7.8 /10 1 Votes
Language English Pages 669 pp Originally published 1950 Genre Thriller OCLC 47707257 | 3.9/5 Goodreads Publication date 1950 ISBN 0-09-184206-9 Country Australia | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Publisher Realist Printing & Publishing Co Similar My Brother Jack, It's Raining in Mango, The Harp in the South, My Brilliant Career, Capricornia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Power Without Glory is a 1950 novel written by Australian writer Frank Hardy. It was later adapted into a mini-series by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (1976).
Contents
Publication
The work was originally self-published, with illustrations by Hardy's friend and fellow Communist "Amb" Dyson, with the rubric "a novel in three parts by Frank J. Hardy, Ross Franklyn". "Ross Franklyn" was the pseudonym Hardy had always used prior to Power Without Glory. This combination of real name and pen name was also used in Hardy's 1961 book The Hard Way which describes the difficulties "Ross Franklyn" had in having the book published, and the problems Frank Hardy faced in answering the criminal libel charge against him arising from the publication.
Novel
The novel is a fictionalised version of the life of Melbourne businessman and Australian Labor Party power-broker, John Wren. It is largely set in the fictitious Melbourne suburb of Carringbush, which is based on the actual suburbs of Abbotsford and Collingwood. In the novel, West is involved in criminal activities and political machinations, particularly related to gambling.
The book includes many characters based on other important social and political figures in Victoria and Australia, including:
A fuller list of characters and locations is provided in the following section "Characters and real-life equivalents".
The barely-disguised inspiration for the "West" character is made clear by the fact that West, like Wren, has a brother called "Arthur" who spent time in jail for aiding and abetting a crime of rape. (Wren's other brother, Joseph, also appears in the novel.) Wren's wife Ellen (née Mahon) appears as "Nellie", and there is mention in the novel of his children: his violinist daughter Margaret, his son John Jr., and another daughter, who becomes a Communist, resembles Wren's radical daughter Mary, who was an active member of the communist front organisation the Movement Against War and Fascism.
The novel is partly set during World War I, and the debate about conscription is a major issue in the novel. John West is a fierce patriot who supports conscription, and his sometimes fiery arguments with the Irish-Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne, who opposes conscription on the grounds that to send men to aid England was contrary to his, and Ireland's, historical enmity with that country.
Characters and real-life equivalents
Judges not mentioned by name
Locations
Court case
Hardy was tried for criminal libel in 1951 because of the depiction in the novel of "West's" wife having an affair but he was acquitted on the grounds that the work was, as he said, a mixture of fact and fiction. It was the last prosecution for criminal (as opposed to civil) libel in Victoria.
The case attracted enormous publicity, coinciding as it did with the anti-Communist referendum and served mainly to give the novel and the negative portrayal of Wren greater prominence. Hardy later detailed his experiences during the case in his book The Hard Way.
Hardy's inclusion of Ellen's ("Nellie's") affair with bricklayer Bill Egan, who worked on the Wren mansion, was based on Wren's own belief that his daughter Angela was the illegitimate product of that affair. Just prior to the book's first (underground) publication, Hardy was wracked with uncertainty as to whether it was ethical to include the episode: he was worried about the book's impact on the "living innocents". He was eventually convinced to include it by the former Communist Party leader JB Miles and, it seems, Angela herself, who is portrayed in the book as "Xavier". (Hardy was originally going to call the character "Annette" but changed the baby's sex to provide another layer of protection for Angela.) The real-life Angela committed suicide in 1956 and although Hardy's latest biographer Jenny Hocking (professor) was unable to find concrete evidence for Angela's assistance, she believes that it was provided.
Cultural influence
In 1976, the novel was made into a 26-episode ABC-TV series starring Martin Vaughan as West. While "Nellie's" affair with the brickie is depicted, the affair does not produce a child. The series won numerous Logie, Penguin and Sammy Awards.
The football commentator Rex Hunt habitually refers to Collingwood as "the Carringbush".