A Saturday morning tour of Ernst's heritage

Headstone Tribute of Maria Heyne,
Agnes Straubel and Theodor Ernst

One of the best (awesomest as my students would say) aspect of researching a writer from your own city/state is that the places in which they lived, worked, visited are easily accessible. Visiting from Adelaide, Trevor, a descendant of Olga's uncle Christian Martin Ernst, invited me to join him to visit significant 'sites' in Ernst's life. I hoped to gain a 'sense' of the German Melbourne community in which she lived. Of course, my thesis is NOT a biography although I have completed enough research to write one! A writer's environment impacts on their work and so this 'physical' research gives me an opportunity to 'place' Ernst's writing in context.

483 & 485 Brunswick St

A productive morning beginning with the search for the headstone in the Lutheran section of the Melbourne General Cemetery, visiting the East Melbourne Trinity Lutheran Church where Ernst was christened, Theodor's shop in Brunswick Street, now gutted inside with only the window frames and door frames remaining to remind us of their era. Generously the owner allowed us to enter the shop about to morph into a Perfumery. Low windows, I wonder if Olga peered into the shop window from the backyard while her father worked. I attempted with some crude editing tools to eliminate wires, air-conditioner and road signs from the shop (485) to see what it might have looked like. A fairly simple dwelling, one of three shops together with a few rooms upstairs accessed by a stairway at the rear? middle? of the shop. Also visited the site of the Straubel home in Rose Street (now two square slab like units of concrete) and wondered at the 'mix' of homes; large brick Federation mixed with smaller weatherboard cottages. I wonder what Rose Street looked like in 1888.

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Judged by the audience.

I started this blog as a way to reflect on intriguing aspects of my research. I wonder about who is reading this blog? It is nice to get emails and the occasional comment. I ponder about the regular visitor from Slovenia and am delighted that I was discovered by Heyne family members quite by accident. The most visited posts are: A PhD! What's in it for me? Sept 12,2010 Teaching in the blood Oct 19, 2010 Rosalie's Reward Oct 16, 2010 Tassie Tales Aug 15, 2010 Toxic Friendships Jun 19, 2010 Producing a poster - AARE Conference Oct 24, 2010 So... how popular are the Grimms? March 6 2011

My Thesis - what's it about?

I am always thrilled to be contacted by those who by chance find my blog. I have been blogging for three years and am hoping to complete my first draft by the end of the year. I thought it timely to re-publish what has already been published. The following is from my presentation at the University of Kassel, Germany. In 1904 Olga Ernst, a pupil teacher, wrote Fairy Tales from the Land of the Wattle. Although she was just sixteen years old, Ernst was one of a small group of writers in Australia who attempted to nationalise the fairytale towards the end of the nineteenth century, signalling quite clearly that they intended to affix the elves and fairies of Europe onto the Australian landscape aiming to fill a void that was keenly felt by the children of emigrants and the Australian-born children of emigrants. (Walker, 1988) The beginnings of the Australian bush fantasy genre can be linked with the desire to bring the comfortable and familiar into the new and distinctly non

A new audience for 'old' Australian fairy tales?

The Internet offers collaborative possibilities as well as the ease of sharing. This blog, maintained as a writing tool for five years, has shared research that may not appear in my thesis. It also explored the personal narrative of a PhD journey as well as my relationship with Ernst’s work. Interested relatives and other acquaintances interstate and overseas discovered my blog through search engines. They have added to the research data available in State and Lutheran archival records and made personal papers and photographs available. Patterson and Lindberg (1991) claim that, ‘the private papers of authors and artists are important to the cause of learning’ (218) on two levels: one to allow insight and understanding about, the creative process of the author and at another as the ‘cultural heritage’ of how an author’s work has shaped or reflected for the reader, their environment. Relatives who have contacted me through my blog have offered further insight through their anecdotes, p

Early Australian fairy tales

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