The Queensland Shearers' Strikes in Rosa Praed's Fiction
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1017/S1321816600002750Keywords:
Rosa Praed, colonial Queensland, social position, social and political dynamicsAbstract
Novelist Rosa Praed's portrayal of colonial Queensland in her fiction was influenced by her social position as the daughter of a squatter and conservative Cabinet Minister, Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, and limited by the fact that she lived in Australia for much less than one-third of her life. After she left Australia in 1876, she recharged her imagination, during her long novel-writing career in England, by seeking specific information through family letters and reminiscences, copies of Hansard and newspapers. As the decades went by and she remained in England, the social and political dynamics of colonial society changed. Remarkably, she remained able to tum sparse sources into in-depth portrayals of aspects of colonial life.
References
Byerley, F.J., ed. Narrative of the Overland Expedition of the Messrs. Jardine from Rockhampton to Cape York, Northern Queensland, (Brisbane: J.W. Buxton, 1867); Jack, R. Logan, Northmost Australia, 2 vols (London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent and Co., 1921), Vol 1; Chris Coulthard-Clark, The Encyclopaedia of Australia's Battles (St Leonards, NSW: Allen and Unwin, 2001); ADB Vol 4 (Jardine).
Praed Papers, John Oxley Library, OM64-1 23/3/1, p 195.
Praed, Rosa, Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land (1915; London: Pandora, 1987, p 62).
Murray-Prior Papers, National Library of Australia, MS7801, 3/15/12/32-3; Nora Murray-Prior Letters, John Oxley Library, OM81-71; Praed Papers, 23/3/1.
Macmillan, David S. (comp.), Bowen Downs 1863–1963 (Sydney: Scottish Australian Co., 1963); Stuart Svensen, The Shearers’ War: The Story of the 1891 Shearers’ Strike, (St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1989), p 10; Matt J. Fox (comp.), The History of Queensland, Its People and Industries, 3 vols (Adelaide: Hussey and Gillingham for the States Publishing Co., Brisbane, 1919–23), Vol 2, pp 622–3; ADB Vol 5 (Morehead).
Svensen, , Appendix E, p 296.
The Great Queensland Strike of 1891, (Brisbane: United Pastoralists’ Association of Queensland, 1891); Kerr, R., Freedom of Contract: A History of the United Graziers’ Association of Queensland, (Brisbane: United Graziers’ Association of Queensland, 1990).
Johnson, D.H., Volunteers at Heart: The Queensland Defence Forces 1860–1901 (St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 1974); Svensen; D. H. Johnson, ‘A History of Torrens Creek’, in Torrens Creek State School Centenary 1891–1991 (Torrens Creek, Qld: Torrens Creek State School, 1991); Praed Papers, Box 23/3/1, p 244.
Praed, Campbell Mrs, Mrs. Tregaskiss: A Novel of Anglo-Australian Life, 3 vols (London: Chatto and Windus, 1896), Vol 2, p 53.
Praed Papers, 23/3/1, p 249.
Praed Papers, 23/3/1, pp 244, 227, 229.
Tregaskiss, Mrs., Vol 3, pp 53–55.
Tregaskiss, Mrs., Vol 1, p 14. Most of this quotation is missing from the New York edition (D. Appleton & Co., 1895) in what appears to be a typesetting error. The text skips from ‘and’ in the first sentence of this quote to the word after ‘and’ in the sentence following the end of the passage quoted here.
Svensen, p, 265; see also Kerr, p 27.
Praed Papers, 23/3/1, p. 277.
Tregaskiss, Mrs., Vol 1, pp 119–20.
Tregaskiss, Mrs., Vol 2, p. 37.
Praed Papers, 23/3/1, p 244.
Tregaskiss, Mrs., Vol 1, p 120; Vol 2, p 24.
Svenson, p, 206.
The Worker, 13 June 1891.
Queensland State Archives, LAN/AF689.
Praed Papers, 23/3/1, p 245.
Lady Bridget, p 48.
Lady Bridget, pp 127, 132.
Lady Bridget, pp 151, 152.
Lady Bridget, p 160.
Lady Bridget, p 190.
Murray-Prior Papers, 4/26/17/77.
Murray-Prior Papers, 4/26/17/49.
Lady Bridget, p 47.
Lady Bridget, p 156.
Lady Bridget, pp 202–3.
Lady Bridget, p 191.
Lady Bridget, p 239.
Osmond, Sophie, Snags: A Story of the Shearing Strike (Melbourne: Pater and Knapton, 1895); Summers, H.J., Ashes of the Angry Years (Sydney: Australasian Book Society, 1966); Dorothy Gauvin, Conlan's Luck: An Epic Story of the Shearers’ War (Bayview Heights, Qld: Heritage Gallery Printing, 1998); Errol O'Neill, On the Whipping Side: A Story of the 1891 Shearers’ Strike (Brisbane: Playlab Press, 1991).
