Bernard O'Dowd by Victor Kennedy and Nettie Palmer
Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1954
Bernard O'Dowd, "Poet Militant", is out of fashion these days. His verse, old fashioned in construction and semi-mythical in tone, does not strike a chord with today's reader. His politics are even more out-of-date, with his desire for a true democracy from an enlightened electorate a fading dream in this age of social media and "reality" TV.
But in the early years of the twentieth century, O'Dowd was a force in the debates that whirled around the discussion of what sort of future Australia should have. His political commentary and his poetry were for the notion that Australia should be something new, replacing the failed politics and religion of Europe. He hoped to see that develop, and "did his bit" in the (failed) attempt to make it so.
The book under review was begun while O'Dowd was still alive, and completed by Palmer after his death, and after the death of Kennedy, the co-author. It is a basic re-telling of the poet's life, with a critical essay on his works. O'Dowd was born in the town of Beaufort in Western Victoria, and moved to Ballarat at a young age to continue his schooling. A bright boy, he immersed himself in books, but was also alive to the world around him, which was not in his time the Ballarat of the early gold rush years, but a city on the way up, with grandiose designs, and with an industrialized mining workforce. O'Dowd saw at first-hand how labour and capital interacted.
As well as literature, the law fascinated him, and he completed his law studies and got a job in the Supreme Court Library, where he worked for some time before moving to the Parliament, where he eventually became Chief Parliamentary Draughtsman. O'Dowd engaged in journalism along with his poetry, contributing to The Bulletin, editing The Tocsin, and regularly contributing to other journals of the Left. He campaigned against Federation, on the basis that the "less advanced" states would bring the "more advanced" states down to their level in terms of rights for workers, among other things.
His poetry too was produced for the purpose - he was less concerned with aesthetics or technique than with content - to O'Dowd the poet had replaced gods and prophets, and was the person who would bring forth the new world he hoped for. His focus on what Australia was to become is most seen in the collection Dawnward? and his poem The Bush, which imagines a future Australia, when the struggles of his time will become legend. O'Dowd's wide reading of the classics can make his poetry seem obscure at times, with references to Greek, Roman, Saxon and Nordic legends sprinkled through his verse. Likewise, his use of old forms like the Fourteener Ballad form and the Chant Royal, can make his poetry seem old-fashioned today, harking back to earlier, more mythic, times.
Despite what O'Dowd may have thought, poetry doesn't change the world; politics does, and by his refusal to be active politically, he was never going to have a notable effect on the landscape of Australian life. His poetry, after The Bush, became more mystical, and began to express his belief in a universal consciousness.
This book doesn't delve deeply into O'Dowd's personal life: he was married and had six children (my Father worked for a time with one of his sons), but the reader gets no sense of whether his home life was happy, other than an oblique reference to what may have been an extra-marital affair that caused him much distress. Now that seventy years have passed since his death, it could be time for a fuller biography and re-assessment of the man.
O'Dowd may now be a minor figure in Australian history, and a poet overlooked, but the story of his life is fascinating. As to whether biographies of literary figures are worth it, this one is, because it has taken me back to his poetry with a new vigor and understanding.
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