by Bill Holloway

An annotated list of Australian women writers who began writing in the ‘Bulletin years’: when ‘native’ Australians began to assert their independence not so much from Britain, as from the old class-based structures, and women began, loudly, to demand their freedom from men’s dominion.


The importance of the Bush in this period is firstly that the Bush and the Outback were seen as points of difference from Britain, and so became an important part of our identity as Australians; that the inland exerted the same pull on adventurous Australians as the sea did on the British; and that the greater proportion of native born in the inland meant that it was from inland workers, and the writers who gave them voice, that the feeling for Australian unity came, culminating in Federation, as well as the impetus for labour reform.

The Bulletin reflected all this, actively canvassing (and paying) for contributions. But sadly, it also reflected the prevailing male attitude that women should knuckle under. “The wife [in the Bush] is at the man’s mercy. She must bear what ills he chooses to put upon her and her helplessness in his hands only seems to educe the beast in him.” Louisa Lawson, ‘The Australian Bush-Woman’,1889.

Or this from the Bulletin itself (3 Nov, 1888) “men live and struggle and fight out in the open most of the time. When they go to their homes they go to beat their wives…”, continuing “.. home life trammelled a man’s spirit and sapped his masculinity. And it robbed him of his independence.” quoted by Marilyn Lake, ‘The Politics of Respectability’, 1986.

Writers in birth date order. Links in brackets are to reviews.

Agnes Hay (1837-1909) Austlit

‘Pauline Connolly, Mrs Hay & the SS Waratah – Final Passage’ here

Louisa Lawson (1848-1920) ADB

A General Servant (s/story). Part 1, Part 2

Michelle Scott Tucker, Louisa Lawson
Brian Matthews, Louisa (The Australian Legend)
The Australian Legend, Louisa Lawson vs Kaye Schaffer here

Barbara Baynton (1857-1929) ADB

Human Toll (1909) (The Australian Legend)
Bush Studies (1902) Imprint, 1993:
  Squeaker’s Mate (The Australian Legend) (Whispering Gums)
  Bush Church (Whispering Gums)
  Billy Skywonkie (Whispering Gums)
  A Dreamer (Whispering Gums)
  Scrammy ‘and (Whispering Gums)
  The Chosen Vessel (Whispering Gums)

Penne Hackforth-Jones, Barbara Baynton, Between Two Worlds (1989) (The Australian Legend)
Sally Krimmer & Alan Lawson (ed.s), Barbara Baynton, UQP, 1980 (includes Human Toll and Bush Studies)
Whispering Gums, Monday musings on Australian literature: Barbara Baynton here

Alice Henry (1857-1929) ADB

Miles Franklin, Alice Henry (newspaper story)
Miles Franklin, On Dearborn Street, 1981 (The Australian Legend)

Alys Hungerford (1857-1934) AustLit

Elizabeth Lhuede, ‘Two Simple Letters’ (AWWC)

Florence Baverstock (1860-1937) Wiki

Elizabeth Lhuede, “Journalistic Genius”: Florence Baverstock (AWWC)

Mary Eliza (Minnie) Gaunt (1861-1942) ADB

Kirkham’s Find (The Australian Legend)
Alone in West Africa (extract)

Brona, Mary Gaunt, her life, 1 (AWWC)
Brona, Mary Gaunt, her life, 2 (AWWC)

Rose Boldrewood (1862-1935) oldest daughter of Rolf Boldrewood. Full name: Rose Christiana Angell Browne

The Complications at Collaroi, 1911
Recollections of Rolf Boldrewood, 1922

Laura M Palmer (1864-1929) Wiki

A Bush Honeymoon & other stories, 1904 (Brona’s Books)

Mary Gilmore (1865-1962) ADB

Anne Brooksbank, All My Love  (The Australian Legend)

Marion Knowles (1865-1949) ADB

Lilian Turner (1867-1956) Wiki

An Australian Lassie, 1903 here

Mary Fullerton (1868-1946) ADB

Bark House Days (1931)

Sylvia Martin, Passionate Friends, Onlywomen Press, London, 2001 (The Australian Legend)

Vida Goldstein (1869-1949) ADB

Jacqueline Kent, Vida (The Australian Legend)
Janette M Bomford, That Dangerous and Persuasive Woman: Vida Goldstein (Resident Judge)

Ethel Turner (1870-1958) ADB

Tales from the Parthenon, 1889-92 (Whispering Gums)
Seven Little Australians, 1894 (Mrs B’s Book Reviews)
The Story of a Baby, 1896 here
In the Mist of the Mountains, 1906 (Brona’s Books)

Beatrice Grimshaw (1870-1953) ADB

Jeannie Gunn (1870-1961) ADB

The Little Black Princess, 1905 (extract) (The Australian Legend)
We of the Never Never, 1908 (extract)

Stacey Roberts, Aboriginal domestic servants in colonial women’s fiction, 1854-1906 (AWWC)

Louise Mack (1870-1935) ADB

The World is Round, 1893 (Whispering Gums) (Whispering Gums)
Teens: A Story of Australian School Girls, 1897 here
Girls Together, 1898 (AWWC)
An Australian Girl in London, 1902
A Woman’s Experiences in the Great War, 1915 here, audio (Nancy Elin)

Whispering Gums, Monday musings on Australian literature: Louise Mack here

Henry Handel Richardson (1870-1946) ADB

Maurice Guest, 1908
The Getting of Wisdom, 1910 (Reading Matters) (Brona’s Books)
The Fortunes of Richard Mahony
Australia Felix, 1917 (Brona’s Books)
The Way Home, 1925 (Brona’s Books)
Ultima Thule, 1929 (Brona’s Books)
The Adventures of Cuffy Mahony and other stories, 1934 (The Australian Legend)
The Young Cosima, 1939 (The Australian Legend)
Myself when Young, 1948 (Brona’s Books) Autobiography

Nettie Palmer, Henry Handel Richardson: A Study, A&R, 1950.

Constance Clyde (1872-1951) Wiki

The Paying Back (short story) (AWWC)

Whispering Gums, Forgotten Writers 6, Constance Clyde, here
Inside Boggo Road, A Suffragette Recalls Boggo Road Gaol, here

Elinor Mordaunt (1872-1942) ADB

Amy Eleanor Mack (1876-1939)

Bushland Stories, 1914 (Whispering Gums)

Whispering Gums, A Nature Lover (AWWC)

Mary Louisa (Mollie) Skinner (1876-1955) ADB

Letters of a V.A.D., 1918 here
The Fifth Sparrow, 1972  Autobiography

The Australian Legend, Writing The Boy in the Bush (with DH Lawrence), here

Bertha Lawson (1876-1957) ADB: Bio of her mother, activist Matilda McNamara

My Henry Lawson, 1943 (Holloway)

Tarella Quin (1877-1934) Wiki (also Mrs Daskien, ‘James Adare’)

A Desert Rose (1912)
Kerno: A Stone (1914)

The Australian Legend, Tarella down a Rabbit Hole, here

May Gibbs (1877-1969) ADB

Mary Grant Bruce (1878-1958) ADB

Billabong series (Michelle Scott Tucker)
The Early Tales, 1898,1900 (Whispering Gums)
A Little Bush Maid, 1910 download
Mates at Billabong, 1912 download (Brenda)
Back to Billabong, 1914 download
Captain Jim, 1916 download
Possum, 1917 download

Miles Franklin (1879-1954) ADB

My Brilliant Career, 1901 (Book Around the Corner) (Booker Talk)
see also: AWWC Miles Franklin page for a comprehensive listing of reviews and posts

Lillian Pyke (1881-1927) ADB

Whispering Gums, Lillian Pyke and ‘Mary’s Mother’ (AWWC)

Capel Boake/Doris Boake Kerr (1889-1944) ADB

Whispering Gums, Monday musings on Australian literature: Capel Boake here
Whispering Gums, Capel Boake: Three short stories here
Whispering Gums, Capel Boake  here (AWWC)


Early Australian women poets and “sex-prejudice” (newspaper story)