by Jill Roe
Canberra: Australian War Memorial; National Archives of Australia; RSSS history program colleagues, in particular Barry Higman, Patricia Jalland and Barry Smith; the National Archives of Australia; Terry Hull; Rebecca Lamb; Chris Poll; Claudia Thame.
Hobart: University of Tasmania Archives.
Melbourne: Baillieu Library, University of Melbourne; State Library of Victoria; John Barnes; Graeme Davison; Maryanne Dever; Diane Kirkby; Stuart Macintyre; Poppy Malone; Anne Mitchell; Mark Peel; the late Sasha Soldatow; Lucy Sussex; Chris Wallace-Crabbe.
Perth: Battye Library, State Library of Western Australia; University of Western Australia Archives; Murdoch University Archives; Geoffrey Bolton; Brian de Garis; Lenore Layman; Bob Reece; Tom Stannage.
Sydney and regional NSW: Fisher Library, University of Sydney; Concord Historical Society; Goulburn Historical Society; Goulburn Regional Art Gallery; Hurstville City Council Library; Nightingale Museum Sydney Hospital; Penrith City Library; Randwick Public Library; Rockdale City Library; State Records of NSW; Railway Historical Society; Yass & District Historical Society; the late Don Adamson; Suzanne Baker; Tony Barker; Bill Blinco; the late Ken Cable; Jeanne Kellett Cox; Barbara Dale; Laurie Ferguson, MHR; Ian Frazer and Mrs Rose Frazer; Gwen Frolich; Laurence Gooley; Mrs Shirley Graham; Jocelyn Hedley; Mrs M. C. Knox; Jennifer Lamb; Robyn and Robert Lance; David McNight; Diane McQuillan; Bruce Mansfield; Barbara Mebberson; Drusilla Modjeska; Ray Mooney; David Myton; Marilla North; Marjorie Pizer; the late Ron Rathbone; Brigid Rooney; Lyndall Ryan; Alison Spencer; Lynn Stevens; Greta Stone; Sue Tracey; Ian Tyrrell; Robin Walker; Eizabeth Webby; James Weirick; Mr A. J. Willett; Elinor Wrobel; Christine Yeats.
America
Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library, Harvard University, Boston; Chicago Historical Society; Mary Baker Eddy Library, Boston, in particular Judith Heunneke; New York Public Library (Berg Collection); University of Illinois at Chicago Library (Special Collections); John Boaz; Sheila Fitzpatrick; Maria Whitney Lloyd (preliminary researches, Boston, 1999); Bruce K. Martin; Gilbert and Glenn Nelson.
United Kingdom
England: British Library, London; Bristol University Archives, in particular Hannah Lowery; City of Bradford Central Library; Royal Mail Archive, London; Society of Friends Library, London; Women’s Library, London; Hera Cook; John Thane; Pat Thane.
Scotland: Mitchell Library, Glasgow; University of Edinburgh Archives.
Greece
Christos Gandos, Australian Consul, Salonika; Ambassador Stuart Hume, Richard Mathews, Australian Embassy, Athens; and information officers, Edessa; with special thanks to Leonard Janisweski and the late Deborah George who facilitated contacts.
Miles Franklin’s family
The interest and quiet encouragement of members of Miles Franklin’s family has been much appreciated. Bridle/Lampe family historians Margaret Francis, Stella Vernon and Colin Wilkinson, also Barbara Crighton, have been unfailingly helpful. The late Lindsay Franklin, Shirley Graham, Jenn Lane, Pamela Mathers, Peter Norvill and Claire O’Connor have provided valuable new data and insights, the latter two regarding Miles Franklin’s nephew John Franklin.
Readers
For their great kindness and helpfulness in perusing some or all of the manuscript at various times, I thank Judith Allen, Eileen Chanin, Chris Cunneen, Desley Deacon, Lisa Featherstone, Stephen Garton, Laurie Hergenhan, Jacqueline Kent, Beverley Kingston, Diane Kirkby, Sylvia Martin, Nicole Moore, Marilla North, Michael Roberts and Elizabeth Webby, also the publisher’s editors. Considering that Miles Franklin had a very low tolerance for error and obscurity, I have been grateful for all and every comment. However, none but my editors and I have seen the final version, and responsibility for any infelicities or error rests solely with me.
Every effort has been made to acknowledge assistance received. Nonetheless, due to the lengthy period of research and writing, oversights may have occurred. Any such oversight is deeply regretted and will, if made known to me, be remedied in future editions.
The publisher
Miles would surely have been pleased that her name is being kept before the public by HarperCollins Publishers Australia. The Fourth Estate imprint seems just right for her. The professionalism and generous production values of staff have been much appreciated. Special thanks go to publisher Linda Funnell, who went well beyond the call of duty in making it all happen.
A final acknowledgement is due to Miles herself. She has been good company and taught me much. May this be so for others.
Jill Roe
August 2008
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
The publisher would like to thank Neil Thomas for his work on the abridgment of this text; and Beverley Kingston, for her wisdom, sensitivity and oversight in thoroughly reviewing this exercise, and for ensuring that Jill Roe’s spirit, intentions and interpretations were maintained faithfully throughout.
Miles Franklin's last diary for 1954, long thought to be lost, was presented by members of her family to the State Library of New South Wales just before this abridged edition went to print, and some details have been included in the text.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JILL ROE, AO, FASSA, was Professor Emerita in the Department of Modern History at Macquarie University, Sydney. She wrote numerous papers on Miles Franklin’s life and work. Her edited selection of Miles Franklin’s letters, My Congenials, appeared in 1993, and A Gregarious Culture: Topical Writings of Miles Franklin (with Margaret Bettison) in 2001.
The original edition of this biography, Stella Miles Franklin: A Biography, was published in 2008. In 2009, it won the Queensland Premier’s Literary Award and in 2010 it received both the South Australian Premier’s Prize for Non-fiction and the Australian Historical Association’s Magarey Medal for Biography.
Professor Roe passed away January 2017 at the age of 76. In 2014, the Jill Roe Prize was inaugurated in her honour.
PRAISE FOR STELLA MILES FRANKLIN: A BIOGRAPHY
Winner — 2009 Queensland Premier’s Literary Awards, History Book Award
Winner — 2010 South Australian Premier’s Prize for Non-fiction
Winner — 2010 Australian Historical Association Magarey Medal for Biography
‘Jill Roe’s handling of Stella Miles herself is compassionate and sympathetic in spirit, yet quietly measured and just’
Australian Historical Association
‘Roe’s mighty biography of a woman who was pivotal to the culture during a formative period of Australian literary life is meticulous and welcome’
Hilary McPhee, The Australian
‘a long-awaited and splendidly breezy blockbuster biography of the indefatigable, self-inventing and campaigning author of My Brilliant Career’
Richard Holmes, Australian Book Review
COPYRIGHT
The writing of this project was assisted by the Commonwealth Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.
Fourth Estate
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
First published in Australia in 2008
Second edition published in 2010
This edition published in 2018
by HarperCollinsPublishers Australia Pty Limited
ABN 36 009 913 517
harpercollins.com.au
Copyright © Jill Roe 2008
The right of Jill Roe to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000.
This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
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Cover design by Mark Campbell, HarperCollins Design Studio
Front cover image of Miles Franklin (c. 1901) courtesy State Library of New South Wales [P1 / 595]
Internal illustrations reproduced with permission of the State Library of New South Wales. Where images are held in more than one collection, acknowledgement has been made according to where the reproduction was originally obtained.