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Hay, William (1875 - 1945)

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    An Australian Rip Van Winkle and other pieces : being a sketch-book after the style of Washington Irving
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    The escape of the notorious Sir William Heans : (and the mystery of Mr Daunt) : a romance of Tasmania
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    Strabane of the Mulberry Hills
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Born
17 November 1875
Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
Died
21 March 1945
South Australia, Australia

Summary

Hay was born in Adelaide, a distant relative of the famous Victorian literary writer, Sir Edmund Gosse. Educated in Melbourne and at Cambridge, he returned to Adelaide in 1901 where he wrote his three best-known novels, each about Australian convict life, Herridge of Reality Swamp (1907), Captain Quadring (1912) and The Escape of the Notorious Sir William Heans (1919). Hay's writings were more or less ignored in Australia, however, and from 1925 he lived in seclusion with his wife and children near Victor Harbour in South Australia. His reputation in Australia was reassessed with the republishing of The Escape of the Notorious Sir William Heans in 1955 by Melbourne University Press. He had died ten years earlier, from an illness following over-exertion while fighting a local bushfire.

Published resources

Books

  • Hay, William, Herridge of Reality Swamp, T. Fisher Unwin, London, 1907, 304 pp. Details
  • Hay, William, The escape of the notorious Sir William Heans : (and the mystery of Mr Daunt) : a romance of Tasmania, Allen & Unwin, London, 1918, 416 pp. Details
  • Hay, William, An Australian Rip Van Winkle and other pieces : being a sketch-book after the style of Washington Irving, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1921, 199 pp. Details
  • Hay, William, Strabane of the Mulberry Hills : the story of a Tasmanian lake in 1841, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1929, 414 pp. Details
  • Hay, William, The mystery of Alfred Doubt : being the adventure of a retired statesman : a novel, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1937, 319 pp. Details

Short Stories

  • Hay, William, 'Where the Butterflies Come From', in An Australian Rip Van Winkle and other pieces : being a sketch-book after the style of Washington Irving, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1921, pp. 194-199. Details
  • Hay, William, 'An Australian Rip Van Winkle', in An Australian Rip Van Winkle and other pieces : being a sketch-book after the style of Washington Irving, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1921, pp. 7-47. Details

See also

Archival resources

The University of Melbourne Archives

  • Hay, William Gosse (1875-1945), 1894 - 1947, Accession Number: 105/25; The University of Melbourne Archives. Details

Rachael Weaver