"The Commercial Traveller's Wife" | |
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by Ronald McCuaig | |
First published in | The Penguin Book of Australian Verse edited by John Thompson, Kenneth Slessor and R. G. Howarth (1958) |
Country | Australia |
Language | English |
Publication date | 1958 |
"The Commercial Traveller's Wife" is a poem by Australian poet Ronald McCuaig. [1] It was first published in the anthology The Penguin Book of Australian Verse edited by John Thompson, Kenneth Slessor and R. G. Howarth in 1958, [2] and later in the author's collections and in other Australian poetry anthologies.
A neglected older woman makes a pass at the young man boarder with her and her husband. She is rejected and the young man then realises that he will have to move out and find another place to live.
In his commentary on the poem in 60 Classic Australian Poems Geoff Page praised the poet's " mastery of the colloquial", putting the opinion that McCuaig "was perhaps the first urban poet to use language in this way". He goes on to comment that this is a poem about the "everyday – and the shoddy moral compromises made by people who are fully human but have no particular claim to fame." [3]
Kenneth Adolphe Slessor was an Australian poet, journalist and official war correspondent in World War II. He was one of Australia's leading poets, notable particularly for the absorption of modernist influences into Australian poetry. The Kenneth Slessor Prize for Poetry is named after him.
"Where the Dead Men Lie" is a poem by Australian poet Barcroft Boake. It was first published in The Bulletin magazine on 19 December 1891, and later in the poet's poetry collection Where the Dead Men Lie, and Other Poems (1897).
The Sick Stockrider is a poem by Australian poet Adam Lindsay Gordon. It was first published in Colonial Monthly magazine in January 1870, although the magazine was dated December 1869. It was later in the poet's second and last poetry collection Bush Ballads and Galloping Rhymes (1870).
This article presents a list of the historical events and publications of Australian literature during 1958.
Ronald McCuaig was an Australian poet, journalist, literary critic, humorist and children's author. He was described by Geoffrey Dutton as "Australia's first modern poet" and Kenneth Slessor included him in "the front rank of Australian poets". His work was the subject of one of Douglas Stewart's 1977 Boyer Lectures for the ABC. Most of his poems were first published in The Bulletin, which he joined as a member of staff in 1949, becoming short story editor from 1950 to 1960. In Norway he is well known for his children's book Fresi Fantastika, translated into Norwegian in 1975, originally published as Gangles in English in 1972.
The Wind at Your Door (1959) is a one-poem volume by Australian poet R. D. Fitzgerald. The poem was originally published in The Bulletin on 17 December 1958, and later in this 275 copy Talkarra Press limited edition, signed by the author. It won the Grace Leven Prize for Poetry in 1959.
The Tomb of Lt. John Learmonth, AIF is a poem by Australian poet J. S. Manifold. It was first published in New Republic magazine on 10 September 1945, and later in the poet's poetry collections Collected Verse (1978), and On My Selection : Poems (1983). The poem has subsequently been published numerous times in various Australian poetry anthologies.
"Beach Burial" (1944) is a poem by Australian poet Kenneth Slessor.
"South of My Days" (1945) is a poem by Australian poet Judith Wright.
"Bullocky" (1944) is a poem by Australian poet Judith Wright.
"Nationality" is a poem by Australian poet Mary Gilmore. It was first published in Australian Poetry 1942, edited by Robert D. Fitzgerald in 1942, and later in the poet's collection Selected Verse, and other Australian poetry anthologies.
"The Orange Tree" is a poem by Australian poet John Shaw Neilson. It was first published in The Bookfellow on 15 February 1921, and later in the poet's collections and other Australian poetry anthologies.
"Middleton's Rouseabout" is a poem by Australian poet Henry Lawson. It was first published in The Freeman's Journal on 8 March 1890, and later in the poet's collections and other Australian poetry anthologies.
Unfinished - individual poem - Gilmore, Lawson, Harpur, Kendall, Paterson
"I'm Like All Lovers" is a poem by Australian poet Lesbia Harford. It was written in 1917, though first published in the poet's collection The Poems of Lesbia Harford in 1941 under the title "Poems XIV", and later in other Australian poetry anthologies.
"The Mayan Books" is a poem by Australian poet A. D. Hope. It was first published in the poet's collection Orpheus in 1991, and later in other Australian poetry anthologies.
"Suburban Sonnet" is a poem by Australian poet Gwen Harwood.
"Because" is a poem by Australian poet James McAuley.
60 Classic Australian Poems is an anthology of poems edited by Australian writer Geoff Page, published by Hardie Grant Books in 2008.
"The Children March" is a poem by Australian poet Elizabeth Riddell.