Course Summary

Unit 1 - Lawson's Life and Times
Henry Lawson was an Australian writer and poet. Along with his contemporary Banjo Paterson, Lawson is among the best-known Australian poets and fiction writers of the colonial period and is often called Australia's "greatest writer".

Unit 2 - Elements of the Short Story Form
This unit provides an understanding of the history and main elements of this literary form, which can enhance the reading and study of short stories. The short story form in English literature has a long history.

 Unit 3 - Lawson's Short Stories (1)
Lawson's most successful prose collection is While the Billy Boils, published in 1896. In it he "continued his assault on Paterson and the romantics, and in the process, virtually reinvented Australian realism". Most of his work focuses on the Australian bush and is considered by some to be among the first accurate descriptions of Australian life as it was at the time.

Unit 4 - Lawson's Short Stories (2)
Through his short stories, Henry Lawson presents visual images, which convey the reality of life in the Australian bush, as he perceived it.

Lawson’s highly visual stories, through his use of the elements of narrative, serve to challenge the commonly held perceptions of life in the Australian bush during the late 1800s.

 “I am glad to see that the workmen of Albany are beginning to form branch unions here because I think that the surest and the shortest road to the great social reformation of the future lies through trades unionism.”

In this unit we look at some of Lawson’s best known poems which reiterate his major themes..

In this Unit we look at some of Lawson’s poems that are concerned with Australia’s birth as a nation, and patriotism.

This Unit looks at Lawson’s poems about women – women of the bush and women of the towns.

Louisa Lawson must be included in any feminist history of Australia. She was an independent and resourceful woman who fought for women's rights during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century in Australia and her beliefs had a profound influence on her son, Henry Lawson.

The "Bulletin Debate" was a famous dispute in The Bulletin magazine from 1892-93 between two of Australia's most iconic writers and poets: Henry Lawson and Andrew Barton "Banjo" Paterson.