image of person or book cover 6203258152771459736.jpg
Advertisement, Advertiser [Adelaide], 17 July 1920, p.10
form y separately published work icon The Breaking of the Drought single work   film/TV  
Adaptation of The Breaking of the Drought Arthur Shirley , 1902 single work drama
Issue Details: First known date: 1920... 1920 The Breaking of the Drought
The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.

AbstractHistoryArchive Description

The outback station of Wallaby is in the grip of a drought. Unable to stop the bank from repossessing his land, veteran farmer Jo Galloway is forced to move his wife and daughter to the city in the hope that his son Gilbert can help them. Gilbert has supposedly been studying there, but Jo soon finds out that he has been corrupted by the highlife. Worse, Gilbert has long been embezzling the family funds to support his life of luxury and decadence. A number of 'melodramatic' episodes unfold, including a murder and a suicide, before the family is finally able to unite and return to the Wallaby (just as the rains begin to fall once more).

John Tulloch, in Legends on the Screen (1981), notes that the natural threat of drought (represented in naturalistic mode) and the social threat constituted by the corrupt city (in melodramatic mode) are, in effect, opposite sides of the same coin. The independent bush woman, Molly (see A Girl in the Bush), appears to represent the 'right' balance between nature and culture.

Exhibitions

7718668
7921780
7913414
7992747
7974092

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

First known date: 1920

Works about this Work

The Long Shadow of 1927 Ray Edmondson , 2015 single work criticism
— Appears in: Studies in Australasian Cinema , vol. 9 no. 3 2015; (p. 230-240)
The Long Shadow of 1927 Ray Edmondson , 2015 single work criticism
— Appears in: Studies in Australasian Cinema , vol. 9 no. 3 2015; (p. 230-240)
Last amended 30 Sep 2014 13:56:17
X