Monday 19 October 2009

Banjo Paterson





Sculpture of Australian poet Andrew 'Banjo' Paterson (1864-1941), outside Rock End Cottage at Gladesville. Now a restaurant, the cottage was built in the 1830s as an inn. From 1866 to 1909, Emily Jane Barton, grandmother of Banjo Paterson lived here.

Paterson's most famous poems include The Man From Snowy River:
"There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around
That the colt from old Regret had got away,
And had joined the wild bush horses - he was worth a thousand pound,
So all the cracks had gathered to the fray."


Clancy of the Overflow:
I had written him a letter which I had, for want of better
Knowledge, sent to where I met him down the Lachlan years ago;
He was shearing when I knew him, so I sent the letter to him,
Just on spec, addressed as follows, "Clancy, of The Overflow."

And an answer came directed in a writing unexpected
(And I think the same was written with a thumb-nail dipped in tar);
'Twas his shearing mate who wrote it, and verbatim I will quote it:
"Clancy's gone to Queensland droving, and we don't know where he are."


and the words of Waltzing Matilda (1887), later set to music.

7 comments:

  1. Interesting photos ...

    ReplyDelete
  2. A favorite song, and a favorite movie as well. Pipe smokers rock! -:)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Looks very interesting! Photos are really wonderful .

    Thanks for sharing!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Sydney's silly Sally showed some sad, smoking sculpture!

    ReplyDelete
  5. This portrait was sculpted in 1999 by my cousin Anthony Chandler.

    ReplyDelete