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y separately published work icon The Story of an Earnest Life : A Woman's Adventures in Australia, and in Two Voyages around the World single work   autobiography  
Issue Details: First known date: 1881... 1881 The Story of an Earnest Life : A Woman's Adventures in Australia, and in Two Voyages around the World
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Notes

  • Ch 5 relates her experiences on the Mt Bryan expedition with Captain Sturt. It is republished in The Mount Bryan Expedition 1839 by Charles Sturt (publ Sullivan's Cove, 1982, p 45). It is the basis of the account by Mrs Doudy (qv) in her historical novel, The Magic of Dawn (1924)

Affiliation Notes

  • 19th-Century Australian Travel Writing

    Born in Paisley, Scotland, Eliza Davies (nee Arbuckle 1819-1888) recounted her travels following a thrilling Baptist conversion. Estranged from her parents, she travelled from Scotland to New South Wales with church members Mr and Mrs Holmes, with her narrative dominated by highly emotive accounts of the torments of her soul and body. The work includes incidents of her travels between Scotland, America, New South Wales and South Australia. Davies befriended Captain Charles Sturt and travelled with his family to Adelaide, before accompanying him on this 1839 expedition across Lake Alexandrina and the Murray River. A highly melodramatic account of "the perils of youthful maidenhood," The Story of an Earnest Life is a life narrative in which travel is secondary to the heroine's emotional and spiritual experiences.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Cincinnati, Ohio,
      c
      United States of America (USA),
      c
      Americas,      :       Central Book ,       1881 .
      image of person or book cover 1393965300975788989.png
      Link: 20391109Full text document Sighted: 08/10/2020
      Extent: vii, 8-570 p.p.
      Description: illus.

      Holdings

      Held at: Flinders University of South Australia
      Local Id: 919.4 D255s

      Holdings

      Held at: Royal Australasian College of Physicians History of Medicine Library
      Local Id: 610

      Holdings

      Held at: National Library of Australia
      Local Id: N 920 DAV

      Holdings

      Held at: State Library of Victoria
      Local Id: S 920.7 D286

      Holdings

      Held at: Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW
      Local Id: A920.7/D

      Holdings

      Held at: State Library of South Australia State Library of SA
      Local Id: 920 D255
VIEW PUBLICATION DETAILS FOR ALL VERSIONS ()

Related Works

y separately published work icon Magic of Dawn : a Story of Sturt's Explorations Jane Sarah Doudy , 1923 single work novel historical fiction
VIEW ALL RELATED WORKS (1)

Works about this Work

The Laws of God and Men : Eliza Davies' 'Story of an Earnest Life' Sara Ailwood , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Life Writing , December vol. 8 no. 4 2011; (p. 433-444) This article explores Eliza Davies' 1881 autobiography The Story of an Earnest Life through the lens of nineteenth-century spiritual autobiographic genres. It analyses Davies' use of the spiritual autobiography to create a subjectivity beyond the culturally-sanctioned role of wife and mother, a sense of self that is closely linked to her legal identity. In South Australia in the early 1840s, Davies found herself trapped in a position of legal non-subject through her marriage to a violent, alcoholic husband. Her autobiography charts not only her spiritual journey as Christ's missionary, but also he recreation as a legal subject through the divorce proceedings she brought against her husband in the 1860s. Through her interrogation of legal identity, Davies registers a dissenting voice in contemporary religious and imperial discourses regarding women's social and legal position.
South Australian Settler Memoirs Amanda Nettelbeck , 2001 single work criticism
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Studies , no. 68 2001; (p. 97-104; Notes: 233-235) This article looks at the ways in which settlers from the first wave of migration to South Australia constructed a sense of regional identity in the colony through the genre of memoir, and at the consequent process of mythologising a regional legend of foundation.
The Laws of God and Men : Eliza Davies' 'Story of an Earnest Life' Sara Ailwood , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: Life Writing , December vol. 8 no. 4 2011; (p. 433-444) This article explores Eliza Davies' 1881 autobiography The Story of an Earnest Life through the lens of nineteenth-century spiritual autobiographic genres. It analyses Davies' use of the spiritual autobiography to create a subjectivity beyond the culturally-sanctioned role of wife and mother, a sense of self that is closely linked to her legal identity. In South Australia in the early 1840s, Davies found herself trapped in a position of legal non-subject through her marriage to a violent, alcoholic husband. Her autobiography charts not only her spiritual journey as Christ's missionary, but also he recreation as a legal subject through the divorce proceedings she brought against her husband in the 1860s. Through her interrogation of legal identity, Davies registers a dissenting voice in contemporary religious and imperial discourses regarding women's social and legal position.
South Australian Settler Memoirs Amanda Nettelbeck , 2001 single work criticism
— Appears in: Journal of Australian Studies , no. 68 2001; (p. 97-104; Notes: 233-235) This article looks at the ways in which settlers from the first wave of migration to South Australia constructed a sense of regional identity in the colony through the genre of memoir, and at the consequent process of mythologising a regional legend of foundation.
VIEW ALL WORKS ABOUT (2)
Last amended 15 Mar 2022 15:20:22
Subjects:
  • New South Wales,
  • South Australia,
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