Guide to the Papers of Alan Mickle
MS 1886
National Library of Australia View Catalogue Record
Collection Summary
- Creator
- Alan Durwood Mickle
- Title
- Papers of Alan Mickle
- Date Range
- 1879-1966
- Collection Number
- MS 1886
- Extent
- 2.4 metres (15 boxes + 1 folio)
- Language of Materials
- English
- Repository
- National Library of Australia
Introduction
Scope and Contents
The collection is divided into five main series: correspondence, including personal and business correspondence; literary manuscripts, including essays, novels, poems, and plays; journals; press cuttings; and miscellaneous material including music, drawings and photographs.
Conditions Governing Access
Please refer to the collection's catalogue record for the access conditions (http://nla.gov.au/nla.cat-vn1259285).
Conditions Governing Use
Copying and publishing of unpublished manuscript material is subject to copyright restrictions. For such material, written permission to publish must be obtained from the copyright holder(s). Copying of unpublished material for research purposes is permissible 50 years after the death of the creator of the material.
Preferred Citation
Items from this collection should be cited as '[Title or description of manuscript item], Papers of Alan Mickle, National Library of Australia, MS 1886, [box number and series and/or file number]'.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
The papers were donated to the Library by Alan D. Mickle in 1967.
Biographical Note
Alan Durwood Mickle was born in Melbourne in 1882 and educated at Melbourne Grammar School.
Mickle’s first book The great longing was published in 1910 and his last book, My lady life, appeared in 1960. He was a full-time writer for most of his adult life. He published eight collections of philosophical essays, six collections of poetry, two novels, a book for children, a book of sporting reminiscences and several volumes of reminiscences. Few of his works achieved commercial success, the exceptions being the children’s book The Trio from Rio (1942) and a travel book Appartement in Brussels (1939). He championed the writings of Eugene O’Neill and Six plays of Eugene O’Neill (1929) was the first critical study of the playwight in book form.
In his old age, Mickle took up painting and held a number of exhibitions. He died in Melbourne in May 1969.
Source: Southerly, vol. 30 (1970) p.69
Item Descriptions
Series 1. Correspondence, 1979-1966
Personal correspondence (Files 1-4) and business correspondence (Files 5-11a).
Personal correspondence from 1879 to 1912, consisting mainly of letters from Mickle to his parents, 1897-1906. (File 1) - Box 1
Personal correspondence from 1912-1919, dealing mainly with the career and life in the Army of Captain Kenneth Mickle, D.S.O., Mickle’s brother. (File 2) - Box 1
Personal letters to Mickle from his wife Ida, and correspondence with parliamentarians about the Commonwealth Literary Fund, 1922-1961 (File 3) - Box 1
Series 2. Literary manuscripts, 1907-1945
Literary manuscripts and typescripts, including poems, plays, essays, novels, and miscellaneous literary manuscripts. Many of the essays are located in more than one File, due to Mickle’s various attempts to produce books of collected essays for publication.
The Rovers, Me, The Bush, The Little Ship, Clara, Disappointed Hope, A Ballada of Deep Mourning, The Lament of the Lost Lover, and various nameless verses. (File 12) - Box 2
Printed copies of Rhythmy Rhymes, published in Melbourne, n.d. (File 13) - Box 3
Including 1. The Case of Timothy Tout. 2. The Treasure of Captain Carbuncle. 3. Rupert the Red. Plus a typescript copy of number 2 bound with other children’s poems.
Typescript copy of article in The Women’s Mirror, Sydney, 1934, reviewing Mickle’s book of nursery rhymes, Pemmican Pete and Other Verses. (File 13) - Box 3
Typescript copy of several poems bound together under the collective title, Wimin. (File 13) - Box 3
Three copies of a booklet of several poems bound-together under the title The Foreign Colony. (File 14) - Box 3
Several poems grouped under the title We Kids and other verses for Children of All Ages. (File 14) - Box 3
Collection of essays under the general title A War-time Diary (File 16) - Box 3
The essays in this collection first appeared in Mickle’s books Appartement in Brussels, Of Many Things, and Suzanne and I. Book 1: Brussels on the Eve, 1937-1938: Flags, The Captain, Dies Irae, Elsinore, Waterloo, Black Sunday. Book 2: Sydney, 1938-1941: The Cross, The Nostalgia of Spring, Advertising, Lugarno, England, The Boer War. Book 3: Melbourne in War-time, 1941-1945: I Decide to Start a Diary, When the Yanks Came, Western, Operations, The Leonski Affair, The War – Youth – And Some Small Boys, That Third Day, A Surgeon and Ned Kelly (2 copies).
Collection of essays under the general title Art and the Man in the Street (File 17) - Box 4
The essays are The Man in the Street, Rebels and Acceptors, Music and Painting, Sport and Art, Caricature, Fiction and Truth-Teller, The Drama, Churches and Architecture, The Artist and the Man of Action, The Trained-Mind Man, Literary Artists, A Sixth Sense, Art and the Game of Touring, Art and the Artists.
Collection of essays under the general title of A Writer’s Digest. A long introduction deals with Mickle’s life and writings (File 18) - Box 4
The essays are divided into five books: ook I: Thoughts and Memories: The Will to Express, Sport and Games, Achievement, The Third Player, Unity, Discontent, Fun, Golden Ages, Demi-gods, Caricature, The Dog and Cat, Cinema Stars, The Funny Story, The Rude Story, Childhood, A Business Partner, A Christmas Party, Victorians, A Book Begins, Shopping, Memories, Life, The Ideal Garden, The Fiddler, The Grey Gum, The Sun, Moon and Stars, The Sky. Book II: The Foreign Colony: The Foreign Colony, Colonists, A Foreign Colony Party, The Lady Tourist, The Bullfight. Book III: The Jervis Bay: Ginger, The ‘Tout’, Queenie, Tragedy. Book IV: The Vamp Women: Vamp Women, A Real Vamp Women. Book V: Extracts: The Dinkey-dies and The Dinkey-does, Flags, Habits, The Soldier, The Bush, Bushfires, A Walking-Stick, Prologue to The Pilgrimage of Peer.
Collection of essays under the general title of The Way Home and Other Autobiographical Chapters (File 19) - Box 4
The essays are divided into four books: Book I: The Way Home: My Beginnings, The Way Home, Adolescence, The Bush. Book II: The Land of Cockagne: The Land of Cockagne, A 1923 Diary. Book III: Travel: The Foreign Colony, The Wild Carpathians. Book IV: Prose Writing: The Poet Speaks, The Artist has the Last Word.
Collection of essays under the general title of The Land of Cockagne and Other Regions (File 20) - Box 4
The essays are The Land of Cockagne (2 copies), The Wild Carpathians (2 copies), A 1923 Diary, and The Foreign Colony.
Collections of essays under the general title Writing and Painting (File 21) - Box 4
The essays are Prose Writing, The Poet Speaks, and The Painter has the Last Word (incomplete).
Essays, not bound together, listed in the order in which they are in the file (File 22) - Box 4
A Visit to Relations, Entertainments, Elsinore, Fihi, Pets, On Putting on Weight, ‘Flu, Curiosity, The Posterity Book, On Pray, When the Crisis Gripped London, Lawrence, Virtues and Vices, The Sea, Black Sheep (by ‘Oxley’), Dogs.
Essays, not bound together, listed in the order in which they appear in the file (File 23) - Box 5
Thoughts, The Trained-Mind Man, Shaw, Shakespeare, and Falstaff (2 copies), Fiction and the Truth-Teller, article in The Hospital Magazine, Melbourne, May 1943: ‘Well-known Author Salutes Doctors and Staffs of our Public Hospitals’, Two Men, Attitudes, Crossword Puzzles, At The Theatre, The Sentimental Age, The Balearics, Tragedy, The Sea and Ships, My Brother, Minor Things and People, That Power, Spring.
Nine essays, or sections of essays, untitled, not bound together (File 24) - Box 5
Bulletin Memories, Poet’s Purloinings, Waterloo, extract from The Pilgrimage of Peer, Two Famous People, Macbeth and Hamlet, Mayday in Majorca, Ibsen, and Mr Bruce’s Ten Thousand.
Essays, not bound together, listed in the order in which they appear in the file (File 25) - Box 5
Two Gold Mines, Father and Son, Josephine, Three Mighty Russians (2 copies).
Collection of essays bound under the general title The Questing Mind (File 26) - Box 5
The essays are My Religion, My Dream, Says the Man or Woman, The Artist, A Sea Picture, The Robber, The Failure, Life as a Woman, I Think of Homer, The Church, The Chairs, The Sphinx, The Great War, The Underling, The Band, The Fiddler, The Imagination, The Swan, The Elephant, My View, If, The Dog, Training, The Unremembered and the Subconscious, Mathematics and Intuition, Human Nature, The Thinker, The Valley, Scent Music, The Gift of Sorrow, The Sea and the Mountains, The Reminiscent Mood, Moods, The Mountain, The Conrad Touch, London, My Thoughts, Games, At the Zoo, Ourselves, The Credit We Want, Desire, The Secret, The Known, The Onlooker, The North Wind, My Idea, The Introspective Man, Time and Distance, The Lion and Mice, The Clock, Evening, The Happy Ones, Flirtation, Beauty, Clouds and Sun, Convictions, Dies Irae, Memory, Experience, Scarabs, Hamlet, From a Diary, Summer is Coming, Two Impressions, Myself, The Modest Man, The Lady, Storm and Calm, The Lunatic, The Flower, The Way We Go, Man as an Artist, At the Pictures, Fate, The Humble, Youth and Age, The Couple, Here and There, The Blind, The Mists, and Remorse.
Collection of essays bound under the general title The Way Home and Other Autobiographical Chapters (File 27) - Box 5
The essays are divided into four books: Book I: The Way Home: My Beginnings, The Way Home, Adolescence, The Bush. Book II: The Land of Cockagne: The Land of Cockagne, an 1923 Diary. Book III: Travel: The Foreign Colony, The Wild Carpathians. Book IV: Writing and Painting: Prose Writing, The Poet Speaks, The Artist has the Last Word.
Collection of essays bound under the general title Those Yesterday (File 28) - Box 6
The essays are My Beginnings, The Late Eighties, Servants, School, Entertainments, Fashions and Prices, The Sea and Ships, Books and Songs, Some Minor Concerns, Holidays, A Bush Township, The Bush, The Boer War.
Collection of essays bound under the general title I Would go to London (continued) (File 29) - Box 6
The essays are Some Disillusionments, Norway to England, Waterloo, I Mourn a Book, and Ibsen.
Collection of essays bound the general title The Edge of Beyond. (File 30) - Box 6
The essays are divided into five books: Book I: Thoughts and Memories: The Will to express, Sports and Games, Achievement, The Third Player, Virtues and Vices, Vanity, Discontent, Fun, Golden Ages, Demi-gods, Caricature, The Dog and the Cat, Cinema Stars, The Funny Story, The Rude Story, Childhood, A Business Partner, A Christmas Party, Victorians, A Book Ends, Shopping, Memories, Life, The Ideal Garden, The Fiddler, The Grey Gum, The Sun, Moon and Stars, The Sea, The Sky. Book II: The Foreign Colony: The Foreign Colony, Colonists, A Foreign Colony Party, The Lady Tourist, The Bullfight, War. Book III: The Jervis Bay: Ginger, The ‘Tout’, Queenie, Tragedy. Book IV: Vamp Women: Vamp Women, A Real Vamp Women. Book V: Extracts ߪ: The Dinkey-Dies and the Dinkey-does, Flags, Habits, The Soldiers, The Bush, Bushfires, A Walking-Stick, Prologue to The Pilgrimage of Peer.
Two pages listing titles of Mickle’s essays, and the following essays, unbound, listed in the order in which they appear in the file (File 31) - Box 6
One’s Loneliness, The Son, Jones, The Fly and the Spider, Sir John, The Optimist and the Pessimist, Spring and Autumn, The Man whom Woman Loved, A Picture, Butterflies, Afternoon Tea, and Novar.