Guide to the Papers of Frank Hardy, 1931-1988

Summary

Collection number:

MS 4887

Creator:

Hardy, Frank

Extent:

(242 ms boxes + 1 small folio box + 9 medium folio boxes + 1 large folio box + 1 elephant folio)

Language:

English

Preferred citation:

Items from this collection should be cited as '[Title or description of manuscript item], Papers of Frank Hardy, National Library of Australia, [class/series/file number]'.

Availability:

Available

Access conditions:

Part requires permission for research; part not available for research. Not for loan.

Background

Content Summary:

MS 4887 comprises correspondence, notes, drafts and research material relating to Hardy's published works; diaries; notebooks; press cuttings; tape recordings; photographs; cartoons and sketches by Hardy, Ambrose Dyson, Bruce Petty, Counihan and Vane; autobiographical notes; radio and television scripts; papers connected with political and literary organizations; material relating to the Power without glory trial; biographical and critical material on Henry Lawson, Russian poet Evgenii Yevtushenko, and writings by others.There is correspondence with publishers and fellow writers in Australia and overseas, 1946-1973; and letters from Martin Boyd, Eric Lambert, the Palmers, Neville Shute, Jack Lindsay, Howard Fast, Owen Webster, family, friends and Communist Party comrades. Photographs include Hardy in Russia, Europe, the United States and Australia, historical material of revolutionary Russia and postwar Poland (242 boxes, 11 fol. boxes, 1 elephant folio).

Biographical / Historical:

Frank Hardy, the fifth of the eight children of Thomas and Winifred Hardy, was born on 21 March 1917 in Southern Cross, Victoria. Later the family moved to Bacchus Marsh, where Hardy attended school until the age of thirteen. For the next few years he was a seasonal worker and in 1937 moved to Melbourne. In that year Radio times published a selection of his cartoons. In 1940 Hardy married Rosslyn Couper and they had three children, Frances, Alan and Shirley. From 1954 they made their home in Sydney.

Whilst Hardy was in the Army and stationed in the Northern Territory, he started writing poetry and anecdotes for his Unit's paper Troppo tribune, which he edited during 1943 and 1944. In 1944 he joined the staff of the army magazine Salt. Later his short stories 'A stranger in the camp' and 'The man from Clinkapella' won competitions and soon his work was being accepted by Coast to Coast and the Guardian. Many of his early stories were written under the pseudonym Ross Franklyn.

After the war, Hardy worked part-time as a journalist and began research for his first novel Power without glory. It was published in 1950 and almost immediately Hardy was arrested on a charge of criminal libel. A sensational court case resulted in his acquittal. A television series adapted from the novel was shown by the ABC during 1976. Earlier, his book The hard way (1961) had documented the writing of Power without glory and the subsequent court case.

Hardy joined the Communist Party of Australia in 1940. As its candidate he twice unsuccessfully sought public office: in 1953 as a Senate candidate for Victoria, and in 1955 for the seat of Mackellar (NSW) in the House of Representatives. In 1955 and again in 1967 he was rejected for a position on the National Committee of the CPA.

After moving to Sydney in 1954, Hardy re-formed the Realist Writers' Group which he had joined in Melbourne in 1945. From 1958 until 1966 he was a member of the editorial committee of the Realist writer. In addition, he was a member of other literary organisations: the Australasian Book Society, the Fellowship of Australian Writers, International PEN and the Australian Society of Authors. He was twice awarded literary fellowships: by the New South Wales Government in 1969 and by the Commonwealth Literary Fund in 1972.

Apart from being the author of best-selling novels and short stories which have been translated into German, Russian and Czechoslovakian, Hardy became known as a contributor to newspapers and periodicals, a television and radio panellist, a book reviewer and a guest speaker. He also wrote plays, including 'Who was Henry Larsen' (first performed 1984) and Faces in the street (first performed 1988, published 1990), which were both based on Henry Lawson.

Hardy's principal works are Power without glory (1950), The four-legged lottery (1958), The hard way (1961), Legends from Benson's Valley (1963), The yarns of Billy Borker (1965), The unlucky Australians (1968), The outcasts of Foolgarah (1971), and But the dead are many (1975).

Frank Hardy died in 1994.

References: Cavenagh, R.H. 'The fiction of Frank Hardy' (Dissertation presented to the Department of New England for the degree of Bachelor of Letters, 1972). Oxford companion to Australian literature. 2nd ed. Melbourne, OUP, 1994

Immediate Source of Acquisition:

The papers of the writer Frank Hardy were purchased by the Library in seven consignments between 1975 and 1988.

Conditions Governing Access:

Please refer to the collection's catalogue record for the access conditions (http://nla.gov.au/nla.cat-vn2060293).

Conditions Governing Use:

Copying and publishing of unpublished manuscript material is subject to copyright restrictions. For such material, written permission to publish must be obtained from the copyright holder(s). Copying of unpublished material for research purposes is permissible 50 years after the death of the creator of the material.

Preferred citation:

Items from this collection should be cited as '[Title or description of manuscript item], Papers of Frank Hardy, National Library of Australia, [class/series/file number]'.

Location of this collection:

National Library of Australia

Parkes Place

Canberra ACT 2600, Australia

Contact:

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