Henry Lawson’s Short Stories Essay Guide (HSC Common Module)

1Introduction

Today, we’ll be looking at Henry Lawson’s short stories (collection) in the updated HSC Texts and Human Experiences Module. Below is an unpacking of the new syllabus description for HSC Common Module and how we can link this to the ideas in the short story collection.

From NESA: “Students deepen their understanding of how texts represent individual and collective human experiences. They examine how texts represent emotions and qualities related to these experiences. By responding to a range of texts, students explore how texts provide insight into emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences. They explore the ways texts represent identity, culture, acceptance and growth, invite the reader to see the world differently, and challenge assumptions. Students explore how texts can represent the tension between agency and conformity in our human experience, while examining the paradoxes of motivation and behaviour. Through critical and creative responses to texts, students consider the ways that texts encourage them to reflect personally and challenge their assumptions about the nature of human experience.”

Important things to note:

• individual and collective human experiences
• emotions and qualities related to these experiences
• emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences
• identity, culture, acceptance and growth
• invite the reader to see the world differently, and challenge assumptions
• tension between agency and conformity
• paradoxes of motivation and behaviour
• texts encourage students to reflect personally and challenge their assumptions about the nature of human experience

2Links to the human experience syllabus

A key tip to answer questions for the Common Module is to analyse how the composer’s portrayal of the human experience has allowed them to ______, or, alternatively, invites the responder to ______.

Also, a common pitfall is to focus too much on themes, e.g. language, historical revisionism. When doing your paragraphs, make sure to focus on what the HUMAN EXPERIENCE is rather than thematic concerns.

3‘The Drover’s Wife’ by Henry Lawson

• Individual and collective human experiences: the story focuses on the woman’s individual experience of protecting her family against the threats of nature and her yearning for her previous life in the city. We also see the collective experience of her and her children within the outback, and her collective experience with her dog, which helps her protect her family.
• Emotions and qualities related to these experiences: innate human resilience to cope with their surroundings arises from enduring adversities. While she is tormented by the oppressiveness of the bushland, she ultimately reconciles with its harshness.
• Emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences: she undergoes emotional hardship within the isolating bush but overcomes it through resilience. She also reminisces on lived experiences of carefree life in the city and reflects on her relationship with her husband.
• Identity, culture, acceptance and growth: the drover’s wife oscillates between her identity as the protector of her family and her yearning for her carefree past in the city. She accepts her position in the bush and the need to continually sacrifice and endure hardship for her family, thereby undergoing personal growth when overcoming these adversities.
• Tension between agency and conformity: while the bush continually aims to overwhelm her, she decides to continue persisting against these physical and psychological hardships. She also doesn’t conform to the traditional notions of femininity, instead privileging hard work and sacrifice to protect her family.
• Paradoxes of motivation and behaviour: despite being alienated by the desolation of the bush, she paradoxically becomes attached to it and reconciles with the innate difficulties of rural life. The persistence involved in adapting to this landscape forces her to adopt masculine traits for survival.

4‘The Union Buries Its Dead’ by Henry Lawson

• Individual and collective human experiences: despite being a collective, ultimately this society is fragmented as they lack a genuine relationship with each other. The narrator undergoes an individual experience of understanding this.
• Emotions and qualities related to these experiences: the deceased’s identity is merely reduced to his contribution to this community rather than any personal connection. The narrator, while understanding the collective solidarity that his community displays towards honouring the deceased man, ultimately remains apathetic towards the man.
• Emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences: Lawson reflects on the social apathy towards the unnamed union man. Additionally, he presents the superficiality of mateship culture.
• Identity, culture, acceptance and growth: subverting the notion that mateship is integral to Australian identity, the story satirically exposes the shallow connections in society and the emptiness of mateship culture. The identity of the dead man is reduced to merely his occupation and allegiance rather than his personal attributes.
• Tension between agency and conformity: the identity of the dead man is presented as part of the Union collective, thereby conforming his attributes to his professional group. Additionally, the entire community conforms to the expected displays of grief, which are ultimately meaningless.
• Paradoxes of motivation and behaviour: while there are displays of veneration for the deceased, Lawson undermines this by revealing its superficial performativity, as the mourners are emotionally indifferent towards the deceased.

5‘Shooting the Moon’ by Henry Lawson

• Individual and collective human experiences: Lawson uses the frame narrative to reflect Mitchell’s initial individual experiences of navigating economic hardship in the bush, and he later undergoes a collective experience of ‘shooting the moon’ with a fellow bushman.
• Emotions and qualities related to these experiences: Lawson reveals how people in economic hardship resort to ingenuity not due to innate corruption, but due to necessity for survival. Additionally, these hard circumstances repress emotional expression in male friendship and also bring about acts of generosity.
• Emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences: Lawson presents the lived experience of poverty and the desperation to commit a crime for survival.
• Identity, culture, acceptance and growth: the narrator undergoes personal growth when reminiscing on his experience of ‘shooting the moon’ and his learnings of humanity’s inherent generosity, which reshapes his assumptions of the landlord.
• Tension between agency and conformity: challenging social expectations of Australian mateship and heroism, they instead conform to rugged criminality to survive economic hardship.
• Paradoxes of motivation and behaviour: Mitchell and Tom’s assumption of the landlord is subverted through the landlord’s generosity towards them. Also, despite Mitchell and Tom’s camaraderie, Mitchell’s understatement of Tom’s death reveals how stoicism from harsh circumstances conceals any displays of emotional grief.

6‘Our Pipes’ by Henry Lawson

• Individual and collective human experiences: the story presents the collective experience of Mitchell and the narrator smoking together, which becomes a symbol of how they endure the hardships and isolation of the bush. Furthermore, Mitchell reflects on his relationships with his mother and father.
• Emotions and qualities related to these experiences: Mitchell regrets his resistance against his mother’s stance against smoking and recounts how smoking is a way to bond with his father.
• Emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences: Lawson uses storytelling of memories to reveal the lived experiences of the mother’s disciplined approach to parenting and the narrator’s bond with his father.
• Identity, culture, acceptance and growth: the narrator’s identity as a bush man is strengthened through reminiscing on his experiences with his father, undergoing personal growth in gaining resilience and understanding loss within the harsh outback.
• Tension between agency and conformity: the narrator conforms to the expected masculinity of bush men but also subverts this through reflecting on his brusque treatment of his mother.
• Paradoxes of motivation and behaviour: while the narrator rebelled against his mother when he was young, upon reflection on childhood memories, he regrets his treatment of her now.

7‘The Loaded Dog’ by Henry Lawson

• Individual and collective human experiences: the story follows the collective experiences of the three miners who depend on each other in adapting to the hardship of the bush. Their ploy to exploit nature’s resources goes humorously awry when the dog, a harbinger of nature’s retribution, obliviously threatens their lives with the cartridge.
• Emotions and qualities related to these experiences: human qualities of resilience and ingenuity are shown through the miners’ adaptation to their barren surroundings through building the cartridge. Yet this also reveals their hasty decision to attempt to exploit nature. The subversion of their dynamic with the dog, through the dog posing an imminent threat with the cartridge, reveals how they respond with a self-preservation instinct.
• Emotional, intellectual, physical, cultural and lived experiences: the men undergo lived experiences of harsh bush life and look to use natural resources for economic gain. They also undergo an emotional experience of fear as the dog takes the cartridge.
• Identity, culture, acceptance and growth: Lawson presents the culture of Australian mateship through the men’s collective aspiration of using explosives to gain natural resources, yet also presents how they subvert this camaraderie and prioritise self-preservation when the dog takes the cartridge.
• Tension between agency and conformity: while they conform to Australian mateship ideals, the expected heroism is discarded for survival. They also wish to gain agency over their economic struggle through their plan with the cartridge.
• Paradoxes of motivation and behaviour: despite the collective solidarity of the miners, when faced with imminent danger, their self-preservation instinct forces them to prioritise themselves over others.

8Final thoughts

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