SOURCE: Semmler, Clement. “‘Banjo’ Paterson and the Bush Tradition in the History of Australian Literature.” Journal of the Royal Australian Historical Society 62, no. 4 (March 1977): 224-31.

In the following essay, Semmler illuminates A. B. “Banjo” Paterson's integral contribution to the Australian bush verse tradition in the 1890s as one of the most prominent and popular Bulletin writers.

Andrew Barton Paterson was born on 17 February 1864 at Narambla near Orange, in New South Wales. He died in Sydney in February 1941, just short of his seventy-seventh birthday. At the age when he was taking an active part in the social and literary life of this city and State, that very important period in our history—the 1890s—had begun. Paterson's role in this exciting decade was of particular significance—to that I'll return later in these notes.

He travelled widely around Australia and in the Territories and thus came to appreciate, as...