The poems of Joseph Furphy Edited by Kate Baker, Melbourne, 1916

Component identifier:

Item 118

Content Summary:

Boards. Canvas back. Paper label. Fcp. 4to. With Foreword by Bernard O'Dowd.

Inscribed by Kate Baker: 'To Mr C.J. Dennis, with every good wish, K.B. New Year, 1917'.

With this typewritten letter from Miles Franklin (signed 'Miles') to a friend commenting upon her visit to Perth and meeting there the daughter of Joseph Furphy 'who is a wonderful person, who brought out many mementos'. She also sends donation of 5/- to the Roderic Quinn Memorial Fund. Also autograph letter from Kate Baker to Frank Neilson inviting him to be present at a function to commemorate his brother, Shaw Neilson.

This letter is to Lucy Cassidy, friend and benefactor of Rod Quinn. Miles Franklin regrets the small donation, writing that her assured income dwindled in the previous year to only two pounds each week, and anticipates that it may disappear entirely any day. '...but I suppose there will be soup kitchens'.

In his Foreword Bernard O'Dowd makes some denigratory remarks about Dennis's poetry, the sentimental bloke and his 'tart', 'Brogan's Lane' and 'Little Lon'. But 'Den' would only have been amused, and well he might be, for at this time the sales of The sentimental bloke had passed 76,000 and were to double in a few years.

Immediate source of acquisition:

The collection was purchased from Harry Chaplin in 1981.

Names:

Chaplin, Harry F.

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