advertisement); Miles Franklin’s Manuscripts and Typescripts, 150th Anniversary Catalogue, Berkelouw, Sydney, 1962.
8Susan Sheridan, ‘The Career of the Career’, ALS, 2002; Veronica Brady, South of My Days: A Biography of Judith Wright, Sydney, 1998, p. 30, and Half a Life Time, ed. Patricia Clarke, Text Publishing, Melbourne, 1999, p. 53.
9The remaining stock of Some Everyday Folk and Dawn was pulped at the time of takeover, and the introduction to The Net of Circumstance, which I was invited to prepare, was not needed.
10Newcastle Herald, 36 episodes, 14/12/1992–25/1/1993.
11My Brilliant Career: Miles Franklin, ed. Bruce K. Martin, Broadview Edns, Toronto, Canada, 2007. HarperCollins Australia published a new combined edition of My Brilliant Career and My Career Goes Bung in 2004.
12See the Bibliographic Note for the works referred to.
13‘You Have Mail’, SMH, 6–7/6/2006, p. 22; Nicole Moore and Brigid Rooney, ‘Centenary Celebrations/Symposium of Miles Franklin’s My Brilliant Career’, Australian Historical Association Bulletin[now HA] 2001, no. 93, and ‘Focus on Miles Franklin’ ALS, 2002, vol. 20, no. 4 (selected seminar papers). See Appendix, Principal Published Writings, for the works referred to.
14‘A Century of Democracy’, SMH, 10/5/2001, p. 6; Angela Bennie, ‘The Books that Tell Us Who We Are and What Australia Is’, SMH, 26/1/2001 (Holiday Metropolitan), p. 6.
15Miles Franklin by Some of her Friends, p. 21; ‘My Brilliant Blunder’, SMH, 5/4/2004, p. 18; ‘Moorhouse Gets the Last Laugh with Aussie Edith’, SMH, 6/6/2001, p. 3.
16Ruth Park, Fishing in the Styx, Penguin, Ringwood, Vic, 1993, p. 151 (a ‘dark side’).
17David Martin, ‘Miles Franklin’, Overland, 1954–55, no. 2, p. 17.
18Martin, My Strange Friend, p. 215.
19Michèle Le Doeuff, The Sex of Knowing, Routledge Kegan Paul, London, 2004, as reviewed by Elizabeth Fallaize, ‘Ladies Intellectual’, TLS, 21/5/2004, p. 6; Stephensen, Miles Franklin by Some of her Friends, p. 39; SMF to David Martin, 3/2/1951, FP vol. 41.*
20Bruce Sutherland to SMF, 3/9/1954, ML MSS 1128.
21Leslie Bridle to J. K. Moir, 19/9/1955, J. K. Moir Colln, Box 32/4.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The origins of this book lie in the feminist ferment of the 1970s and in the then publishing program of Angus & Robertson, now an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Australia. In December 1982, publisher Richard Walsh, a Franklin enthusiast, commissioned a ‘life and times of Miles Franklin’. It has been a long time coming, due to other commitments and responsibilities, and because of the extent of previously unexamined source material. The encouragement and steady support of many individuals and the practical assistance of several key institutions have been vital to its completion.
The following individuals deserve special thanks: Margaret Bettison, whose exceptional research skills brought many previously obscure aspects of Miles Franklin’s life to light; Chris Cunneen, whose unrivalled biographical expertise helped run numerous hitherto unidentified and partly or erroneously identified persons to ground; and Beverley Kingston, whose wise counsel ensured the project stayed on track, despite difficulties and diversions.
Without the support of the State Library of New South Wales, this book could not have been written. An honorary research fellowship in 2002 made possible a start on unexamined areas of the Franklin Papers. I thank especially Dagmar Schmidmaier and her successor, Regina Sutton; Elizabeth Ellis; Paul Brunton; and, on a day-to-day basis, Arthur Easton. Rosemary Moon facilitated a centenary symposium on My Brilliant Career in 2001 and a presentation on Miles Franklin’s Sydney in 2004. Staff on the special collections desk, Mitchell Reading Room, and elsewhere in the library, have provided ongoing assistance.
A sabbatical fellowship at the Australian National University in 2003, and concurrent membership of the Petherick Room at the National Library of Australia (NLA), enabled research to be done on the poorly documented period of 1918 to 1927 and the drafting of related chapters, also the presentation of a paper on Miles Franklin and photography. Special thanks are due to the then head of the Research School of Social Sciences (RSSS) history program, Desley Deacon, and to Margy Burn, assistant director-general of the NLA. As well, proximity to the office of the Australian Dictionary of Biography was most beneficial; appreciative ackn
owledgement is made of assistance received then and at other times, in particular from Anthea Bundock, Martha Campbell, Christine Fernon and Diane Langmore, also research associates Sally O’Neill in London and Roger Joslyn in New York.
Macquarie University has provided in-kind support throughout the project, such as office space and library facilities. Minor funding enabled early-stage work on Franklin materials by my then students Sandra McKirdy and Ros Parsons. A travel grant arranged by Christina Slade, dean of humanities at the time, enabled me to review sites and materials in Chicago, the UK and Macedonia, in 2004. As well, the weekly research seminar sponsored by the modern history discipline at Macquarie University provided a regular reality check. For their expertise, insights and good humour, I thank in particular colleagues Michelle Arrow, Lee Benness, Lisa Featherstone, Bridget Griffen-Foley, Tom Hillard, Alison Holland, Marnie Hughes-Warrington, Joan Kirkby, Nicole Moore, Alanna Nobbs, George Parsons, Carroll Pursell, Michael Roberts, Boris Skvoric, Mary Spongberg, Hsu-ming Teo, Duncan Waterson and Angela Woollacott. My recent postgraduate students Robyn Arrowsmith, Brother Howard Le Couteur and Carolyn Skinner have kindly shared relevant findings. Particular acknowledgement is due to administrative officer Jackie Anker, who entered the data on the first drafts of the family trees, and the staff of the university library, especially document supply staff and Robin Walsh.
A modest publisher’s advance covered some costs along the way, such as indexing of materials by Lynne Milne and Tessa Milne, and problem-related data searches by Stephanie Liau and Katharine Bradley in London, and Valerie Wright in Glasgow.
Grateful acknowledgement is made of assistance and references received from institutions and individuals located as follows:
Australia
Adelaide: State Library of South Australia; Flinders University Library; Helen Bartley; David Hilliard; Susan Magarey; Sue Sheridan; Barbara Wall.
Brisbane: AustLit database project and staff, University of Queensland, in particular Leigh Dale; Jennifer Harrison; Laurie Hergenhan; Carol Hetherington; Deborah Jordan; Helen Malone; Barbara Poniewierski.