Author: [CAMERON, John?]. Wulla Merrii.
Title: The Fire Stick: Incidents in the shearer's strike. A tale of bush life.
Description: n.p. [Brisbane 1893?]. Octavo publisher's illustrated boards. A few small knicks, a rather good copy. ¶ The attribution to Cameron seems fairly well accepted. A virulently anti-union novel so it's no surprise that neither the printer nor author dared put their name on it (both the title and last leaf appear to be cancels - redone without colophon or any other details). Can we presume that fear of retribution also accounts for the fact that so many copies were clearly never circulated until recent decades? Surely it couldn't be the writing, plot, paper thin characters: villainous unionists and cartoon blacks? Plenty of other novels have done well on worse. Cameron was a pastoralist and politician, a leader of the anti-union movement (they "aimed at nothing short of REVOLUTION") and a central figure in the strike. A confirmed White Australian he was known to declare, I gather while campaigning for office, that "I have never believed in the principle of one man one vote, and nothing will ever convince me that men should have equal voting rights".

Keywords: literature fiction thrillers c19th Queensland Australia politics trade unions