'The Mystery of Major Molineux is a strange and weird production, evidently founded on a fact connected with the early history of Tasmania. As a psychological study it approaches in subtlety to some of the most successful efforts of the author of Adam Bede; while for intensity of sustained interest and soul-thrilling excitement it is only surpassed by Edgar Allen Poe in The Mystery of Marie Roget and The Murders in the Rue Morgue.
'That the story is based upon fact does not detract from its interest, but rather lends an air of vraisemblance to a story which would otherwise be too appalling. It is an introspective study, a psychological romance, a social drama - worthy of the author of His Natural Life.'
[Source: Burra Record 22 June 1881, p.2]
The quotation published in the Burra Record (above) very likely originated from the novel's first publisher, Cameron, Laing, & Co. Evidence for this comes from a number of metropolitan and regional newspapers which published the same blurb, in most instances word for word, that same year. The only difference appears to be the concluding paragraph. An alternate ending, not used by the Burra Record, appears in most other newspapers in place of the Record's final statement:
It is a remarkable narrative, and another instance of the fact that 'truth' is stranger than fiction.' The author of The Raven in his wildest flights of fancy was not more absorbing (Border Watch 2 July 1881, p.1).
'Both Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) and Clarke’s ‘The Mystery of Major Molineux’ (1881) appear to have influenced a small group of Australian short story writers who were working in the decade immediately preceding Federation. Their work appeared in The Bulletin, The Boomerang and the Australian Journal, as well as in privately edited collections of short fiction. This essay examines Campbell McKellar's 'The Premier's Secret' (1887) and Ernst Favenc's 'My Only Murder' (1893), in addition to Clarke’s ‘The Mystery of Major Molineux’, to determine how these three writers used the concepts of degeneration, the double brain and multiple personality, and to what ends. My contention is that, like Stevenson, the colonial writers explore atavism and reversion by using motifs and elements drawn from Gothic and popular crime fiction to expose the depravity of members of the nation’s ruling classes, but paradoxically also to lend them a more human face. While we might recognise greater moral ambiguity in the Australian stories compared to Stevenson’s, accounting for that ambiguity is more difficult. One possible explanation is that the writers were not just more mindful of the public’s growing taste for fictions that shocked and thrilled, they were also more willing to satisfy this demand. A second is the greater class mobility within Australian society compared to that of Britain, and that this generated a stronger tolerance for the savage impulses that lay at the heart of the settler enterprise. In other words, in that the violence that accompanied settlement had become a part of everyday life, the Australian stories appear to be more at ease with the atavistic elements of their characters – the veneer of civilisation seems to be much thinner in Australia than in Britain. Closely related to this idea is Australian audiences’ more ready acceptance of personal traits like eccentricity, mateship and anti-authoritarianism, which can arguably be traced to the colony’s convict beginnings but also to its mounting desire for an independent future.'
Source: Abstract.
'Both Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) and Clarke’s ‘The Mystery of Major Molineux’ (1881) appear to have influenced a small group of Australian short story writers who were working in the decade immediately preceding Federation. Their work appeared in The Bulletin, The Boomerang and the Australian Journal, as well as in privately edited collections of short fiction. This essay examines Campbell McKellar's 'The Premier's Secret' (1887) and Ernst Favenc's 'My Only Murder' (1893), in addition to Clarke’s ‘The Mystery of Major Molineux’, to determine how these three writers used the concepts of degeneration, the double brain and multiple personality, and to what ends. My contention is that, like Stevenson, the colonial writers explore atavism and reversion by using motifs and elements drawn from Gothic and popular crime fiction to expose the depravity of members of the nation’s ruling classes, but paradoxically also to lend them a more human face. While we might recognise greater moral ambiguity in the Australian stories compared to Stevenson’s, accounting for that ambiguity is more difficult. One possible explanation is that the writers were not just more mindful of the public’s growing taste for fictions that shocked and thrilled, they were also more willing to satisfy this demand. A second is the greater class mobility within Australian society compared to that of Britain, and that this generated a stronger tolerance for the savage impulses that lay at the heart of the settler enterprise. In other words, in that the violence that accompanied settlement had become a part of everyday life, the Australian stories appear to be more at ease with the atavistic elements of their characters – the veneer of civilisation seems to be much thinner in Australia than in Britain. Closely related to this idea is Australian audiences’ more ready acceptance of personal traits like eccentricity, mateship and anti-authoritarianism, which can arguably be traced to the colony’s convict beginnings but also to its mounting desire for an independent future.'
Source: Abstract.
