Such Is Life

Such Is Life is an Australian novel written by Joseph Furphy under a pseudonym of “Tom Collins” and published in 1903. It purports to be a series of diary entries by the author, selected at approximately one-month intervals during late 1883 and early 1884. “Tom Collins” travels rural New South Wales and Victoria, interacting and talking at length with a variety of characters including the drivers of bullock-teams, itinerant swagmen, boundary riders, and squatters (the owners of large rural properties). The novel is full of entertaining and sometimes melancholy incidents mixed with the philosophical ramblings of the author and his frequent quotations from Shakespeare and poetry. Its depictions of the Australian bush, the rural lifestyle, and the depredations of drought are vivid. Furphy is sometimes called the “Father of the Australian Novel,” and Such Is Life is considered a classic of Australian literature.

This is not poetry. This is my life, my heart, my soul, Love, hope, dreams and despair, Intense moments, stitched together into words, Neatly creased in folds of ink and paper! And this may be your life too. This book takes you through the roller-coaster journey of life, posing questions that you have always wanted to ask the world. The poems in this book are born out of emotions that each one of us go through in our lives sometime or the other and feel that we have someone by our side who understood it. If you have ever loved truly and had to let go, if you have played well and lost, if there were moments when you felt cheated by everyone around, if life has knocked you out at times, then grab this book and relive all those moments - that hearty laughter with your soul mate or crying alone in the lonely nights!

Since its publication in 1903, Joseph Furphy’s Such is Life has become established as an Australian classic. But which version of the novel is the authoritative text, and what does its history reveal about Australian cultural life? From Furphy’s handwritten manuscript through numerous editions, a controversial abridgement for the British market (condemned by A.D. Hope as a “mutilation”), and periods of obscurity and rediscovery, the text has been reshaped and repackaged by many hands. Furphy’s first editors at the Bulletin diluted his socialist message and “corrected” his Australian slang to create a more marketable book. Later, literary players including Vance and Nettie Palmer, Miles Franklin, Kate Baker and Angus & Robertson all took an interest in how Furphy’s work should be published. In a fascinating piece of literary detective work, Osborne traces the book’s journey and shows how economic and cultural forces helped to shape the novel we read today.

This is a collection of poetry that captures some of the feelings and experiences that many of us encounter on this journey called life. The purpose of this book is to express some of those emotions and offer comfort in knowing that someone else can relate to your disappointments, insecurities, infatuations, and the loves of your life. It makes it alright to accept wherever you are at this moment in your life or whatever you may be feeling right now. It will inspire open conversation about individual experiences and hopefully provide an opportunity for people to understand that they may have more in common with others than they think. It is everything from funny, to disturbing, and even quite erotic. This collection offers a little something for everyone to relate to and ultimately implies that all of our ups and downs lead to change and with change comes growth. It is simply up to us to embrace the opportunity for growth and allow ourselves to exhale, with relief, in the change of our life’s journey.

A classic of the Australian outback, Such Is Life is the farcical, tragic reminiscences of Tom Collins, philosopher and rogue. As Tom drives his team across the plains of the Riverina and northern Victoria, he gets entangled in the fate of others like Rory O'Halloran, the two Alfs (Nosey and Warrigal) and Hungry Buckley of Baroona recreating the humour, the pathos, the irony of life in the bush. His is the tough-talking, law-dodging world of the 1880s, where swagmen and bullockies slept under the stars with 'grandeur, peace and purity above; squalor, worry and profanity below'. These inspired yarns, 'fatally governed by an inveterate truthfulness', are woven into one of the greatest books of Australian literature, combining a genius for story-telling with a wry wit and a deep feeling for the harsh sun-baked land and the people who worked it. Joseph Furphy was born at Port Phillip, Victoria, in 1843. 'Half bushman and half bookworm', Furphy worked as a goldminer, labourer and farmer before coming to the profession that would inspire Such Is Life, bullock driving. In 1904 he settled in Fremantle, Western Australia, to join his children. Such Is Life was originally published in 1903 and was soon regarded as one of Australia's great novels. Furphy's three other books - Poems, Rigby's Romance and The Buln Buln and the Brolga - were all published after his death in 1912.

Just a few words to acquaint you with me, and who I am, and where I come from. I was born in Lawton Oklahoma, raised there also. I left there around 16 or so to explore America. Went to all the states except Hawaii-someday... maybe, maybe not. I've always wanted to be a writer, just didn't always know it. Some people have to be hit over the head with a book to realize it's a book. Anyway, I've been hit and I realize what I want to do with the rest of my life-no matter how long, or how short it may be.