Cirrus@Austlit

'When Vance Palmer met Nettie Higgins in the summer of 1909 in the sedate setting of the State Library of Victoria, they were both twenty-three years old. Yet even to speak to one another was a breach of convention; they had not been introduced, and Nettie at least felt quite daring. An arts student at Melbourne University, she had never been far from her parents’ house. Vance had made the break with home and travelled the world: he had worked as a teacher and a freelance journalist, and nourished hopes of becoming a full-time writer.'  (Introduction)