A CRITICAL BIOGRAPHY OF EDWIN JAMES BRADY - Mallacoota ...

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Quite a lot of Australian literary criticism had in the past been concerned to
show that certain poets, writers on a pretentious scale, have been as important
as they set out to be – and we know that this wasn’t always so. In fact, nature
is very prodigal of poets, as she is of all her creations. There is great waste.
Not every acorn that crops from an oak-tree is destined to grow. Not every
poet who writes is bound to survive. And not every verse that the best of poets
prints is bound to enter into the real heritage of a nation. Like the unfruitful
seed, and the leaves that fall, some only serve to enrich the soil. They go back
into the earth and keep it fit to produce; but they decay themselves and leave
no trace. Yet even in that way they have their importance. They bear a real
influence, though they themselves are overwhelmed.
Some writers are more important in that way than for their actual works. To
my way of thinking, E.J. Brady belongs in that class. 1
There is more than a grain of truth in this statement of Brady’s function as a poet.
Secure in his niche as a writer of sea poems, he yet has little cause for immortality on
account of his verse as a whole. There is no real doubt however, that his relationships
with other literary figures gave him a unique opportunity to become aware of and to
influence on a personal level the current output of many of his more famous
contemporaries particularly of Lawson, Quinn and Daley, but also of C.J. Dennis,
Miles Franklin, K.S. Prichard, Louis Esson and younger figures such as Muit Holburn
and Robert Close. He was a living link between the balladists of the 1880’s and
1890’s and the younger writers of the first half of the twentieth century. Although it
is not claimed that he influenced them, Brady was still writing for The Bulletin when
Judith Wright, Kenneth Slessor, R.D. Fitzgerald and David Campbell were becoming
established and supplying verse to its columns. He, along with Mary Gilmore, was
one of the longest links between the two centuries, encompassing the nationalistic
emphasis of the nineties, the slackness of the early part of this century and the lyric
revival of the late thirties and the forties. However, his personal contacts with poets,
writers and artists were strongest and most frequent in the last decade of the last [19 th ]
century.
It has already been recounted how Brady first met Lawson after “stealing” his poem,
“The Cambararoora Star” for publishing in The Australian Workman. From this
beginning there ensued a strong friendship which continued right up to Lawson’s
death – a period of over thirty years – with the exception of a brief couple of months
in 1899 when the two had a difference of opinion over Lawson’s pessimistic article in
The Bulletin giving advice to young Australian writers. Brady’s reply, rather
undiplomatic in the light of his knowledge of Lawson’s personal quirks, was intended
to apply to all writers, but Henry took offence and refused to speak to the younger
man until his grievance, more imaginary than real, subsided. Brady made the point
that it was Lawson’s view of life which was at fault, strongly hinting that he should
think less of himself and more of his art:
Lawson-on-himself is interesting from the psychological aspect, but open to
criticism when he proceeds as an authority to deduce from a purely personal
experience axioms for the working out of all future Australian literary
problems. All writers understand from private experience how important the
Literary Ego is to itself – but some learn to believe that this importance is
nothing whatever in comparison with the importance of Literature.
1 Brian Elliot, “A century of Australian Literature” a radio broadcast on Dennis, Brady and Ogilvie
given on the A.B.C., 4.2.1951. The script is in the A.B.C. Archives.