Frank Hardy

Francis Joseph Hardy (21 March 1917 – 28 January 1994), published as Frank J. Hardy and also under the pseudonym Ross Franklyn, was an Australian novelist and writer. He is best known for his 1950 novel Power Without Glory, and for his later political activism. He brought the plight of Aboriginal Australians to international attention with the publication of his book, The Unlucky Australians, in 1968, written during the Gurindji Strike. He ran unsuccessfully for the Australian parliament twice as a Communist Party of Australia candidate.

Early life Frank Hardy, the fifth of the eight children of Thomas and Winifred Hardy, was born on 21 March 1917 at Southern Cross in Western Victoria and later moved with his family to Bacchus Marsh, west of Melbourne. His mother, Winifred, was a Roman Catholichis father, Thomas, an atheist of Welsh and English descent. In 1931 Hardy left school, aged 14, and embarked upon a series of manual jobs. According to Hardy biographer Pauline Armstrong, "his first job was as a messenger and bottlewasher at the local chemist's shop" and then Hardy worked at the local grocer. He later also did manual work "in and around Bacchus Marsh in the milk factory, digging potatoes, picking tomatoes and fruit".

There is some debate among Hardy's biographers about the relative extent Hardy personally suffered from hardships during the 1930s depression. Hardy claimed himself that he left home when he was 13 because "his dad couldn't get the dole" with him at home. However, Jim Hardy, Frank's eldest brother, wrote to the Melbourne Herald on 6 November 1983 to rebut this assertion, claiming that Frank had never had to leave homefurther noting that their "father never lost a day's work in his life". According to biographer Jenny Hocking

After his discharge, his short stories "A Stranger in the Camp" and "The Man from Clinkapella" won competitions, and his work was accepted by Coast to Coast and The Guardian. Many of his early stories were written under the pseudonym Ross Franklyn.

Journalism He continued to work in journalism for most of his life. Although he opposed the foundation of the Australian Society of Authors for political reasons in 1963, he later joined the Society and served on its Management Committee. He played an active role in assisting the Gurindji people in the Gurindji strike in the mid to late 1960s. The documentary film The Unlucky Australians, which featured Frank Hardy and the Gurindji people, was made by director and producer John Goldschmidt for Associated Television (ATV) and transmitted on the ITV network in the UK.

Power Without Glory

His most famous work, Power Without Glory, was completed whilst at Camp Eureka in 1949 and was published in 1950 by Hardy, with the assistance of other members of the Communist Party. The novel is a fictionalised version of the life of a Melbourne businessman, John Wren, and is set largely in the fictitious Melbourne suburb of Carringbush (based on the suburb of Collingwood).

In 1950 Hardy was arrested for criminal libel and defended Power Without Glory in a celebrated case shortly after its publication. Prosecutors alleged that the book criminally libelled John Wren's wife by implying that she had engaged in an extramarital affair. Hardy was acquitted and it was the last criminal libel case launched in Victoria; all subsequent libel cases were civil matters. Hardy detailed the case in his book The Hard Way.

In 1976, ABC-TV adapted the novel as a 26-episode television miniseries, produced by Howard Griffiths and Cliff Green. The series won numerous Logie, Penguin and Sammy Awards.

Following the success of Power Without Glory, Hardy founded the Australasian Book Society.

The Unlucky Australians In 1968, Hardy published The Unlucky Australians, with a foreword by Donald Horne and contributions by Vincent Lingiari, Aboriginal Union organiser Dexter Daniels, actor Robert Tudawali and others, telling the story of the Gurindji people based on personal narratives, and the Gurindji Strike.

Plays Hardy also wrote plays, including Who was Harry Larsen (first performed 1984) and Faces in the Street (first performed 1988, published 1990), which were both based on Henry Lawson.

Hardy founded the Realist Writers Group, which he represented in 1951 at the 3rd World Festival of Youth and Students in Berlin.

Death Frank Hardy died at his home in North Carlton, a suburb of Melbourne, from a heart attack on 28 January 1994, aged 76. His cremated remains were interred at Fawkner Memorial Park.

Family Hardy's younger sister, Mary Hardy, was a popular radio and television personality in the 1960s/1970s.

His granddaughter, Marieke Hardy, is a writer in Melbourne.