22 October 2008

The “Bush Controversy”

Posted by Mick under: Historical Info .

I recently ran across this great site on Banjo Paterson (wikipedia) from a comment on a another site i hang out on, The Fedora Lounge.

The site contains a great deal of information on Banjo and his work, but one area i found really interesting has all of the pieces written by both Banjo Patterson and Henry Lawson during their “Bush Controversy”.

In 1892, Banjo Paterson and Henry Lawson, his friend and co-contributor to The Bulletin, decided to have a little fun, and to stir up a controversy in their poems. Henry Lawson set out to criticise the optimistic picture The Banjo painted of the Bush, and The Banjo in turn railed against the doom and gloom of Lawson’s outlook.

Some great material from an interesting period in Australian history.

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