Joseph Furphy

Joseph Furphy
Born(1843-09-26)26 September 1843
Yering, Victoria, Australia
Died13 September 1912(1912-09-13) (aged 68)
Claremont, Western Australia
Pen nameTom Collins
OccupationAuthor, poet
GenreAustralian literature

Joseph Furphy (Irish: Seosamh Ó Foirbhithe; 26 September 1843 – 13 September 1912) was an Australian author and poet.[1] He mostly wrote under the pseudonym Tom Collins[2] and is best known for his novel Such Is Life (1903), regarded as an Australian classic.[1][3]

Personal life

Furphy was born at Yering Station in Yering, Victoria.[1] His father, Samuel Furphy, was originally a tenant farmer from Tandragee, County Armagh, Ireland, who emigrated to Australia in c. 1840-1841.[4][1] In about 1850 the family moved to Kangaroo Ground, Victoria.[1]

In 1904, Furphy and his wife moved to Western Australia to join his sons.[1] He built a house at Swanbourne. Furphy died in Claremont on 13 September 1912 and is buried in Karrakatta Cemetery.[1]

Literary career

"I have just finished writing a full-sized novel; title, Such is Life; the scene, Riverina and northern Vic; temper, democratic; bias, offensively Australian."

— Furphy's famous self-introduction to J. F. Archibald, published in The Bulletin, April 1897[5]

While living at Shepparton, he was encouraged in his writing by Kate Baker, a schoolteacher[1] who boarded with his mother. He sent a story 'The Mythical Sundowner' to The Bulletin under the name 'Warrigal Jack' and it was accepted for publication.[2] Later works were published under the pseudonym 'Tom Collins' which may have come from the slang term meaning "a fellow about town whom many sought to kill for touching them on 'sore points'".[2]

His most famous work is Such Is Life, a fictional account of the life of rural dwellers, including bullock drivers, squatters and itinerant travellers, in southern New South Wales and Victoria, during the 1880s.[1][3] In 1897 the manuscript was sent to The Bulletin where A. G. Stephens recognised its worth.[1] He suggested cuts including the replacement of two entire chapters.[1] Stephens persuaded the proprietors of The Bulletin to publish the revised Such Is Life because it was a great Australian work although not commercially viable. It was published in 1903[1] under his pseudonym 'Tom Collins'[2] and only sold about a third of the print run. Through the efforts of Kate Baker who bought the residual copies from The Bulletin, later editions were brought out after Furphy's death

Having removed the original chapters 2 and 5 from Such is Life, Furphy considered joining these portions together as the basis for another novel but instead decided to focus on chapter 5 separately.[6] He expanded and remodelled the chapter to form Rigby's Romance, which was serialised in The Barrier Truth from 27 October 1905 to 20 July 1906. It would be released in book form in 1921.[7] After moving to Western Australia in 1905, Furphy commenced work on revising the original second chapter, which he titled The Lyre Bird and the Native Companion before retitling it The Buln-Buln and the Brolga. Never published in his lifetime, the manuscript was provided by Furphy's son Samuel and ultimately published in book form in 1946.[8] Both of these subsequent novels feature the same protagonist, Tom Collins, and function as adjuncts to the first novel.

Legacy

Such is Life has been described as Australia's Moby Dick because, like Melville's book, it was neglected for thirty or forty years before being discovered as a classic.[9] The novel contains possibly the first written incidence of the Australian and New Zealand idiom "ropeable". Chapter One contains the following phrase: "On't ole Martin be ropeable when he sees that fence!" The historian Stuart MacIntyre has said the book challenged the assumption that "nothing of significance ever happened" in Australia or that Australians lacked "creative originality".

A full biography of Furphy was written through a collaboration of Australian author Miles Franklin and Furphy's friend Kate Baker, titled Joseph Furphy: The Legend of a Man and His Book, in 1944.[1]

To honour Furphy, in 1992 his and his brother's descendants established the Furphy Literary award.[3][10] On the 100th anniversary of Such is Life they also funded a statue in Furphy's home town.[10][11] The home which Furphy built in Swanbourne is now the headquarters of the West Australian branch of the Fellowship of Australian Writers.

Furphy's popularity may have influenced the usage of the Australian slang word "furphy", meaning a "tall story". However, scholars consider it more likely that the word originated with water carts, produced in large numbers by J. Furphy & Sons, a company owned by Furphy's brother John.[3][10]

Works

  • Such Is Life (1903)
  • Furphy, Joseph (1916). Baker, Kate (ed.). The Poems of Joseph Furphy (PDF). Melbourne & Sydney: Lothian Book Publishing Co. Pty. Ltd. – via University of Sydney Library.
  • Rigby's Romance (1921)
  • The Buln Buln and the Brolga (1946)
  • Various articles in periodicals (Joseph Furphy: An Annotated Checklist of Items in Periodicals)
  • Christmas Hymn to music composed by Australian composer Arthur Chanter[12]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Clark, Manning (1981). Furphy, Joseph (1843–1912) (Australian Dictionary of Biography, Volume 8 ed.). Melbourne University Press).
  2. ^ a b c d Hoffmann, Lois (1 May 1984). "Joseph Furphy: An Annotated Checklist of Items in Periodicals". Australian Literary Studies. 11 (3): 409–416. doi:10.20314/als.4b3ffbbd09.
  3. ^ a b c d Harris, Rob (15 November 2019). "Fifth-generation Furphys breathing new life into the Australian legend". The Age. Retrieved 17 July 2021.
  4. ^ Collins Family History – General Information at freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com
  5. ^ The Bulletin, April 1897
  6. ^ Devlin-Glass, F. (1991). "Textual Note". In Devlin-Glass, F. (ed.). The Annotated Such is Life by Joseph Furphy. Oxford University Press. pp. 300–301.
  7. ^ Austlit - Rigby's Romance by Joseph Furphy
  8. ^ Furphy, Joseph (1946). Howarth, R. G. (ed.). The Buln-Buln and the Brolga. Sydney: Angus & Robertson. p. 2.
  9. ^ Serle, Geoffrey (1973). From Deserts the Prophets come; the creative spirit in Australia 1788-1972. Melbourne: Heinemann. p. 66. ISBN 0855610298.
  10. ^ a b c "Furphy Literary Award". Furphy Story. Retrieved 29 June 2021.
  11. ^ "Joseph Furphy | Monument Australia". monumentaustralia.org.au. Retrieved 29 June 2021.
  12. ^ ""A Christmas Hymn" by Joseph Furphy". Austlit. Retrieved 14 September 2024.

Further reading

  • Archer, A. L. Tom Collins (Joseph Furphy) as I Knew Him (Melb, 1941)
  • Barnes, John (1990). The Order of Things: A Life of Joseph Furphy. South Melbourne, Australia: Oxford University Press Australia. ISBN 0-19-553187-6.
  • Bushman and Bookworm: Letters of Joseph Furphy edited by John Barnes and Lois Hoffmann; Melbourne: Oxford University Press 1995
  • Furphy, Joseph (2013). "The Mythical Sundowner" (pdf). Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literary Criticism. 13 (1). National Library of Australia. — this is the first article published in The Bulletin by Furphy, under the pseudonym "Warrigal Jack"
  • Furphy papers (State Library of New South Wales).
  • Croft, Julian The Life and Opinions of Tom Collins: A Study of the Works of Joseph Furphy St Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland Press 1991
  • "Table of contents". Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literary Criticism. 13 (1). National Library of Australia. 2013.
  • The annotated Such Is Life: being certain extracts from the diary of Tom Collins / by Joseph Furphy ; with an introduction and notes by Frances Devlin-Glass, Robin Eaden, Lois Hoffmann and G.W.Turner; Melbourne: Oxford University Press 1991
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