Ron asks what a ‘pusser’ is, himself supplying part of the answer when he wonders whether it shouldn’t be ‘purser’. ‘Pusser’ (the u is pronounced as in cut) has been a colloquial naval form for most of this century at least, a derivation from purser which means an enlisted member of the navy, as distinct from a ‘grunter’, an officer. The last time I was listening, ‘pussers’ was edging out ‘the Andrew’ as a collective noun for the navy in Australian navy usage. It’s an intriguing speculation whether or not, behind the obvious, descriptive ‘purse’ for a seagoing accountant, purser is in turn derived from ‘pursuivant’.

Try as I may, I don’t think my book is spoilt by misprints. They are (most obvious) corrigenda rather than errata. My reviewer’s concern about ‘less’ in ‘The North American Colour-Field’ is unnecessary, though inventive.

Despite extensive proof readings by my publishers and myself the third series of corrections was not fully inserted after leaving my publishers’ hands for the last time; the result, solely, of a typesetter rushing to meet a deadline. I suppose this is the case with Ron Pretty’s misquotation of my title ‘Captain Burnett RAN’. Joseph Burnett was seconded to the RN during his career but he was never a member of it.

Robert Harris, Glebe, NSW

Dear Editor,

I respond briefly to Sandra Forbes’s comments on my remarks about the Lit Board.

1. Sandra suggests that, in stating that the Lit Board is ‘too secretive’, I am ‘simply out of date’. Not out of date, Sandra, just out of fashion with Lit Board bureaucracies.
2. I do know, as I indicated, that information about a writer’s previous grants can be obtained through the tedious process outlined. I still maintain that, like digging for the lost Ark, it is a cumbersome process. It still seems to me reasonable, undemanding, and completely relevant that a writer’s previous grants be indicated when the most recent grant is made.
3. Sandra Forbes goes on to admit ‘applicants are not informed as to who exactly reads their particular application in detail’ (‘exactly reads’ or ‘exactly who’?). She mounts a defence of this: ‘usual government practice’; prevention of ‘unacceptable harassment, as distinct from proper criticism’; and the clincher, ‘anyhow, in our view, such information is irrelevant’. Appeals to ‘government practice’ are about as compelling as appeals to Bob Hawke on unemployment among synchronised swimmers. The ‘unacceptable harassment versus proper criticism’ argument is both circular and question begging. The ‘cabinet solidarity’ argument bombed out at the Nuremberg trials.
4. Finally, Sandra Forbes defends Hilary McPhee’s defence of the wondrous works of the Lit Board by providing ‘one quantitative indicator of the truth of McPhee’s statement’. Translated, this means books funded by the Lit Board with many major prizes. This begs many questions about the significance of literary prizes, omits to mention that many Lit Board panellists also wear the hats of judges of literary awards, and conveniently ignores one of the crucial points at issue, which is that the judges of literary prizes are named.

I remain unconvinced and unrepentant. Let the public be given more information, let the public decide what is ‘unacceptable personal harassment’ and what is ‘proper criticism’.

John Hanrahan, Balwyn, Vic.

Dear Editor,

Responding to Meg Sorensen’s review of A Little Bush Maid, by Mary Grant Bruce, I should begin by pointing out that she omitted to state the publisher. All fifteen books in the Billabong series are being reissued in new paperback editions under the Angus & Robertson imprint of Harper Collins.

            My involvement in this venture followed the publisher’s decision to produce the series. As a freelance editor, I was asked to provide notes for each story presenting the historical setting in context – the ‘Afterword’. Since these notes frequently refer to specific incidents in the text, they would be largely meaningless before the story had been read.

The other part of my brief was to carry out a small amount of editing to remove overtly racist sentiment, mostly contained in dialogue. This related not only to Aboriginal people but to Chinese and African people as well. The copyright holder of the works, Jonathan Bruce, was adamant that no other textual alteration be made. For the record, my personal opinion is that the stories would have become more accessible to today’s young readers if they had been shortened, as they are considerably longer than contemporary young novels.

Nevertheless, the Billabong books do hold a firmly established place in the canon of Australian literature for young readers. This is why I included an extract from Mates at Billabong in the Illustrates Treasury of Australian Stories and Verse for Children (1988). For this reason, too, I willingly undertook the task offered to me by Harper Collins.

Although the series was originally published between the years 1910–1942, the period covered by the stories concludes in the early 1930s. (By 1942, Norah, who is ten in A Little Bush Maid, would have been approaching middle age.) The fourteen stories which follow A Little Bush Maid, whose title belongs so clearly to the Edwardian era, take the reader through World War I, including trench warfare in Flanders and a sojourn in Ireland before returning to Australia and the period of rural depression leading up to the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Meg Sorensen’s hind-sighted criticism of the ‘white kiddies’ relationship with Billy (not ‘Billie’, the young station hand – not, as she states, a ‘child about their own age’ – is fashionably emotive. It is misleading to quote Jim’s words to Billy – ‘All right, now Billy, you catch ‘um kangaroo, wallaby – d’you hear?’ as though they were the stern ‘order’ of a ‘little white lord’. The words are in fact spoken light-heartedly amid general hilarity after Billy has emerged as the hero of a race featuring several Billabong creatures, including a pet wallaby and kangaroo.

A notable aspect of the series as a whole is the way in which the characterisation of Billy and also that of Lee Wing, the Chinese gardener, deepens and strengthens over the years. In later stories, the author takes up a strong position against anti-Chinese prejudice in particular. Ms Sorensen’s outrage on the Aboriginal issue scarcely seems to tally with the brutal criticism she heaped on the story ‘Stolen Car’ by Koori writer Archie Weller, in her May review of the anthology Brief Encounters a story originally edited and published by Jack Davis in Identity magazine. In her remarks about the ‘cloying ambiguity of the relationship between the father and the daughter’ (i.e. David and Norah Linton), does Ms Sorensen impute an incestuous connexion? If so, why not come out with it in a straightforward way? David Linton’s grief following his wife’s death is well chronicled in the stories. On page six of A Little Bush Maid, that death is described as ‘a sudden, terrible blow, that changed Norah’s] father in a night from a young man to an old one’. But again, in our present era of increasing child abuse, it is fashionable to sneer at the notion of family life with close and loving relationships.

I am not really concerned about defending my own ‘inadequate’ contribution to these new editions of the Billabong books, as Ms Sorensen describes it. But I do want to speak up for an author unable to come to her own defence. While the literary quality of the Billabong stories is variable, the author’s integrity of purpose remains constant throughout the series. The Billabong stories present an ongoing saga of family life through twenty years of significant Australian history. This is a unique and admirable achievement, undeserving of facile iconoclasm.

Barbara Ker Wilson, Moreton Bay, Queensland