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

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After a night in the pub at Genoa, Brady’s two sturdy lads brought a launch
puttering alongside the little jetty at the head of Mallacoota Lakes. I was
afraid of being dumped in the lake, but Mr. McAllister assured me the
youngsters were used to handling boats almost as soon as they could walk.
Such a dream of liveliness it was, gliding through those three wide lakes,
shining silverly in the early sunshine, with the densely timbered shores, misty
on either shore. Not a habitation in sight anywhere – until we came to the
rising ground on which Brady’s camp stood, in sight of the ocean. Norma was
there to greet me, with her youngest child at foot. She was tall and handsome,
a Junoesque figure. I liked her immediately, recognising the simple dignity of
her bearing…
What was called ‘the camp’ was planned with a large room, roofed and floorboarded,
and smaller tents on the other side of an open court-yard, overgrown
with wild creepers. A shack of corrugated iron at one end served as a kitchen.
Here Norma had lived and brought up her children, often alone for months
when Brady’s literary interests took him again to the city. 1
After a most enjoyable visit, Miss Prichard had to return by coach to Eden, and while
McAllister tried to catch a young colt, she drove the coach, only to have the horses
start with fright when the runaway colt suddenly appeared in front of them:
Then my pair bolted, and away they went, helter-skelter, along the track down
hill. I heard McAllister shout “Jump!” But I hung on to the reins until I
managed to steady the horses, and McAllister running behind, scrambled into
the back of the buggy. He looked ghastly and when he could speak, said, ‘If
anything were known of this I would lose my job.’
Yet in this wild country Brady had the vision to foresee a railway, highways and close
settlement. He campaigned for all of these, for was not his family motto “Vincit
Pericula Virtus”? And did he not love the Croajingolong district with all his heart?
Even though Miss Prichard was farther left in her politics than Brady himself would
go, he always had a tender feeling for her. “Comrade Katharine, gentle, cultured and
sincere is fearlessly Communistic, a militant worker and member of groups.” Writing
in 1931, he saw her novels presenting “a picture of Australian working class reality
which in the somewhat crowded walls of our native production hang conspicuously in
a frame of red.” He also admired her pamphlets on socialism, agreeing with her that
this doctrine stood for “light, honesty, reason, justice and love”, with unionism as the
only legitimate weapon left to the worker to fight what were regarded as the evils of
capitalism. But once Brady, on the basis of long friendship, advised her against a toofervid
utterance of her views, having visions of her being imprisoned, or worse. The
“withering scorn” with which she greeted this piece of brotherly advice was still a
vivid memory for Brady many years later.
Brady’s friendships tended to be long ones, and like so many of his other visitors to
Mallacoota and to Melbourne, Louis Esson and his wife, Hilda, enjoyed the Brady
company, discussion and confidences. Roderic Quinn, in 1906, jokingly asked Brady
to bring Louis Esson back with him from a visit to Melbourne, as both writers had
been impressed with the verse which Esson had had published in the journals,
especially The Bulletin. Upon discussing his achievements, Brady and Quinn decided
that Esson had what Daley called the “thirrough” (also spelled “thirra”) – that subtle
quality of inspiration, which separated true poetry from, rhymed verse.
1 The Manuscript was undated, but had been newly written (1969) and was entitled “Brady”.