Douglas Stewart

Douglas Stewart (6 May 191314 February 1985) was a major twentieth century Australian poet, as well as short story writer, essayist and literary editor. He published 13 collections of poetry, 5 verse plays, including the well-known Fire on the Snow, many short stories and critical essays, and biographies of Norman Lindsay and Kenneth Slessor. He also edited several poetry anthologies.

His greatest contribution to Australian literature came from his 20 years as literary editor of The Bulletin, his 10 years as a publishing editor with Angus & Robertson, and his lifetime support of Australian writers.

Life Douglas Stewart was born in Eltham, Taranaki Province, New Zealand, to an Australian-born lawyer father. He attended primary school in his home town, and a high school thirty miles away, before studying at the University of Wellington. He began studying law there, but soon changed courses to major in writing and journalism. He returned to Australia in 1938 and took up a position with The Bulletin.

He attempted to enlist in the A.I.F. near the beginning of the war, but was rejected on medical grounds and so volunteered to serve as an air raid warden instead.

He married the painter Margaret Coen in 1945, and they had a daughter, Meg. They lived in a flat in the city of Sydney until 1953 when they moved to St. Ives in the northern suburbs. It was still rural countryside then, close to the natural beauty of Ku-ring-gai Chase. That year he won a UNESCO traveling scholarship to Europe and so the family of three spent eight months on the continent in 1954.

Stewart and Coen maintained close friendships with several contemporary artists and literati including Norman Lindsay, Kenneth Slessor, Nancy Keesing, David Campbell, Rosemary Dobson, her publisher husband Alec Bolton, and publisher Beatrice Davis.

In addition to his literary pursuits, Stewart was a keen fisherman and often went trout fishing with his friend, the poet David Campbell.

He died in 1985, and was buried at Frenchs Forest Cemetery.

Literary career Stewart wrote his first poetry at fourteen years of age, while he still lived in New Zealand. He began initially because of the need to produce a poem for his school magazine, but his love for reading and writing poetry developed rapidly. He read widely, including Shakespeare, Wordsworth, Milton and Coleridge, enjoying their ability to compact powerful description into language, and to convey emotion through sound, rhythm and word selection. As he read he worked on his own writing. His father was a subscriber to The Bulletin from Australia and the young Stewart regularly sent poems to that magazine, the vast majority of which were rejected. However, he had the thrill of seeing some of his poems published in a companion magazine, The Australian Women's Mirror, as well as newspapers and magazines in New Zealand. This encouraged him to continue.

After his university studies, Stewart worked as a journalist in New Zealand in the early 1930s. In 1936, he published his first volume of poems, Green Lions, before moving permanently to Australia in 1938 to become Assistant Literary Editor of The Bulletin. Two years later he was appointed Literary Editor of its "Red Page", and he retained this position for the next twenty years. He left in 1961, after a change in ownership, and joined the Australian publisher, Angus & Robertson, where he worked until 1972. He was also a member of the advisory board of the Commonwealth Literary Fund from 1955–70. Goodwin goes on to write that "More eclectic than he is often given credit for, he did have a distaste for rhetoric and declamation and a preference for the Audenesque air of jaunty reasonableness" and that "he was sceptical about large religious affirmation". The Bulletin, along with Meanjin and Southerly were significant magazines for promoting the poetic achievement of writers and for establishing a cultural milieu in which younger poets could refine their skills. During his editorship The Bulletin published such poets as Judith Wright, Francis Webb, David Campbell, Rosemary Dobson, Chris Wallace-Crabbe, Randolph Stow and Vivian Smith. While working with The Bulletin, Stewart published six volumes of his own poems, co-edited two books of Australian poetry, and produced a number of verse-plays and a volume of short stories. He also contributed to the script for the award-winning Australian documentary, The Back of Beyond (1954).

Stewart, like Campbell, Wright and many poets of his time, drew much of his inspiration from nature, and is best known for his "meditative nature poems". His last book was a diary about the garden at his home in St. Ives.

The Fire on the Snow and other verse plays As well as writing poetry, Stewart also made a significant contribution in the area of radio and verse drama. The Fire on the Snow, his verse play dramatising Scott's tragic Antarctic journey, was written at night, sometimes all night, while he worked for The Bulletin magazine. It was performed on ABC radio in 1941 to great success, and started a new interest in writing verse plays. The two poets maintained a correspondence over a long period, from 1946–1979. In other words, their correspondence conveys their "exploration and understanding of poetry", particularly on the part of Stewart, who was "one of Australia's finest critics". Examples are "Frogs" from his 1952 Sun Orchids, and "The Fungus".

Awards He received a number of awards in recognition of his achievements, including: 1960: Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) 1967: Sydney Myer Award for the best volume of poetry of the year 1967: Grace Leven Prize for Poetry for Collected Poems 1936–1967 1967: Colin Roderick Award for Collected Poems 1936–1967 1968: Britannica-Australia Award in the humanities