Gwen Harwood

In this first study of a female author to be published in Oxford's 'AW' series, Stephanie Trigg has produced a superbly readable and highly provocative account of the work of this central and much-loved Australian poet - the 'Tasmanian mum', as she was so often dismissed, who went on to write some of this country's outstanding lyrics. Aware of Harwood's increasing importance, and the current wave of critical and biographical interest in her life and works, Trigg positions her as a testing ground for feminist poetic criticism in Australia. Thus, in an interview, she asks, 'Who is the "Glenn Harwood" to whom I refer when I write about the poetry of a woman who in recent years has become increasingly public, celebrated and accessible?' Noting that much writing about Harwood has been informed, if not blinkered, by her domestic, even grandmotherly persona and modesty, she asks if this is the best critical vocabulary in which to describe or interpret her poetry. Trigg argues that this biographical model, organized around a corpus of works, signed by a known or theoretically knowable subject, has tended to produce something like heroine-worship. Drawing on Foucault, Trigg focuses on Gwen Harwood' as a poetic signature written by the desires and interests of her readers, rather than as the living subject. She notes that such a Foucauldian project sits in some tension with a feminist insistence on women's lives.