Will Lawson
Lawson (undated)
Born
William Lawson

(1876-09-02)2 September 1876
Durham, England
Died13 October 1957(1957-10-13) (aged 81)
Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Occupation(s)Poet, author

Will Lawson (2 September 1876 – 13 October 1957), born in Durham, England, was a popular bush poet, novelist, journalist and historian of Australia.[1] Many of his works had sailing or stage coach themes.[2]

Early life

Born at Gateshead, Durham, England, the family was of Scandinavian descent, with the family name originally of Larsen.[3] Moving with his family to New Zealand at the age of four, they first lived in Wellington, New Zealand.[3]

The family moved to Brisbane, Australia around 1885, where Lawson received some education, then moved back to Wellington, New Zealand,[1][3] where he worked as a clerk in an insurance office, and began writing poems for The Bulletin.

Lawson was a fireman on the Wellington & Manawatu Railway Company, and wrote a poem Firin’ on the Mail:[4]

Fill her tank and give her coal
Clear her fires, and then
Let the big-wheeled Yankee roll
Down the grades again.

For World War I, Lawson was rejected by the New Zealand military for the mounted infantry because of his diabetes.[3] He wote a book on the Trentham Military Camp in WWI.

Career

In 1912 Lawson returned to Australia and joined the staff of Sydney's Evening News, also writing for Smith's Weekly and The Bulletin.

In 1924 and 1925 Lawson went to San Francisco as the publicity officer for the Union Steamship Company.[1] In 1929, he then undertook an extensive tour of the 'Far East'.[1]

From 1932, Lawson has been freelancing literature.[1]

He was associated with the Sydney Bohemian artistic scene and such well-known figures as poet and later politician Randolph Bedford (1868–1941), journalist and writer Edward Dyson (1865–1931), illustrator Will Dyson (1880–1938), artist Livingston Hopkins (1846–1927), landscape painter Percy Lindsay (1870–1952), and poet Roderic Quinn (1867–1949).

Although not related to poet Henry Lawson (1867–1922),[5] they were lifelong friends,[1][3] and a friend of his widow Bertha.

Later life

Lawson died in Sydney in 1957, aged 81.[5]

Some literary historians did not know whether to list Lawson as an Australian or a New Zealand writer, although Lawson considered himself Australian.[3]

Selected works

Poetry

  • The Red West Road (1903)
  • Light love (1904)[6]
  • Between the Lights (1906)
  • Stokin' and Other Verses (1908)
  • The tug that went a-trawling (1909)[7]
  • The Three Kings (1914)[8]
  • To the Fallen (c. 1917)[9]
  • Bush Verses (1943)
  • Bill the Whaler (1944)

Novels

  • Red West Road (1906)[1]
  • Old Man Murray (1937)[13]
  • Harpoons ahoy! (1938)[14]
  • In Ben Boyd's Day (1939), considered to be his best to date, in a historical setting of a gentleman adventurer[15]
  • Red Morgan Rides (1940)
  • Bound for Callao (1942)[16]
  • Black Diamonds (1945)
  • The Lady of the Heather (1945)
  • Forbidden Gold (1945)
  • Paddle Wheels Away (1945)
  • Gold in their Hearts (1950), republished as Mary Smith's Hotel (1957)

With fellow author Tom Hickey:

  • Galloping Wheels (1947)
  • Moira of Green Hills (1950), set in the paddle-steamer days of trade between the Hunter River and Sydney, about an Irish colleen Moira.[17][18]

Short stories

  • A stokehold tragedy (1909)[19]
  • A pack track knight (1913)[20]
  • The buggy ride (1935)[21]

Miscellaneous

  • The Three Kings, and other verses (1914), 250 pages of many verses and poems, including The Old Ngahauranga Road, published by Angus & Robertson, being sold for the cost of 2 shillings 7 pence.[2]

Edited:

  • Australian Bush Songs and Ballads (1944)

Historical:

  • Historic Trentham 1914–1917: The story of a New Zealand Military Training Camp (1917).[22]
  • Pacific steamers (1928), about the development of steam shipping on the Australian, and West American coasts. It contained 237 pages with illustrations, and sold for 16 shillings.[23]
  • Blue Gum Clippers and Whale Ships of Tasmania (1949), in conjunction with the Shiplovers' Society of Tasmania, Georgian House, Melbourne.[24]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Cessnock Rotary Club". The Cessnock Eagle and South Maitland Recorder. Vol. 31, no. 4004. New South Wales, Australia. 12 January 1943. p. 1. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  2. 1 2 "Our book column". The Sydney Stock and Station Journal. Vol. XXVI, no. 73. New South Wales, Australia. 22 December 1914. p. 12. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Balladist recalls Bohemian Sydney". The Daily Telegraph (Sydney). Vol. XVIII, no. 107. New South Wales, Australia. 25 July 1953. p. 19. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  4. ↑ Troup, Gordon (1978). Footplate: The Victorian Enginemans’s New Zealand. Wellington: A.H. & A.W. Reed. p. 140. ISBN 0 589 01096 4.
  5. 1 2 3 ""Will" LAWSON dies in Sydney". The Canberra Times. Vol. 31, no. 9, 299. Australian Capital Territory, Australia. 14 October 1957. p. 7. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  6. ↑ "Light love". Camperdown Chronicle. Vol. XXX, no. 4881. Victoria, Australia. 17 December 1904. p. 50 (Unknown). Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  7. ↑ "The tug that went a-trawling". Western Mail. Vol. XXV, no. 1, 252. Western Australia. 25 December 1909. p. 26. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  8. ↑ "The Three Kings". The Land. Vol. XX, no. 1007. New South Wales, Australia. 3 October 1930. p. 8 (The Countrywoman). Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  9. ↑ "To the Fallen". New Zealand Electronic Text Collection, Victoria University of Wellington. 1917.
  10. ↑ "Laughing Buccaneer". The Australian Women's Weekly. Vol. 6, no. 17. Australia, Australia. 1 October 1938. p. Front cover (Laughing Buccaneer). Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  11. ↑ "Another coach robbery". Sunday Mail (Brisbane). No. 334. Queensland, Australia. 13 September 1936. p. 33. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  12. ↑ "Will Lawson's Cobb and Co. In Third Edition". The Canberra Times. 31 October 1959. p. 13. Retrieved 24 September 2013 – via National Library of Australia.
  13. ↑ "OLD MAN MURRAY". The Riverine Herald. No. 19, 879. Victoria, Australia. 27 December 1938. p. 3. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  14. ↑ "Harpoons ahoy! Chapter 10". Western Mail. Vol. 55, no. 2, 722. Western Australia. 28 April 1938. p. 12. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  15. ↑ "Will LAWSON's historical novel". The Manning River Times and Advocate for the Northern Coast Districts of New South Wales. Vol. 71, no. 8868. New South Wales, Australia. 6 September 1939. p. 4. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  16. ↑ "Bound for Callao". Newcastle Morning Herald and Miners' Advocate. No. 20, 177. New South Wales, Australia. 10 June 1941. p. 3. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  17. ↑ "Historical novels on Australia". The Northern Star. New South Wales, Australia. 27 October 1950. p. 7. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  18. ↑ "Migration story of the Eighties". The Age. No. 29, 804. Victoria, Australia. 4 November 1950. p. 10. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  19. ↑ "A stokehold tragedy". The Queenslander. No. 2282. Queensland, Australia. 4 December 1909. p. 47. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  20. ↑ "A pack track knight". Australian Town and Country Journal. Vol. LXXXV, no. 2287. New South Wales, Australia. 3 December 1913. p. 62. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  21. ↑ "The buggy ride". The Sydney Morning Herald. No. 30, 523. New South Wales, Australia. 31 October 1935. p. 18 (Women). Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  22. ↑ "Historic Trentham 1914-1917". NZETC. 1933.
  23. ↑ "Our reference library". Daily Commercial News and Shipping List. No. 12, 294. New South Wales, Australia. 23 January 1928. p. 4. Retrieved 11 February 2023 – via National Library of Australia.
  24. ↑ "Shipping History and Romance". The Advertiser. Adelaide. 3 June 1950. p. 6. Retrieved 24 September 2013 – via National Library of Australia.

Sources

  • Wilde, William H, Hooton, Joy, Andrews, Barry Oxford Companion to Australian Literature Oxford University Press, 2nd ed. 1994 ISBN 0 19553381 X
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