WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:01.419 All right, I want you to do something for me 00:00:01.419 --> 00:00:04.860 right now, a little physical task to get us started. 00:00:04.900 --> 00:00:07.440 Okay, I'm ready. If you happen to be in Australia, 00:00:07.639 --> 00:00:09.699 just reach into your wallet. If you're listening 00:00:09.699 --> 00:00:12.480 from overseas, well, maybe go check that jar 00:00:12.480 --> 00:00:14.900 of leftover travel money you keep on the bookshelf. 00:00:14.919 --> 00:00:18.559 I know the one. Full of strange coins and maybe 00:00:18.559 --> 00:00:21.079 a 20 -kroner note. Exactly. I want you to find 00:00:21.079 --> 00:00:24.000 an Australian $10 note. Yeah. Got it. The blue 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:26.640 one. The blue one. Look at the front. You've 00:00:26.640 --> 00:00:30.969 got that distinct cool blue tint. And, well, 00:00:31.050 --> 00:00:33.570 staring right back at you is a man in a hat. 00:00:33.850 --> 00:00:37.869 He looks calm, dignified. Maybe a little rugged 00:00:37.869 --> 00:00:40.250 around the edges. It's an iconic piece of portraiture, 00:00:40.310 --> 00:00:43.549 really. And if you have incredibly sharp eyesight 00:00:43.549 --> 00:00:45.630 or, you know, better yet, a magnifying glass, 00:00:45.789 --> 00:00:48.009 take a look at the area just around his shoulder. 00:00:48.090 --> 00:00:50.030 Oh, yeah. You'll see these swirling lines of 00:00:50.030 --> 00:00:52.469 text. At first glance, it just looks like a design 00:00:52.469 --> 00:00:54.929 pattern, but it's actually microprint. Tiny, 00:00:54.969 --> 00:00:58.090 microscopic words. The complete text of The Man 00:00:58.090 --> 00:01:01.090 from Snowy River and The Man in the Hat is, of 00:01:01.090 --> 00:01:03.689 course. Andrew Barton Patterson. Better known 00:01:03.689 --> 00:01:06.730 to history and to basically everyone who has 00:01:06.730 --> 00:01:09.890 ever held a beer in an Australian pub as Banjo. 00:01:10.209 --> 00:01:12.930 Banjo Patterson. Right. Now, usually when you 00:01:12.930 --> 00:01:15.430 see a face on a banknote, you make certain assumptions. 00:01:15.549 --> 00:01:18.269 You assume they're a statesman, a general, a 00:01:18.269 --> 00:01:21.209 monarch. Someone. Stiff. Someone who spent their 00:01:21.209 --> 00:01:23.469 life in boardrooms or parliaments. Part of the 00:01:23.469 --> 00:01:25.209 establishment. Right. And most people, they see 00:01:25.209 --> 00:01:26.650 the hat, they know the name, and they think, 00:01:26.730 --> 00:01:30.450 OK, Bush poet. wrote about horses, wrote Walsing 00:01:30.450 --> 00:01:33.430 Matilda, national icon, and they just file them 00:01:33.430 --> 00:01:36.409 away in this mental box marked Old Colonial History. 00:01:36.750 --> 00:01:40.489 He becomes the static grandfatherly figure sitting 00:01:40.489 --> 00:01:43.469 under a gum tree. Yes. And that is such a massive 00:01:43.469 --> 00:01:46.849 disservice because the dry history book version 00:01:46.849 --> 00:01:49.150 of Patterson, the one you get in school, it misses 00:01:49.150 --> 00:01:51.370 the actual human being entirely. Oh, absolutely. 00:01:51.530 --> 00:01:53.450 When you really start to peel back the layers 00:01:53.450 --> 00:01:55.329 of his biography, when you read his personal 00:01:55.329 --> 00:01:57.349 letters and look at the trajectory of his life, 00:01:57.430 --> 00:01:59.969 you don't find a simple farm boy writing rhymes. 00:02:00.109 --> 00:02:03.299 Not at all. That is exactly what blew my mind 00:02:03.299 --> 00:02:05.400 when we started researching this deep dive. This 00:02:05.400 --> 00:02:07.920 guy wasn't just a poet. I mean, he was a rock 00:02:07.920 --> 00:02:11.340 star of the 1890s. He was a high -powered solicitor 00:02:11.340 --> 00:02:14.099 handling complex legal cases in the city. He 00:02:14.099 --> 00:02:16.280 was a war correspondent hanging out with Winston 00:02:16.280 --> 00:02:18.259 Churchill. And Rudyard Kipling? Don't forget 00:02:18.259 --> 00:02:20.560 Kipling. Incredible. And as we're going to get 00:02:20.560 --> 00:02:24.180 into in quite some detail, he was the central 00:02:24.180 --> 00:02:27.379 figure in a messy, high -stakes romantic scandal 00:02:27.379 --> 00:02:30.080 that birthed the country's most famous song. 00:02:30.509 --> 00:02:32.810 The tea is incredibly hot in this one, as they 00:02:32.810 --> 00:02:34.909 say. It really is. We're going to get into the 00:02:34.909 --> 00:02:37.509 rumors, the womanizer claims, and the fact that 00:02:37.509 --> 00:02:39.610 he kept a box of chocolates for 40 years. Which 00:02:39.610 --> 00:02:42.289 is just a wonderful little detail. It's so human. 00:02:42.810 --> 00:02:45.430 So our mission today is to move beyond that flat 00:02:45.430 --> 00:02:48.409 image on the banknote. We want to meet the adventurer, 00:02:48.550 --> 00:02:51.229 the journalist, and the man whose specific vision 00:02:51.229 --> 00:02:54.289 of Australia arguably defined the national character 00:02:54.289 --> 00:02:56.889 we still talk about today. It's a character study, 00:02:57.050 --> 00:02:59.750 really. We're looking at a man who constructed 00:02:59.750 --> 00:03:03.889 a romantic ideal of a country, a brand for Australia, 00:03:04.090 --> 00:03:06.550 if you will, even while living a life that was 00:03:06.550 --> 00:03:10.090 far more sophisticated, urban, and, well, contradictory 00:03:10.090 --> 00:03:12.810 than his poems might suggest. So we've got the 00:03:12.810 --> 00:03:15.449 comprehensive biography, details on his literary 00:03:15.449 --> 00:03:18.610 works, his war diaries, even some analysis of 00:03:18.610 --> 00:03:21.150 his personal letters. Let's dive in. Where does 00:03:21.150 --> 00:03:24.530 the story of the banjo actually begin? Because 00:03:24.530 --> 00:03:26.919 despite the myth, He wasn't born with a pen in 00:03:26.919 --> 00:03:29.280 his hand, and he certainly wasn't born into security. 00:03:29.560 --> 00:03:31.819 No, far from it. He was born on February 17, 00:03:32.219 --> 00:03:35.139 1864, at a property called Narambla, which is 00:03:35.139 --> 00:03:37.379 near Orange in New South Wales. Okay, so for 00:03:37.379 --> 00:03:39.740 our international listeners, or even for Aussies 00:03:39.740 --> 00:03:41.539 who stick to the coast, let's put that on the 00:03:41.539 --> 00:03:43.860 map. Orange is west of the Great Dividing Range. 00:03:44.080 --> 00:03:47.080 In the 1860s, this wasn't just the country. No, 00:03:47.099 --> 00:03:48.860 this was the frontier. This is only a decade 00:03:48.860 --> 00:03:50.879 or so after the gold rush has really kicked off, 00:03:50.960 --> 00:03:53.060 right? So the infrastructure is thin. It's remote. 00:03:53.639 --> 00:03:56.629 Precisely. It was a frontier society. Patterson 00:03:56.629 --> 00:03:59.069 was the eldest of seven children. And his father, 00:03:59.229 --> 00:04:01.289 Andrew Bogle Patterson, was a Scottish immigrant 00:04:01.289 --> 00:04:03.789 from Lanarkshire. And this is a really crucial 00:04:03.789 --> 00:04:07.169 detail for understanding Banjo. His father wasn't 00:04:07.169 --> 00:04:09.629 part of the established landed gentry. He wasn't 00:04:09.629 --> 00:04:11.830 sitting on old money. Not at all. He was a grazier 00:04:11.830 --> 00:04:13.949 trying to make a go of it on the land. We should 00:04:13.949 --> 00:04:16.430 probably define grazier for our global audience. 00:04:17.029 --> 00:04:18.810 Because we aren't just talking about a guy with 00:04:18.810 --> 00:04:21.089 a few cows and, you know, a petting zoo. No. 00:04:21.420 --> 00:04:23.860 No, not at all. In the Australian context, a 00:04:23.860 --> 00:04:26.819 grazier is a large scale pastoralist, someone 00:04:26.819 --> 00:04:29.319 raising sheep or cattle, often on these vast 00:04:29.319 --> 00:04:32.180 tracts of land for the production of wool or 00:04:32.180 --> 00:04:35.160 meat. It's big business. It is a high risk, high 00:04:35.160 --> 00:04:37.139 reward business. You are completely dependent 00:04:37.139 --> 00:04:40.339 on the global commodity markets and more terrifyingly, 00:04:40.339 --> 00:04:42.699 on the Australian climate. And for the Patterson 00:04:42.699 --> 00:04:46.019 family, that risk wasn't just some abstract concept. 00:04:46.180 --> 00:04:49.209 It bit them hard. Oh, it did. They were living 00:04:49.209 --> 00:04:51.490 on a station, which is what we call a large ranch 00:04:51.490 --> 00:04:54.990 named Buchenbach. But when young Andrew Arbanjo 00:04:54.990 --> 00:04:58.250 was just five years old, disaster struck. The 00:04:58.250 --> 00:05:01.230 region was hit by a massive flood and his father 00:05:01.230 --> 00:05:04.209 lost his entire wool clip. I want to pause on 00:05:04.209 --> 00:05:06.350 that for a second because it sounds almost abstract. 00:05:06.470 --> 00:05:10.689 Lost his wool clip. But in economic terms, that's 00:05:10.689 --> 00:05:13.430 catastrophic, isn't it? It is total ruin. I mean, 00:05:13.449 --> 00:05:16.490 imagine working for 12 solid months. You breed 00:05:16.490 --> 00:05:18.290 the sheep, you keep them alive through drought 00:05:18.290 --> 00:05:21.069 and disease, you shear them, which is just backbreaking 00:05:21.069 --> 00:05:23.769 labor, and you process the wool. That physical 00:05:23.769 --> 00:05:26.430 pile of wool represents your entire income for 00:05:26.430 --> 00:05:27.930 the year. It's everything. It's your mortgage 00:05:27.930 --> 00:05:30.430 payment, your food, your operating costs for 00:05:30.430 --> 00:05:33.069 the next year. And then a river rises, and in 00:05:33.069 --> 00:05:35.490 a matter of hours, it's all washed away. Gone. 00:05:35.790 --> 00:05:38.939 And back then, in 1869, there's no FEMA. There's 00:05:38.939 --> 00:05:40.819 no government bailout. There's no insurance policy 00:05:40.819 --> 00:05:42.439 that's going to cover acts of God on the frontier. 00:05:42.699 --> 00:05:45.800 Exactly. It forced them to sell up. It completely 00:05:45.800 --> 00:05:48.220 changed the family's destiny. They couldn't stay 00:05:48.220 --> 00:05:51.100 at Bakkenba. They had to move. And this is a 00:05:51.100 --> 00:05:53.860 recurring theme you see in Bush life. the boom 00:05:53.860 --> 00:05:55.819 and the bust. It's something Patterson would 00:05:55.819 --> 00:05:57.980 later capture in his poetry, not because he studied 00:05:57.980 --> 00:06:00.579 it in the library, but because he lived the trauma 00:06:00.579 --> 00:06:02.560 of it as a five -year -old boy. That experience 00:06:02.560 --> 00:06:04.620 must have been seared into his memory. I think 00:06:04.620 --> 00:06:07.420 so. The precariousness of it all. So the family 00:06:07.420 --> 00:06:09.939 packs up their lives. They move to a place called 00:06:09.939 --> 00:06:13.519 Illalong, near Yes. Now, looking at the map and 00:06:13.519 --> 00:06:16.300 the historical context, this location seems pivotal 00:06:16.300 --> 00:06:19.160 to me. It wasn't just some quiet backwater tucked 00:06:19.160 --> 00:06:21.579 away in the hills. No, it was positioned... Right 00:06:21.579 --> 00:06:25.259 on the main drag. The main drag. Precisely. Illalong 00:06:25.259 --> 00:06:27.540 was right near the main overland route between 00:06:27.540 --> 00:06:30.019 Melbourne and Sydney. You have to remember, the 00:06:30.019 --> 00:06:32.259 railway network wasn't fully connected yet. There 00:06:32.259 --> 00:06:35.279 were no highways. This dirt road was the lifeline 00:06:35.279 --> 00:06:38.339 of the colony. So as a boy, Patterson isn't just 00:06:38.339 --> 00:06:41.000 seeing sheep and gum trees. He's sitting at his 00:06:41.000 --> 00:06:43.560 front gate watching the arterial blood of the 00:06:43.560 --> 00:06:46.459 colony flow past. Paint the picture for us. What 00:06:46.459 --> 00:06:48.899 is he actually seeing from that front gate? Okay, 00:06:48.939 --> 00:06:51.819 so he's seeing the machinery of colonial transport. 00:06:52.300 --> 00:06:54.939 First, he's seeing the bullet teams. Which are 00:06:54.939 --> 00:06:57.019 what, exactly? For someone who's never seen one. 00:06:57.120 --> 00:07:00.939 These are massive heavy wagons hauling tons of 00:07:00.939 --> 00:07:03.519 wool or supplies. And they're pulled by these 00:07:03.519 --> 00:07:06.779 huge teams of 12, sometimes 20 oxen bullocks. 00:07:06.920 --> 00:07:10.360 They move incredibly slowly. They're immensely 00:07:10.360 --> 00:07:13.519 powerful. And the men who drove them, the bullockies, 00:07:13.740 --> 00:07:17.379 were famous for their colorful language and their 00:07:17.379 --> 00:07:19.439 toughness. The truckers of their day. A very 00:07:19.439 --> 00:07:22.319 slow version, yes. And then on the other end 00:07:22.319 --> 00:07:24.180 of the speed spectrum, he's seeing the Cobb and 00:07:24.180 --> 00:07:27.720 Co. coaches. Ah, Cobham Co., legendary. Think 00:07:27.720 --> 00:07:30.680 of it as the Wells Fargo stagecoach of Australia. 00:07:31.019 --> 00:07:33.240 There were the mail carriers, the passenger transport, 00:07:33.459 --> 00:07:35.220 the high -speed connection to the outside world. 00:07:35.399 --> 00:07:37.259 These coaches would come rattling through in 00:07:37.259 --> 00:07:39.319 clouds of dust, changing horses at stations, 00:07:39.480 --> 00:07:41.939 bringing news, mail, and, you know, interesting 00:07:41.939 --> 00:07:43.620 strangers from the city. It's like living on 00:07:43.620 --> 00:07:46.519 the side of Route 66 in the 1950s, or next to 00:07:46.519 --> 00:07:48.399 a major truck stop today. He's just watching 00:07:48.399 --> 00:07:50.839 the world go by. And perhaps most significantly 00:07:50.839 --> 00:07:53.879 for Patterson's future work, he saw the drovers. 00:07:54.600 --> 00:07:58.120 Another term we need to pin down, drover. A drover 00:07:58.120 --> 00:08:00.540 is a specialist stockman who moves livestock 00:08:00.540 --> 00:08:04.399 over long distances on the hoof. So they aren't 00:08:04.399 --> 00:08:06.500 farmers who stay in one place behind a fence. 00:08:06.600 --> 00:08:09.800 They are these nomadic experts who drive thousands 00:08:09.800 --> 00:08:12.800 of sheep or cattle, hundreds, sometimes thousands, 00:08:12.899 --> 00:08:15.540 of miles to market. They were the cowboys of 00:08:15.540 --> 00:08:17.819 the Australian bush. Right, but often dealing 00:08:17.819 --> 00:08:20.139 with much harsher terrain and longer distances. 00:08:20.500 --> 00:08:22.839 They were legendary figures. And Patterson is 00:08:22.839 --> 00:08:25.399 just a kid, watching this parade of rough -and 00:08:25.399 --> 00:08:27.860 -tumble characters go past his house every day. 00:08:28.439 --> 00:08:30.699 Specifically, he watched the horsemen from the 00:08:30.699 --> 00:08:33.179 Snowy Mountains and the Murrumbidgee River area. 00:08:33.580 --> 00:08:35.559 Now, these weren't just farmhands. These were 00:08:35.559 --> 00:08:38.100 men who lived in the saddle. The terrain in the 00:08:38.100 --> 00:08:40.340 Snowy Mountains is steep. It's scrubby. It's 00:08:40.340 --> 00:08:43.259 incredibly dangerous. To ride there, you needed 00:08:43.259 --> 00:08:45.740 a level of horsemanship that was almost acrobatic. 00:08:45.879 --> 00:08:47.919 And he saw them showing off their skill. He saw 00:08:47.919 --> 00:08:50.559 them at local picnic races and at polo matches. 00:08:50.820 --> 00:08:53.200 That's the spark, isn't it? That's where the 00:08:53.200 --> 00:08:56.379 obsession begins. He's a kid fanboying over these 00:08:56.379 --> 00:08:59.000 guys who can ride anything, jump anything, go 00:08:59.000 --> 00:09:01.980 anywhere. It's the origin story of the man from 00:09:01.980 --> 00:09:04.659 Snowy River archetype. He was idolizing these 00:09:04.659 --> 00:09:06.960 horsemen long before he ever wrote a word about 00:09:06.960 --> 00:09:09.639 them. It absolutely imprinted on him. He saw 00:09:09.639 --> 00:09:12.580 a kind of nobility in their skill, in their connection 00:09:12.580 --> 00:09:14.659 with their horses. But there's another side to 00:09:14.659 --> 00:09:17.200 his upbringing that we really can't ignore. OK. 00:09:17.320 --> 00:09:20.080 Despite this rough environment, he wasn't uneducated, 00:09:20.100 --> 00:09:24.149 not by a long shot. His mother. Rose Isabella 00:09:24.149 --> 00:09:27.169 Barton, was Australian born and very well connected. 00:09:27.389 --> 00:09:29.769 She was actually related to Edmund Barton. Wait, 00:09:29.870 --> 00:09:33.049 Edmund Barton? As in the guy who would eventually 00:09:33.049 --> 00:09:35.289 become the very first prime minister of Australia? 00:09:35.610 --> 00:09:38.190 The very same. Wow. OK, so Patterson isn't just 00:09:38.190 --> 00:09:41.110 some random bush kid. He has blood ties to the 00:09:41.110 --> 00:09:43.590 emerging political elite. That Barton middle 00:09:43.590 --> 00:09:46.379 name carried some weight. And his education really 00:09:46.379 --> 00:09:48.379 reflects that. He started with a governess at 00:09:48.379 --> 00:09:51.000 home, then went to a local bush school at Binalong, 00:09:51.100 --> 00:09:53.080 but eventually the family scraped together the 00:09:53.080 --> 00:09:55.039 resources to send him to Sydney Grammar School. 00:09:55.259 --> 00:09:58.620 The big city. A huge change. He moves from the 00:09:58.620 --> 00:10:01.919 dust of Yass to a cottage in Gladesville called 00:10:01.919 --> 00:10:05.159 Rock End to attend this prestigious private school. 00:10:05.440 --> 00:10:07.620 Which is a heritage site now. You can still visit 00:10:07.620 --> 00:10:09.779 it. Right. He's doing well. He's a good student, 00:10:09.799 --> 00:10:11.879 a sportsman. He was captain of the rugby team, 00:10:11.899 --> 00:10:17.090 I believe. But then... We hit a snag, a failure 00:10:17.090 --> 00:10:19.029 that I think is really, really important to his 00:10:19.029 --> 00:10:22.429 trajectory. Yes. At 16, he sat for the scholarship 00:10:22.429 --> 00:10:25.250 examination for the University of Sydney, and 00:10:25.250 --> 00:10:28.149 he failed. Which honestly makes me like him more. 00:10:28.269 --> 00:10:31.029 The great literary genius flunked his entrance 00:10:31.029 --> 00:10:33.850 exam. Well, it was a classic sliding doors moment, 00:10:33.990 --> 00:10:35.710 wasn't it? If he had passed, he might have gone 00:10:35.710 --> 00:10:38.450 into academia. He might have become a dry scholar 00:10:38.450 --> 00:10:41.090 of classics or a professor of history. And we 00:10:41.090 --> 00:10:42.590 might never have gotten Clancy the Overflow. 00:10:42.919 --> 00:10:45.480 Possibly not. Because he failed the scholarship, 00:10:45.720 --> 00:10:47.840 the family couldn't afford to just pay his way 00:10:47.840 --> 00:10:50.620 through university. So he had to get a job. He 00:10:50.620 --> 00:10:53.379 had to enter the real world immediately. He needed 00:10:53.379 --> 00:10:55.919 a paycheck. Exactly. So he entered into a legal 00:10:55.919 --> 00:10:58.460 clerkship. He started right at the bottom rung 00:10:58.460 --> 00:11:00.899 of a Sydney law firm. He studied law the hard 00:11:00.899 --> 00:11:03.340 way while working and was eventually admitted 00:11:03.340 --> 00:11:06.440 as a solicitor in 1886. So for a significant 00:11:06.440 --> 00:11:09.759 part of his young adult life, Andrew Barton Patterson 00:11:09.759 --> 00:11:12.940 wasn't a poet. He was a lawyer. He was drafting 00:11:12.940 --> 00:11:15.720 contracts, dealing with wills, sitting in an 00:11:15.720 --> 00:11:18.120 office wearing a stiff collar and a suit. A very 00:11:18.120 --> 00:11:19.539 different picture from the man on the horse. 00:11:19.740 --> 00:11:21.799 Which brings us perfectly to part two of our 00:11:21.799 --> 00:11:25.440 deep dive, the double life. Because this duality 00:11:25.440 --> 00:11:27.399 is the thing that really defines him for me. 00:11:27.559 --> 00:11:31.139 By day, he's Mr. Patterson, the respectable solicitor, 00:11:31.179 --> 00:11:34.279 handling disputes and paperwork. But by night? 00:11:34.879 --> 00:11:38.039 He's the banjo. It is a classic superhero dichotomy, 00:11:38.059 --> 00:11:40.580 isn't it? He started writing poetry around 1885 00:11:40.580 --> 00:11:43.460 and submitting it to the Bulletin. Now, we cannot 00:11:43.460 --> 00:11:45.360 overstate the importance of the Bulletin in the 00:11:45.360 --> 00:11:47.720 1890s. What was the vibe of the Bulletin? Was 00:11:47.720 --> 00:11:50.759 it a newspaper? A magazine? What was its place 00:11:50.759 --> 00:11:53.320 in the culture? It was a weekly magazine, but 00:11:53.320 --> 00:11:56.669 its nickname was the Bushman's Bible. It was 00:11:56.669 --> 00:11:59.830 radical. It was nationalist. It was funny. And 00:11:59.830 --> 00:12:03.090 it was incredibly popular. It was the primary 00:12:03.090 --> 00:12:06.509 cultural touchstone for the entire colony. It 00:12:06.509 --> 00:12:08.809 was where the Australian conversation was happening. 00:12:08.909 --> 00:12:10.649 If you wanted to be read, if you wanted to be 00:12:10.649 --> 00:12:13.230 part of that conversation, you published in the 00:12:13.230 --> 00:12:15.769 bulletin. And Patterson didn't use his real name. 00:12:16.029 --> 00:12:19.570 He signed his poems, The Banjo. Now, if you didn't 00:12:19.570 --> 00:12:21.289 know the backstory, you'd think maybe he played 00:12:21.289 --> 00:12:23.649 the instrument. But tell them where the name 00:12:23.649 --> 00:12:26.039 actually came from. It was the name of his favorite 00:12:26.039 --> 00:12:28.960 racehorse. I just love that. It's so unpretentious. 00:12:29.080 --> 00:12:31.159 It's like if I wrote serious, heart -wrenching 00:12:31.159 --> 00:12:33.580 poetry about the soul of the nation and signed 00:12:33.580 --> 00:12:36.679 it Fido or Sparky. But it fits his character 00:12:36.679 --> 00:12:38.779 perfectly. It's a little bit self -deprecating. 00:12:38.799 --> 00:12:41.039 It ties back to that love of horses he developed 00:12:41.039 --> 00:12:43.480 as a kid at Illalong. It's signal to the reader, 00:12:43.559 --> 00:12:45.679 I'm not a stuffy academic poet from the university. 00:12:46.139 --> 00:12:48.779 I'm a bloke who likes the track. And under this 00:12:48.779 --> 00:12:51.440 pseudonym, he became a sensation. Sensation might 00:12:51.440 --> 00:12:53.179 be an understatement. We're talking about the 00:12:53.179 --> 00:12:56.019 1890s here. There's no internet, no TV, no radio. 00:12:56.559 --> 00:12:59.399 Poetry was a form of pop culture. He publishes 00:12:59.399 --> 00:13:02.500 Clancy of the Overflow in 1889 and then The Man 00:13:02.500 --> 00:13:05.179 from Snowy River in 1890. And people went absolutely 00:13:05.179 --> 00:13:07.500 nuts for this stuff. How nuts are we talking? 00:13:07.659 --> 00:13:09.679 The numbers back it up. When his first collection, 00:13:09.879 --> 00:13:12.019 The Man from Snowy River and Other Verses, was 00:13:12.019 --> 00:13:15.879 published in 1895 by Angus and Robertson, it 00:13:15.879 --> 00:13:19.399 sold 5 ,000 copies in just four months. In a 00:13:19.399 --> 00:13:21.679 colony with a pretty small population, it's viral 00:13:21.679 --> 00:13:23.559 status. That's like a platinum record today. 00:13:23.740 --> 00:13:25.940 The banjo became a household name. He was giving 00:13:25.940 --> 00:13:28.100 people something they desperately wanted. And 00:13:28.100 --> 00:13:30.909 that brings us to the why. Why was he so popular? 00:13:31.110 --> 00:13:33.309 This connects directly to his famous relationship 00:13:33.309 --> 00:13:37.409 and rivalry with Henry Lawson. Ah, the rap beef 00:13:37.409 --> 00:13:40.389 of the 1890s, Lawson versus Patterson. This is 00:13:40.389 --> 00:13:41.990 one of my favorite parts of Australian literary 00:13:41.990 --> 00:13:45.230 history. It was a fascinating dynamic. They were 00:13:45.230 --> 00:13:47.929 friends. They drank together. But they represented 00:13:47.929 --> 00:13:50.210 two very different philosophies about what Australia 00:13:50.210 --> 00:13:53.190 was and what it should be. They even had a poetry 00:13:53.190 --> 00:13:56.049 slam of sorts in the pages of the bulletin, writing 00:13:56.049 --> 00:13:58.590 poems back and forth, attacking each other's 00:13:58.590 --> 00:14:00.710 view of the bush. So break it down for us. What 00:14:00.710 --> 00:14:03.100 was the core of the disagreement? It was about 00:14:03.100 --> 00:14:05.960 the reality of bush life versus the romance of 00:14:05.960 --> 00:14:09.480 it. Henry Lawson, who wrote these famous, stark, 00:14:09.600 --> 00:14:12.340 short stories like The Drover's Wife, portrayed 00:14:12.340 --> 00:14:15.519 the bush as hard, unforgiving, and bleak. Right. 00:14:15.600 --> 00:14:17.700 He focused on the struggle, the poverty, the 00:14:17.700 --> 00:14:20.159 loneliness, the mud. He wrote about the silence 00:14:20.159 --> 00:14:22.820 that drives people mad. He saw the tragedy in 00:14:22.820 --> 00:14:25.500 it. Lawson is like the gritty documentary filmmaker. 00:14:25.879 --> 00:14:28.039 Yeah. He's saying, look at this starvation. Look 00:14:28.039 --> 00:14:30.279 at this despair. Stop pretending it's some grand 00:14:30.279 --> 00:14:32.429 adventure. Whereas Patterson, Patterson was the 00:14:32.429 --> 00:14:34.629 romantic. He was influenced by poets like John 00:14:34.629 --> 00:14:37.909 Farrell. He saw the Bushmen as a hero, an underdog, 00:14:38.049 --> 00:14:41.690 tough, independent, stoic, riding free across 00:14:41.690 --> 00:14:44.830 these vast sunlit plains. In Patterson's world, 00:14:44.970 --> 00:14:46.929 the Bush was a place of adventure and freedom, 00:14:47.110 --> 00:14:50.419 not just misery and hardship. Clancy of the Overflow 00:14:50.419 --> 00:14:53.039 is the perfect example of this. You've got the 00:14:53.039 --> 00:14:55.539 narrator stuck in a dingy little office in the 00:14:55.539 --> 00:14:58.179 justy dirty city, which is obviously Patterson 00:14:58.179 --> 00:15:00.139 projecting his own feelings about being a lawyer. 00:15:00.279 --> 00:15:02.259 Clearly. And he's just wishing he was out droving 00:15:02.259 --> 00:15:05.019 with Clancy. Exactly. And he sees the vision 00:15:05.019 --> 00:15:07.840 splendid of the sunlit plains extended. That 00:15:07.840 --> 00:15:10.620 line. That one line, it makes you want to quit 00:15:10.620 --> 00:15:13.580 your job and buy a horse immediately. It's pure 00:15:13.580 --> 00:15:16.799 escapism. And that is why Patterson won the popular 00:15:16.799 --> 00:15:19.620 vote, so to speak. Australia was forming its 00:15:19.620 --> 00:15:22.460 national identity at this time. Remember, Federation 00:15:22.460 --> 00:15:25.539 is just around the corner in 1901. The separate 00:15:25.539 --> 00:15:27.360 colonies were about to become a single nation. 00:15:27.740 --> 00:15:29.399 And the country wanted to look in the mirror 00:15:29.399 --> 00:15:32.679 and see the man from Snowy River, capable, brave. 00:15:33.440 --> 00:15:35.340 dashing. It didn't necessarily want to see the 00:15:35.340 --> 00:15:37.779 broken down struggle that Lawson depicted. Even 00:15:37.779 --> 00:15:40.000 if Lawson's view was arguably more realistic 00:15:40.000 --> 00:15:43.000 for the average farmer or drover's wife, Patterson 00:15:43.000 --> 00:15:45.639 gave Australia the hero it wanted to be. He invented 00:15:45.639 --> 00:15:48.320 the Aussie legend. He certainly crystallized 00:15:48.320 --> 00:15:51.200 it. But here's the great irony. While he was 00:15:51.200 --> 00:15:53.600 building this national myth of the jolly swag 00:15:53.600 --> 00:15:57.080 man and the free -riding bush man, his own personal 00:15:57.080 --> 00:15:59.399 life was about to get very, very complicated. 00:16:00.080 --> 00:16:03.899 And this leads us to the dark, soapy story behind 00:16:03.899 --> 00:16:06.980 the most famous song in Australian history. Waltzing 00:16:06.980 --> 00:16:10.220 Matilda. The unofficial national anthem. Everyone 00:16:10.220 --> 00:16:13.299 knows the tune. Everyone knows the chorus. Once 00:16:13.299 --> 00:16:16.940 a jolly swag man camped by a billabong. But the 00:16:16.940 --> 00:16:19.559 story of how it was written. It plays out like 00:16:19.559 --> 00:16:21.860 a season finale of a drama series. It really 00:16:21.860 --> 00:16:25.840 does. It takes us to 1895. Patterson is at the 00:16:25.840 --> 00:16:27.919 absolute height of his fame. He travels north 00:16:27.919 --> 00:16:30.360 to Queensland to a place called Dagworth Station, 00:16:30.580 --> 00:16:32.460 which is near the town of Winton. He's not traveling 00:16:32.460 --> 00:16:34.980 alone, though. This is key. He's with his fiancee. 00:16:35.210 --> 00:16:37.429 Sarah Riley. Sarah Riley. And they had been engaged 00:16:37.429 --> 00:16:40.129 for eight years. Eight years. That is a massively 00:16:40.129 --> 00:16:42.330 long engagement. Even for the 19th century, you 00:16:42.330 --> 00:16:43.750 have to wonder why they hadn't tied the knot 00:16:43.750 --> 00:16:47.070 yet. Indeed. It suggests a certain hesitation, 00:16:47.289 --> 00:16:49.990 perhaps on his part. So Banjo and Sarah go to 00:16:49.990 --> 00:16:52.110 Dagrid Station. Sarah is there to visit her old 00:16:52.110 --> 00:16:54.269 school friend, a woman named Christina McPherson. 00:16:54.429 --> 00:16:58.009 So the cast is set. The famous poet, his long 00:16:58.009 --> 00:17:01.049 -suffering fiancé, and the fiancé's best friend. 00:17:01.769 --> 00:17:05.089 This has all the makings of a disaster. And it 00:17:05.089 --> 00:17:07.869 was. Christina McPherson had recently been to 00:17:07.869 --> 00:17:11.150 a race meeting in Warrnambool, Victoria. While 00:17:11.150 --> 00:17:13.529 she was there, she heard a band playing this 00:17:13.529 --> 00:17:16.390 really catchy tune, a Scottish marching tune 00:17:16.390 --> 00:17:19.430 called the Craigielee, most likely. It got stuck 00:17:19.430 --> 00:17:22.180 in her head. A classic earworm. Yes. So back 00:17:22.180 --> 00:17:24.279 at Dagworth, she's playing this tune on an auto 00:17:24.279 --> 00:17:26.440 harp. An auto harp. For those wondering, that's 00:17:26.440 --> 00:17:28.900 a zither -like string instrument. Very. Parlor 00:17:28.900 --> 00:17:31.700 music chic for the 1890s. Very. And Banjo hears 00:17:31.700 --> 00:17:35.099 it. He likes the rhythm. And inspired by a story 00:17:35.099 --> 00:17:37.740 he'd heard at the station about a striking shearer 00:17:37.740 --> 00:17:40.539 who had committed suicide in a waterhole rather 00:17:40.539 --> 00:17:42.660 than be captured by police for stealing a sheep. 00:17:42.960 --> 00:17:44.980 Okay, that's a much darker origin than I think 00:17:44.980 --> 00:17:47.059 most people realize. Oh, it's very dark. The 00:17:47.059 --> 00:17:49.539 Great Shearer's Strike was a violent quasi -civil 00:17:49.539 --> 00:17:52.140 war in the outback. So Patterson takes that story 00:17:52.140 --> 00:17:54.380 and starts writing lyrics to fit Christina's 00:17:54.380 --> 00:17:56.460 music. We should probably pause and just explain 00:17:56.460 --> 00:17:58.039 the lyrics for anyone who doesn't know them because 00:17:58.039 --> 00:18:00.160 they are actually quite rebellious. They really 00:18:00.160 --> 00:18:04.019 are. A swag man is a drifter, a transient worker 00:18:04.019 --> 00:18:07.420 carrying his swag or bedroll. He steals a jumbuck, 00:18:07.579 --> 00:18:10.480 which is just a slang term for a sheep to eat. 00:18:10.900 --> 00:18:13.470 The squatter. The rich landowner comes down with 00:18:13.470 --> 00:18:15.809 the troopers, the police, and rather than go 00:18:15.809 --> 00:18:18.690 to jail, the swag man jumps into the billabong, 00:18:18.829 --> 00:18:21.990 the waterhole, and drowns himself. It is a song 00:18:21.990 --> 00:18:24.910 about class warfare. It is fundamentally anti 00:18:24.910 --> 00:18:27.549 -authority. It celebrates the thief over the 00:18:27.549 --> 00:18:29.990 police. So you've got Banjo and Christina, heads 00:18:29.990 --> 00:18:32.269 together over the auto harp, collaborating, laughing, 00:18:32.509 --> 00:18:35.369 making this rebellious music together. And meanwhile, 00:18:35.569 --> 00:18:38.309 Sarah Riley, the fiancé of eight years, is... 00:18:38.640 --> 00:18:40.960 Where? Well, she was there and she presumably 00:18:40.960 --> 00:18:43.640 wasn't happy because the outcome of this creative 00:18:43.640 --> 00:18:46.380 little visit was explosive. The engagement to 00:18:46.380 --> 00:18:49.000 Sarah Riley was abruptly called off. Dumped at 00:18:49.000 --> 00:18:51.359 the station after eight years. And Patterson 00:18:51.359 --> 00:18:53.099 was suddenly asked to leave the property. He 00:18:53.099 --> 00:18:55.859 was effectively kicked out. Wow. That is not 00:18:55.859 --> 00:18:58.519 the behavior of a respectable gentleman solicitor. 00:18:58.839 --> 00:19:00.740 Historians and biographers have looked at this 00:19:00.740 --> 00:19:03.539 for years. The consensus is pretty clear. Patterson 00:19:03.539 --> 00:19:05.940 was known to be a bit of a womanizer, and he 00:19:05.940 --> 00:19:08.359 almost certainly engaged in a scandalous romantic 00:19:08.359 --> 00:19:11.279 liaison with Christina McPherson right under 00:19:11.279 --> 00:19:14.299 his fiancée's nose. The scandal. So, Waltzing 00:19:14.299 --> 00:19:17.029 Matilda. This wholesome song we teach to kindergartners 00:19:17.029 --> 00:19:19.410 was written by a lawyer who was busy cheating 00:19:19.410 --> 00:19:21.509 on his long -term fiance with her best friend. 00:19:21.690 --> 00:19:24.869 It creates a fascinating juxtaposition. The song 00:19:24.869 --> 00:19:27.630 is so innocent in the public consciousness, you 00:19:27.630 --> 00:19:30.849 know, a jaunty tune about freedom. But its birth 00:19:30.849 --> 00:19:33.309 was steeped in betrayal and social disgrace. 00:19:33.769 --> 00:19:36.309 And what happened to Sarah Riley, the jilted 00:19:36.309 --> 00:19:38.970 fiance? She never married. She was reportedly 00:19:38.970 --> 00:19:41.750 devastated by the whole affair. It's a tragic 00:19:41.750 --> 00:19:44.190 side note to this jaunty national anthem. It 00:19:44.190 --> 00:19:46.130 really changes how you hear the song. It adds 00:19:46.130 --> 00:19:48.670 this entire layer of forbidden romance and heartbreak. 00:19:49.009 --> 00:19:51.849 But Patterson doesn't seem to slow down to mourn 00:19:51.849 --> 00:19:53.630 the relationship. He doesn't just go back to 00:19:53.630 --> 00:19:57.049 drafting wills. The late 1890s arrive and the 00:19:57.049 --> 00:19:59.589 world is changing. There's a war brewing. The 00:19:59.589 --> 00:20:02.220 Second Boer War in South Africa. And this is 00:20:02.220 --> 00:20:03.980 where Patterson sheds the lawyer's skin almost 00:20:03.980 --> 00:20:06.519 completely. He leaves the law behind to become 00:20:06.519 --> 00:20:09.200 a war correspondent. This is a huge pivot. He's 00:20:09.200 --> 00:20:10.900 essentially becoming a foreign correspondent 00:20:10.900 --> 00:20:13.720 for a major, major conflict. He signs on with 00:20:13.720 --> 00:20:15.680 two of the biggest papers, the Sydney Morning 00:20:15.680 --> 00:20:18.519 Herald and The Age. He sails to South Africa 00:20:18.519 --> 00:20:22.279 in October 1899. And this isn't Zoom reporting 00:20:22.279 --> 00:20:24.539 or, you know, sitting in a hotel in the capital. 00:20:24.740 --> 00:20:28.339 He is on the ground on a horse right in the thick 00:20:28.339 --> 00:20:30.960 of the action. And the Boer War was a nasty conflict. 00:20:31.710 --> 00:20:34.789 British Empire versus the Boer Republics. Guerrilla 00:20:34.789 --> 00:20:37.910 warfare, commando raids. It was very dangerous. 00:20:38.210 --> 00:20:40.589 It was. And because of his fame and his charm, 00:20:40.849 --> 00:20:43.109 Patterson wasn't just observing from a distance. 00:20:43.190 --> 00:20:45.349 He was rubbing shoulders with the heavyweights 00:20:45.349 --> 00:20:48.170 of the British Empire. He met Lord Kitchener, 00:20:48.210 --> 00:20:50.910 Lord Roberts, General Haig, and he met other 00:20:50.910 --> 00:20:52.950 correspondents who would go on to be absolute 00:20:52.950 --> 00:20:55.650 legends. Who did he run into? Well, Winston Churchill, 00:20:55.769 --> 00:20:57.789 for one. Winston Churchill. And Rudyard Kipling. 00:20:58.049 --> 00:21:00.009 Can you just imagine the dinner conversation? 00:21:01.099 --> 00:21:04.279 Banjo Patterson, Rudyard Kipling, and a young 00:21:04.279 --> 00:21:06.279 Winston Churchill, who was also a journalist 00:21:06.279 --> 00:21:07.799 at the time, right? He wasn't the prime minister 00:21:07.799 --> 00:21:09.960 yet. No, Churchill was covering the war for the 00:21:09.960 --> 00:21:13.920 Morning Post. That trio represents three fascinatingly 00:21:13.920 --> 00:21:16.259 different views of the British Empire. You've 00:21:16.259 --> 00:21:19.109 got Kipling, the imperialist cheerleader. Churchill, 00:21:19.210 --> 00:21:21.970 the ambitious politician -in -waiting, and Patterson, 00:21:22.049 --> 00:21:24.410 the Australian nationalist observing the mother 00:21:24.410 --> 00:21:27.750 country at war. That is a power trio. And Patterson 00:21:27.750 --> 00:21:29.829 wasn't just tagging along. He was getting scoops. 00:21:29.930 --> 00:21:32.210 He was a very effective correspondent. He was 00:21:32.210 --> 00:21:34.230 actually the first correspondent to ride into 00:21:34.230 --> 00:21:36.890 Bloemfontein after its surrender. That's a massive 00:21:36.890 --> 00:21:39.450 scoop. He beat everyone else, including Churchill, 00:21:39.710 --> 00:21:41.859 to the punch on that one. He sent back these 00:21:41.859 --> 00:21:44.400 graphic grouping accounts of the relief of Kimberley 00:21:44.400 --> 00:21:47.140 and the capture of Pretoria. His writing style, 00:21:47.299 --> 00:21:49.539 that observational, punchy, descriptive style 00:21:49.539 --> 00:21:52.160 he'd honed on the Bush ballads, made his war 00:21:52.160 --> 00:21:54.599 reporting incredibly vivid for the readers back 00:21:54.599 --> 00:21:57.880 home. He didn't write in dry military jargon. 00:21:57.920 --> 00:21:59.819 He wrote about the smell of the dust and the 00:21:59.819 --> 00:22:02.420 sound of the horses. And speaking of vivid details, 00:22:02.559 --> 00:22:04.619 there's a story that came out just recently in 00:22:04.619 --> 00:22:07.240 2020 that I absolutely love. It involves chocolate. 00:22:07.819 --> 00:22:11.460 Ah, yes, the Queen Victoria chocolates. Tell 00:22:11.460 --> 00:22:13.740 the listener about this because this humanizes 00:22:13.740 --> 00:22:17.380 him so much for me. So in 1900, Queen Victoria 00:22:17.380 --> 00:22:19.759 commissioned a gift for her troops serving in 00:22:19.759 --> 00:22:22.759 South Africa. These were tins of Cadbury chocolates. 00:22:22.980 --> 00:22:25.900 It was a morale booster, a personal gift from 00:22:25.900 --> 00:22:27.980 the monarch to the soldiers on the front line. 00:22:28.180 --> 00:22:29.779 Here's some chocolate. Sorry about the dysentery 00:22:29.779 --> 00:22:32.119 and the bullets. Essentially, Patterson, being 00:22:32.119 --> 00:22:34.559 a correspondent embedded with the troops, received 00:22:34.559 --> 00:22:37.480 one of these tins. But here's the strange part. 00:22:37.700 --> 00:22:41.859 He didn't eat them. He kept them. In 2020, researchers 00:22:41.859 --> 00:22:43.960 at the National Library of Australia were going 00:22:43.960 --> 00:22:46.240 through Patterson's papers, which had been donated 00:22:46.240 --> 00:22:50.019 years prior, and they found the tin. And inside... 00:22:50.019 --> 00:22:52.200 The chocolates were still there. A 120 -year 00:22:52.200 --> 00:22:54.539 -old chocolate, still in the straw packing, a 00:22:54.539 --> 00:22:57.359 little decayed perhaps, but fundamentally intact. 00:22:57.660 --> 00:23:00.480 That is just wild. Why did he keep them? Was 00:23:00.480 --> 00:23:03.400 he a hoarder? Was he sentimental? Or did he just 00:23:03.400 --> 00:23:05.720 think British chocolate tasted bad? I think it 00:23:05.720 --> 00:23:07.779 speaks to a certain sentimentality and a sense 00:23:07.779 --> 00:23:10.059 of history. He was a collector of experiences. 00:23:10.200 --> 00:23:12.759 He kept that tin for 40 years until his death. 00:23:12.980 --> 00:23:15.579 It was a tangible link to that high adventure 00:23:15.579 --> 00:23:18.339 period of his life. He knew even then that he 00:23:18.339 --> 00:23:20.299 was living through a major historical moment. 00:23:20.420 --> 00:23:22.759 It's such a human detail. He's this tough war 00:23:22.759 --> 00:23:25.579 correspondent writing into captured cities. But 00:23:25.579 --> 00:23:27.519 he can't bring himself to eat the Queen's chocolate. 00:23:28.109 --> 00:23:30.250 After the Boer War, his adventures continued. 00:23:30.609 --> 00:23:32.730 He also covered the Boxer Rebellion in China, 00:23:32.829 --> 00:23:34.890 where he met the famous correspondent George 00:23:34.890 --> 00:23:37.829 Chinese Morrison. He really was a true global 00:23:37.829 --> 00:23:40.269 adventurer in these years. He eventually returned 00:23:40.269 --> 00:23:42.210 to Sydney and became an editor for the Evening 00:23:42.210 --> 00:23:44.650 News and the Town Country Journal. But the call 00:23:44.650 --> 00:23:48.109 of the bush, that clancy lifestyle. It never 00:23:48.109 --> 00:23:50.569 really left him, did it? Because in 1908, he 00:23:50.569 --> 00:23:53.230 makes another huge life change. He decides to 00:23:53.230 --> 00:23:55.150 stop just writing about the bush and actually 00:23:55.150 --> 00:23:57.150 try to live it. He does. He abandons journalism 00:23:57.150 --> 00:23:59.730 and the city. He moves his family he had finally 00:23:59.730 --> 00:24:02.289 married to a woman named Alice Emily Walker in 00:24:02.289 --> 00:24:05.769 1903 to a 16 ,000 hectare property near Yowes. 00:24:06.130 --> 00:24:10.309 16 ,000 hectares. That is a serious spread. That's 00:24:10.309 --> 00:24:12.910 not a hobby farm. He's trying to be the grazier 00:24:12.910 --> 00:24:15.329 his father was. He's trying to be the man from 00:24:15.329 --> 00:24:18.019 Snowy River for real. But again, as we discussed 00:24:18.019 --> 00:24:20.660 with his father's story, the reality of the bush 00:24:20.660 --> 00:24:23.119 is hard. He lived there for a few years, but 00:24:23.119 --> 00:24:25.079 it wasn't a permanent success in the way his 00:24:25.079 --> 00:24:27.960 legal or literary career was. It was difficult 00:24:27.960 --> 00:24:31.519 work. And then the world went to war again. World 00:24:31.519 --> 00:24:36.640 War I, 1914. Patterson is in his 50s now. He's 00:24:36.640 --> 00:24:38.920 not a young man anymore. He's a national celebrity, 00:24:39.079 --> 00:24:41.660 a middle -aged father. Most men his age would 00:24:41.660 --> 00:24:43.660 sit this one out. But he was desperate to go. 00:24:43.740 --> 00:24:46.119 He felt a duty or maybe a need for that adrenaline 00:24:46.119 --> 00:24:47.920 again. He tried to get a job as a correspondent 00:24:47.920 --> 00:24:50.119 in Flanders covering the Western Front, but he 00:24:50.119 --> 00:24:52.500 couldn't secure the position. Denied. But he 00:24:52.500 --> 00:24:55.099 doesn't give up. No, he puts his ego aside. And 00:24:55.099 --> 00:24:57.259 this is the part of his story that really impresses 00:24:57.259 --> 00:25:00.980 me. This famous man, this national icon, signs 00:25:00.980 --> 00:25:03.220 up as an ambulance driver for the Australian 00:25:03.220 --> 00:25:06.200 Voluntary Hospital in France. That is humility. 00:25:06.460 --> 00:25:08.799 From war correspondent hanging with Churchill 00:25:08.799 --> 00:25:11.259 to driving an ambulance in the mud. There's no 00:25:11.259 --> 00:25:14.140 glory in that. None at all. Eventually, though, 00:25:14.220 --> 00:25:17.460 the army realized who he was and, more importantly, 00:25:17.700 --> 00:25:21.190 what he knew. His specific skill set was finally 00:25:21.190 --> 00:25:23.789 recognized. He was commissioned in the second 00:25:23.789 --> 00:25:26.349 remount unit. The remount unit. That sounds like 00:25:26.349 --> 00:25:30.509 horses. Exactly. Horses. We forget that World 00:25:30.509 --> 00:25:33.230 War I was still powered by horses. The army needed 00:25:33.230 --> 00:25:35.529 thousands of them for the cavalry, for transport, 00:25:35.750 --> 00:25:37.890 for pulling artillery. And they needed someone 00:25:37.890 --> 00:25:40.430 who knew horses inside and out to manage them, 00:25:40.509 --> 00:25:42.670 train them, and transport them. Who better than 00:25:42.670 --> 00:25:46.410 the banjo? It's poetic. Literally. The man who 00:25:46.410 --> 00:25:48.390 wrote the Bible on Australian horsemen spends 00:25:48.390 --> 00:25:51.130 the Great War taking care of the army's horses. 00:25:51.349 --> 00:25:53.710 He rose to the rank of major. He transported 00:25:53.710 --> 00:25:56.769 horses to Africa, China, and Egypt. He was the 00:25:56.769 --> 00:25:58.650 commanding officer of the remount unit based 00:25:58.650 --> 00:26:01.299 in Cairo. It fits him perfectly. While the young 00:26:01.299 --> 00:26:03.579 men, the Clancy's of the next generation, were 00:26:03.579 --> 00:26:06.500 in the trenches at Gallipoli or the Somme, Patterson 00:26:06.500 --> 00:26:08.559 was ensuring the animals he loved so much were 00:26:08.559 --> 00:26:10.920 cared for. And his wife Alice wasn't just sitting 00:26:10.920 --> 00:26:13.220 at home knitting either. No, she joined the Red 00:26:13.220 --> 00:26:15.460 Cross and worked in an ambulance unit near him. 00:26:15.539 --> 00:26:17.460 It was very much a family commitment to the war 00:26:17.460 --> 00:26:20.480 effort. So he comes back in 1919. He's seen two 00:26:20.480 --> 00:26:22.960 major wars. He's tried to live the Bush life. 00:26:23.240 --> 00:26:26.400 He's been a lawyer. He's a celebrity. What does 00:26:26.400 --> 00:26:31.279 a guy like that do in the 1920s? retire this 00:26:31.279 --> 00:26:33.440 is one of the most surprising twists in his entire 00:26:33.440 --> 00:26:36.299 career he pivots again he becomes a sports journalist 00:26:36.299 --> 00:26:39.259 what he started covering rugby league for the 00:26:39.259 --> 00:26:42.500 sydney sportsman banjo patterson the bush poet 00:26:42.500 --> 00:26:45.460 covering the footy that is absolutely amazing 00:26:45.460 --> 00:26:49.170 the man from snowy river analyzing a scrum at 00:26:49.170 --> 00:26:51.250 Redfern Oval. It just shows his adaptability. 00:26:51.609 --> 00:26:53.829 He was a professional writer. He wrote what people 00:26:53.829 --> 00:26:56.049 wanted to read. He wasn't precious about high 00:26:56.049 --> 00:26:58.089 art. If the story was rugby league, he wrote 00:26:58.089 --> 00:27:00.150 about rugby league. He understood the Australian 00:27:00.150 --> 00:27:03.089 working class. They loved poetry in the 1890s 00:27:03.089 --> 00:27:05.210 and they loved rugby league in the 1920s. He 00:27:05.210 --> 00:27:07.170 followed the audience. He really was a working 00:27:07.170 --> 00:27:09.619 journalist right up until the end. He was appointed 00:27:09.619 --> 00:27:12.880 a commander of the British Empire, a CBE in 1938, 00:27:13.259 --> 00:27:16.059 finally getting that official royal recognition. 00:27:16.519 --> 00:27:18.859 And he passed away in 1941 of a heart attack 00:27:18.859 --> 00:27:21.180 right there in Sydney. Leaving behind a legacy 00:27:21.180 --> 00:27:24.299 that is, frankly, staggering. Let's talk about 00:27:24.299 --> 00:27:27.900 that legacy. Part six, works and legacy. Obviously, 00:27:27.940 --> 00:27:30.960 the poems are the. core of it. Clancy, Snowy 00:27:30.960 --> 00:27:34.900 River, Mold Bull's Bicycle, the Geebum Polo Club. 00:27:35.220 --> 00:27:37.039 I mean, these are poems that are taught in almost 00:27:37.039 --> 00:27:39.640 every Australian school. They are part of the 00:27:39.640 --> 00:27:42.440 vernacular. Even if you don't read poetry, you 00:27:42.440 --> 00:27:44.900 know the rhythms and you know the stories. And 00:27:44.900 --> 00:27:46.799 he also wrote novels like An Outback Marriage 00:27:46.799 --> 00:27:49.259 and The Shearer's Cult and the children's book 00:27:49.259 --> 00:27:51.759 The Animals Noah Forgot. But the cultural impact 00:27:51.759 --> 00:27:53.980 is so far beyond the books. We started with the 00:27:53.980 --> 00:27:56.700 $10 note. That's a high honor. But consider this. 00:27:56.900 --> 00:28:00.079 In 1983, when astronauts on the space shuttle 00:28:00.079 --> 00:28:02.599 columbia wanted to broadcast a song from space 00:28:02.599 --> 00:28:05.299 to earth the first australian song played from 00:28:05.299 --> 00:28:08.039 orbit what did they play don't tell me a rendition 00:28:08.039 --> 00:28:10.240 of waltzing matilda by the country music legend 00:28:10.240 --> 00:28:13.440 slim dusty banjo went to space his words did 00:28:13.440 --> 00:28:16.920 and then you have the films the man from snowy 00:28:16.920 --> 00:28:20.180 river movie in 1982 it starred jack thompson 00:28:20.180 --> 00:28:23.170 who By the way, has released wonderful audio 00:28:23.170 --> 00:28:26.069 recordings of Patterson's poems. That movie was 00:28:26.069 --> 00:28:29.269 a massive international hit. It revitalized the 00:28:29.269 --> 00:28:32.210 myth for a whole new generation who maybe hadn't 00:28:32.210 --> 00:28:34.210 read the poems, but loved the visual spectacle 00:28:34.210 --> 00:28:36.589 of it all. And the mystery poem. We mentioned 00:28:36.589 --> 00:28:38.950 the chocolates, but they also found a previously 00:28:38.950 --> 00:28:42.349 unknown poem in a Boer War diary back in 2008. 00:28:42.609 --> 00:28:45.150 Yes. It just shows that there is still material 00:28:45.150 --> 00:28:48.250 out there. He was so prolific writing in diaries 00:28:48.250 --> 00:28:50.369 and notebooks and letters that we are. still 00:28:50.369 --> 00:28:52.829 discovering his work almost a century after his 00:28:52.829 --> 00:28:55.109 death. So we've unpacked a lot. We've gone from 00:28:55.109 --> 00:28:57.609 the flug at Norambla to the law offices of Sydney. 00:28:57.789 --> 00:29:00.069 We've seen him write a viral hit, break a heart 00:29:00.069 --> 00:29:02.650 at Dagworth Station, ride into Bloemfontein with 00:29:02.650 --> 00:29:05.369 the army, drive ambulances in France, and report 00:29:05.369 --> 00:29:07.829 on rugby. It is a life of remarkable breadth 00:29:07.829 --> 00:29:09.990 and contradictions. What's the big takeaway for 00:29:09.990 --> 00:29:11.970 you? If you had to sum up Banjo Patterson, not 00:29:11.970 --> 00:29:14.150 the icon of the banknote, but the man, what do 00:29:14.150 --> 00:29:16.819 you see? I see a man who was a master of observation 00:29:16.819 --> 00:29:19.839 and adaptation. He saw what Australia wanted 00:29:19.839 --> 00:29:22.859 to be, and he gave it to them in beautiful, rhythmic 00:29:22.859 --> 00:29:25.819 verse. He didn't just document the country, he, 00:29:25.900 --> 00:29:29.099 in many ways, invented a version of it. He created 00:29:29.099 --> 00:29:31.859 the archetype of the stoic, capable horseman. 00:29:32.279 --> 00:29:34.400 And even though he was a city lawyer for much 00:29:34.400 --> 00:29:36.900 of his life, he understood that deep longing 00:29:36.900 --> 00:29:39.869 for the vision splendid. He bridged the gap between 00:29:39.869 --> 00:29:42.029 the city and the bush better than anyone else. 00:29:42.210 --> 00:29:44.569 He was the ultimate storyteller. He sold the 00:29:44.569 --> 00:29:47.470 dream. He was the man from Snowy River. But he 00:29:47.470 --> 00:29:49.910 was also the sophisticated guy who could navigate 00:29:49.910 --> 00:29:52.690 a royal reception or a scandalous love affair. 00:29:52.890 --> 00:29:55.549 He contained multitudes. He was a complex man 00:29:55.549 --> 00:29:58.670 who created a simple, powerful mythology. And 00:29:58.670 --> 00:30:01.430 perhaps that is why he endures. We need the myth. 00:30:01.650 --> 00:30:03.309 And that leaves us with something to think about. 00:30:03.470 --> 00:30:05.130 I'm going to leave you with this one final thought. 00:30:05.509 --> 00:30:08.220 Consider waltzing Matilda again. It is the song 00:30:08.220 --> 00:30:09.940 that represents the Australian spirit to the 00:30:09.940 --> 00:30:13.440 world. A song about a swag man, a drifter, who 00:30:13.440 --> 00:30:15.819 chooses death over capture. Freedom at all costs. 00:30:15.980 --> 00:30:18.680 An anti -authoritarian streak. But it was written 00:30:18.680 --> 00:30:22.380 by a solicitor. A man of the law. A man who was, 00:30:22.539 --> 00:30:25.539 at that very moment, navigating a complex web 00:30:25.539 --> 00:30:29.539 of social expectations, class, and personal betrayal. 00:30:29.980 --> 00:30:32.359 It is a profound contradiction right at the heart 00:30:32.359 --> 00:30:34.500 of our unofficial anthem. And maybe that's the 00:30:34.500 --> 00:30:37.079 point. Maybe national identity isn't about facts. 00:30:37.539 --> 00:30:39.720 It's about the stories we choose to tell ourselves. 00:30:39.920 --> 00:30:43.099 We choose the swag man, not the solicitor. We 00:30:43.099 --> 00:30:46.059 choose the romance, not the reality. So what 00:30:46.059 --> 00:30:48.079 does that say about us? What does that say about 00:30:48.079 --> 00:30:50.119 the stories we choose to cherish? A question 00:30:50.119 --> 00:30:53.000 worth pondering. Indeed. Thanks for joining us 00:30:53.000 --> 00:30:54.740 on this journey through the Ballad of the Banjo. 00:30:54.779 --> 00:30:56.579 It's been a pleasure. See you in the next Deep 00:30:56.579 --> 00:30:56.859 Dive.