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From the dust jacket:
"... Early in his career, Upfield wrote two thrillers
... a romance ... and a mainstream novel about a three-year
drought in the Australian Outback, Gripped by Drought.
At the time Gripped by Drought was written (1931)
Upfield was still employed as a boundary rider on State
rabbit Fence #1 ... Gripped by Drought then was
based on his personal experience of withering drought
in the vast reaches of the Australian bush.
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Gripped by Drought is a powerful story of a man's battle
not only with the elements of nature which threatened
the ruins of his huge Australian sheep farm, but also
with a loveless and unhappy marriage. For Frank Mayne,
master of a well-nigh a million-acre sheep station, life
assumed its most dreary aspect. No rain for his farm,
a wife who involved him in an orgy of spending and entertainment,
and with disaster just around the corner, there seemed
little prospect of Happiness. Yet in the darkest hour
of all, after many unexpected and sometimes thrilling
situations, the darkest hour of the drought gave way to
rain and Mayne's tribulations became of the past. |
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Author's Preface
THERE is no greater Australian drama than a three years'
drought, and such a drought, associated with drought
in the human heart, is the theme of this plain tale
for plain people.
The course of this fictitious drought is based on the
course of a real drought. I have followed the weather
records over an actual three-year drought period, and
no city critic can say that such a drought is impossible.
Similarly, I have followed actual wool prices over the
same period. And finally, the succession of mental phases
which the "new-chum" in the bush must live
through, or else desert to a city, is real and based
on personal experience.
I should like to add that my original title for this
work was the one all-sufficient word Drought. It was
found, however, that already a novel under this title
was in circulation, so that regretfully the present
more sensational title was substituted.
KALAMUNDA, W. A.
1932
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