Queensland authors
Picture Queensland contains photographs of some of Queensland’s and Australia’s most admired novelists, poets and dramatists of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Below are just three famous Queensland authors represented in the State Library’s collections.
Steele Rudd, born Arthur Hoey Davis at Drayton, Queensland, 1868, is best known for his ‘Selection’ stories.
The series began in 1895 when 'Starting the Selection,’ based on his father’s experiences, appeared in the Bulletin. Following early encouragement Rudd contributed many more Selection stories, and their popularity was such that in 1899 the first collection, On Our Selection was published. Four years later came the second volume, Our New Selection. Ultimately eight more volumes of Selection stories would see publication.
George Essex Evans has been well known to Queensland’s school children for the best part of a century with his most anthologised poem “The Women of the West.”
Evans was born on 'Waterloo day' in London and migrated to Australia in 1881. He worked as a farmer, teacher and journalist before joining the public service in 1888. While in the public service Evans contributed poetry, criticism and articles to a number of periodicals in Australia and England. He published his first volume of poetry, Repentance of Magdalene Despar, in 1891. This was followed by two further volumes, Loraine and Other Verses (1898) and The Secret Key and Other Verses (1906). A collected volume was published posthumously in 1928.
Rosa Caroline Praed, born 1851 in Bromelton, Queensland, the daughter of Thomas Murray-Prior, pastoralist and later politician, and his first wife Matilda, née Harpur. She was brought up on her father’s stations in Queensland, and his political career led Rosa to an interest in Imperial politics; colonial life and politics were to be major themes in her novels. Rosa married Arthur Campbell Bulkley Praed in October 1872, leaving Queensland with her husband in 1876 to live in England. She returned to Australia only once in 1894-1895, though she frequently used her Australian experiences in her novels.
An Australian Heroine, Rosa’s first novel was published in 1880. Rosa was to write more than forty-five books under the name Mrs Campbell Praed. In addition to her fiction, she also wrote the autobiographical My Australian Girlhood (1902), and collaborated on four books with Irish politician Justin McCarthy.
Find more photographs of Queensland and Australian authors, poets and dramatists in Picture Queensland.
Biographical information sourced from the Australian Dictionary of Biography, and AustLit.
Last updated: 17th September 2008
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