A First Hand Account by Quentin Cockburn
(Lawson, in search of, with ‘the three tenors’.)

It is with breathless excitement that we report on the recent expedition of Composer John Thorn, Professor John Barnes and Quentin Cockburn, to the  outer reaches of known civilisation itself Bourke.

Fragments from Lawson’s life as Australia’s’ foremost bush poet were given the royal treatment by John Thorn and his celebrated  orchestral reworking of some of the more enduring pieces, in ‘Looking for Lawson’ last week.  Held on the anniversary 92 years after his death, the inaugural international premiere of Johns compositions, nineteen in all, were performed in dedication to the six months Lawson spent there in the sumer of 1892-1893.

Sent there by Bulletin proprietor J.F. Archibald to “Dry Out” and send copy, Lawson took advantage of the nineteen pubs, (in a town of three thousand people!!) to soak deeply on the lives of ordinary people, the workers, shearers strikes, dust, flies, and outback.   John Thorn’s compositions have given renewed life to a message that is timeless, and universal.  ‘Don’t go to the dry outback to dry out.’   or…‘There is life there beyond the cities and the coastal fringe, but not life as we know it’!

In honour of the man and his legacy, the locals turned up and filled the Toorale room at the Port of Bourke Hotel, (the sole remaining hotel) to capacity, and had a rollicking time.  John Thorn was rapturously received.  John Barnes gave the occasion gravity and offered us an insight to the man himself, variously described as Australia’s’ finest, bush poet, drunk, ….ratbag.  Indeed you must agree, Lawson captures the bush myth eternal as a ‘true savage’ .

We royal three were then sumptuously entertained at the Port of Bourke, for the remainder of Tuesday evening. We then joined somewhat underwhelmed on the tour to Hungerford to celebrate the long trek, (variously described as the ‘D.T Shuffle’ or the ‘Central Australian Crawl’) undertaken by Lawson in search of work, meaning and respite from creditors. Hungerford welcomed us with enthusiasm, barracks food, another live performance, a taciturn french waitress and other local colour.

And what survives of the man himself? To this day the middens of broken whiskey bottles adorn the site of hotels and grog shanties long gone. Forensics failed to identify those consumed by Lawson, or his lesser known compatriots, Morant, Ogilvie and Swampy.   It is said that ‘his ghost may still be heard’ out along the Queensland Border, locals tell of the sound of clinking bottles, a catarrhal wheeze, and faint odure of unwashed and over worn socks.

Special thanks to the good folk of Bourke and particular mention of Paul and Johnno, who made us feel very much a part of Bourke.  We shall as General Douglas Macarthur so famously said “return”, and trust that the sun will set upon another glorious adventure in the Passive Complicity annals, that shall offer no incentive to turn histories page marked ‘L’ ever again.