• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

The Institute of Australian Culture

Heritage, history, and heroes; literature, legends, and larrikins

  • Home
  • Articles
  • Biographies
  • Books
  • Ephemera
  • Poetry & songs
    • Recommended poetry
    • Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
    • Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
    • Rock music and pop music [videos]
    • Early music [videos]
  • Slang
  • Timeline
    • Timeline of Australian history and culture
    • Calendar of Australian history and culture
    • Significant events and commemorative dates
  • Topics

[Australian candidates for literary fame] [24 June 1824]

10 May 2012 · Leave a Comment

[Editor: An early call for a move towards a more culturally independent Australia, advocating that the Australian intelligentsia be educated in Australia rather than go overseas to study. This article is an extract from the news and editorial section of the The Sydney Gazette, 24 June 1824.]

[Australian candidates for literary fame]

To many of our Readers it must prove a source of great satisfaction, particularly parents and guardians, when they understand our columns are occasionally adorned with productions emanating from the pen of four Australian candidates for literary fame — three of whom are altogether currency.

Why the colonial youth should be exiled to the other side of the world, and be forced to brave the dangers of the ocean, for the purpose of receiving that instruction which is to enable them to grace and benefit the sphere in which Providence may permit them to move, must remain a Query, which, we humbly think, is daily growing unanswerable? Not but that parents and guardians have a right to exercise their prerogative in this important case; but then may not the propriety of an act be questioned, which savours so much of the absence of prudence, and evidently betrays a want of common penetration?

The Colony, even in our yet infant state, can boast of seminaries well calculated to qualify the most brilliant genius for all the exertions to which it may be called; and here, it should not be forgotten, we have sources of mental improvement apart from the endless incitements and attractions to accomplished and almost irresistible vice, that are so much the fashion of Europe.

Why then, again it must be reiterated, with examples the most flattering before us, should the Australian be driven from home (either through false pride, ignorance, or over-anxious fondness), in quest of certain evils that are so easily to be avoided? Perhaps some one of our colonial literati will be able to solve the enigma, pro bono publico.



Source:
The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (Sydney, NSW), Thursday 24 June 1824, page 2

Editor’s notes:
currency = people born in Australia; native-born European Australians were known as “currency lads” and “currency lasses”

pro bono publico = (Latin) a phrase meaning “for the public good” which refers to work undertaken without payment as a service to the general public (usually regarding work carried out by those with a professional background, especially unpaid work by the legal profession)

[Editor: The original text has been separated into paragraphs.]

Filed Under: articles Tagged With: Australianism, SourceTrove, year1824

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Australian flag, Kangaroo, Wattle, 100hThe Institute of Australian Culture
Heritage, history, and heroes. Literature, legends, and larrikins. Stories, songs, and sages.

Search this site

Featured books

The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses, by Banjo Paterson A Book for Kids, by C. J. Dennis  The Bulletin Reciter: A Collection of Verses for Recitation from The Bulletin The Songs of a Sentimental Bloke, by C. J. Dennis The Complete Inner History of the Kelly Gang and Their Pursuers, by J. J. Kenneally The Foundations of Culture in Australia, by P. R. Stephensen The Australian Crisis, by C. H. Kirmess Such Is Life, by Joseph Furphy
More books (full text)

Featured lists

Timeline of Australian history and culture
A list of significant Australiana
Significant events and commemorative dates
Australian slang
Books (full text)
Australian literature
Rock music and pop music (videos)
Folk music and bush music (videos)
Early music (videos)
Recommended poetry
Poetry and songs, 1786-1900
Poetry and songs, 1901-1954
Australian explorers
Topics
Links

Featured posts

Advance Australia Fair: How the song became the Australian national anthem
Brian Cadd [music videos and biography]
Ned Kelly: Australian bushranger
Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]

Some Australian authors

E. J. Brady
John Le Gay Brereton
C. J. Dennis
Mary Hannay Foott
Joseph Furphy
Mary Gilmore
Charles Harpur
Grant Hervey
Lucy Everett Homfray
Rex Ingamells
Henry Kendall
“Kookaburra”
Henry Lawson
Jack Moses
“Dryblower” Murphy
John Shaw Neilson
John O’Brien (Patrick Joseph Hartigan)
“Banjo” Paterson
Marie E. J. Pitt
A. G. Stephens
P. R. Stephensen
Agnes L. Storrie (Agnes L. Kettlewell)

Recent Posts

  • A billabong: Goulbourn River [postcard, 27 November 1907]
  • Dear Mac [postcard, early 20th Century]
  • The New to the Old [poem by Randolph Bedford, 3 January 1896]
  • New Year greetings [postcard, early 20th Century]
  • New Year greetings [postcard, early 20th Century]

Top Posts & Pages

  • The Man from Snowy River [poem by Banjo Paterson]
  • Australian slang
  • The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]
  • The Bard and the Lizard [poem by John Shaw Neilson]
  • The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]

Archives

Categories

Posts of note

The Bastard from the Bush [poem, circa 1900]
A Book for Kids [by C. J. Dennis, 1921]
Click Go the Shears [traditional Australian song, 1890s]
Core of My Heart [“My Country”, poem by Dorothea Mackellar, 24 October 1908]
Freedom on the Wallaby [poem by Henry Lawson, 16 May 1891]
The Man from Ironbark [poem by Banjo Paterson]
Nationality [poem by Mary Gilmore, 12 May 1942]
The Newcastle song [music video, sung by Bob Hudson]
No Foe Shall Gather Our Harvest [poem by Mary Gilmore, 29 June 1940]
Our pipes [short story by Henry Lawson]
Rommel’s comments on Australian soldiers [1941-1942]
Shooting the moon [short story by Henry Lawson]

Recent Comments

  • Annie Crestani on Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]
  • Peter Pearsall on The Clarence [poem by Jack Moses]
  • Trevor Hurst on Timeline of Australian history and culture
  • Ju on Under the Southern Cross I Stand [the Australian cricket team’s victory song]
  • David Carroll on Queensland [poem by Philip Durham Lorimer]

For Australia

Copyright © 2023 · Log in