"My Country" is a poem about Australia, written by

Dorothea Mackellar Isobel Marion Dorothea Mackellar, (1 July 1885 – 14 January 1968) was an Australian poet and fiction writer. Her poem ''My Country'' is widely known in Australia, especially its second stanza, which begins: "''I love a sunburnt country/ ...

(1885–1968) at the age of 19 while homesick in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and Nor ...

. After travelling through Europe extensively with her father during her teenage years, she started writing the poem in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a major s ...

in 1904 and re-wrote it several times before her return to

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountains ...

. The poem was first published in ''

The Spectator ''The Spectator'' is a weekly British magazine on politics, culture, and current affairs. It was first published in July 1828, making it the oldest surviving weekly magazine in the world. It is owned by Frederick Barclay, who also owns ''Th ...

'' in London on 5 September 1908 under the title "Core of My Heart". It was reprinted in many Australian newspapers, such as The Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser, who described the 'little poem' as striking the right note of "...the clear, ringing, triumphant note of love and trust in ustralia" The poem quickly became well known and established Mackellar as a poet. Mackellar's family owned substantial properties in the

Gunnedah Gunnedah is a town in north-eastern New South Wales, Australia and is the seat of the Gunnedah Shire local government area. In the the town recorded a population of 9,726. Gunnedah is situated within the Liverpool Plains, a fertile agricult ...

district of

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , e ...

and a property (Torryburn) in the Paterson district of the

Hunter Region The Hunter Region, also commonly known as the Hunter Valley, is a region of New South Wales, Australia, extending from approximately to north of Sydney. It contains the Hunter River and its tributaries with highland areas to the north and s ...

. The poem is believed to have been directly inspired by witnessing the breaking of a

drought A drought is defined as drier than normal conditions.Douville, H., K. Raghavan, J. Renwick, R.P. Allan, P.A. Arias, M. Barlow, R. Cerezo-Mota, A. Cherchi, T.Y. Gan, J. Gergis, D. Jiang, A. Khan, W. Pokam Mba, D. Rosenfeld, J. Tierney, an ...

when she was at Torryburn; "My Country" uses imagery to describe the land after the breaking of a long drought. ''Of ragged mountain ranges'' possibly refers to the Mount Royal Ranges, and the Barrington Tops. To many Australians the poem is an overtly romanticised version of "The Australian condition", as Mackellar's family were of considerable fortune and social favour. The poem reflects the romanticised and somewhat idealised reflection of a writer yearning to be taken back to Gunnedah. The first

stanza In poetry, a stanza (; from Italian ''stanza'' , "room") is a group of lines within a poem, usually set off from others by a blank line or indentation. Stanzas can have regular rhyme and metrical schemes, but they are not required to have eithe ...

, lesser-known, refers to England, and the fact that the vast majority of Australians of that era were of British birth or ancestry. The second stanza describes Australia and is amongst the best-known pieces of

Australian poetry Australian literature is the written or literary work produced in the area or by the people of the Commonwealth of Australia and its preceding colonies. During its early Western history, Australia was a collection of British colonies; as such ...

. In an interview in 1967, Mackellar described her reasons for writing the poem. MacKellar's first anthology of poems, ''The Closed Door'', published in Australia in 1911, included the poem. The last line of the third stanza, ''"And ferns the warm dark soil"'' was originally ''"And ferns the crimson soil"''. Her second anthology, ''The Witch Maid & Other Verses'', published in 1914, included the original version. A recording of "My Country" made by the radio and TV actor

Leonard Teale Leonard George Thiele AO (26 September 192214 May 1994), professionally Leonard Teale, was a well-known Australian actor of radio, television and film and radio announcer, presenter and narrator known for his resonant baritone voice. He is be ...

became so popular in the 1970s that his reading of the first lines of the second stanza were often used to parody him.

Notes

References

*{{Cite Australian Dictionary of Biography, First=Dorothea, Last=Mackellar, id=A100291b.htm, title=Mackellar, Isobel Marion Dorothea (1885–1968) *http://www.dorotheamackellar.com.au *http://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/discover_collections/people_places/caergwrle/mycountry/index.html

External links

* 'My Country' was added to the

National Film and Sound Archive The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia (NFSA), known as ScreenSound Australia from 1999 to 2004, is Australia's audiovisual archive, responsible for developing, preserving, maintaining, promoting and providing access to a national c ...

Sounds of Australia The Sounds of Australia, formerly the National Registry of Recorded Sound, is the National Film and Sound Archive's selection of sound recordings which are deemed to have cultural, historical and aesthetic significance and relevance for Austral ...

registry in 2009 * Listen to 'My Country' read by Dorothea Mackellar and read more about it o
australianscreen online
Australian poems 1908 poems