"The Old Australian Ways" is a poem by Australian bush poet Banjo Paterson (Andrew Barton Paterson).
It was first published in the poet's collection Rio Grande's Last Race and Other Verses in 1902, and subsequently reprinted in the author's poetry collections and other poetry anthologies.
Synopsis The poet compares the "prison's bars" of the city folk of London, with the wide open land of Australia. He writes of Clancy (of the "Overflow") who saddled a horse and rode west and states that if you want to know what he found there, then you would need to go "Beyond the reach of rule or law", to "Nature's homestead" to "see what Clancy saw/And know what Clancy knew."
Critical reception In a review of the author's Rio Grande's Last Race and Other Verses a writer in The Grafton Argus and Clarence River General Advertiser noted that "The best of his work at present is that in which he abandons the purely quizzical vein, and which gives descriptions of the land he touched with some light of imagination–as in 'The Old Australian Ways'".
Publication history After its original publication in Rio Grande's Last Race and Other Verses the poem was later reprinted as follows:
An Anthology of Australian Verse edited by Bertram Stevens, Angus and Robertson, 1907 The Golden Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Bertram Stevens, Angus and Robertson, 1909 The Children's Treasury of Australian Verse edited by Bertram Stevens and George Mackaness, Angus and Robertson, 1913 Selections from Australian Poets edited by Bertram Stevens and George Mackaness, Cornstalk Publishing, 1925 Poets of Australia : An Anthology of Australian Verse edited by George Mackaness, Angus & Robertson, 1946 An Anthology of Australian Verse edited by George Mackaness, Angus & Robertson, 1952 The Collected Verse of Banjo Paterson edited by Clement Semmler, Viking O'Neill, 1982 Song of the Pen, A. B. (Banjo) Paterson : Complete Works 1901-1941 edited by Rosamund Campbell and Philippa Harvie, Lansdowne, 1983 The New Oxford Book of Australian Verse edited by Les Murray, Oxford University Press, 1986 Banjo Paterson's Poems of the Bush, J. M. Dent, 1987 A Vision Splendid: The Complete Poetry of A. B. 'Banjo' Paterson, Angus and Robertson, 1990 Selected Poems : A. B. Paterson edited by Les Murray, 1992 The Collected Verse of A. B. Paterson : Containing 'The Man from Snowy River', 'Rio Grande' and 'Saltbush Bill, M.P.' , 1921 Our Country : Classic Australian Poetry : From Colonial Ballads to Paterson & Lawson edited by Michael Cook, Little Hills Press, 2002 Banjo Paterson Treasury by A. B. Paterson, Random House, 2013
See also 1902 in Australian literature
References