The passing of Les Murray robs Australia of its most talented and prolific poet. Murray produced some 30 volumes of poetry, most recently, Waiting for the Past, in 2015. Considering how little poetry is read nowadays, his output and (relative) fame is remarkable. Poet of Australia, poet of the bush, poet of the little man, poet of man immured in the natural world, Murray had a vast and original vocabulary and the capacity to write verse in a striking vernacular.

No bells and whistles, no pretensions nor any lahdee-dah about him, Murray was unconventional to a tee, shunning celebrity (though he did like to read publicly) and taking a more right-wing position politically, unusual in a modern writer. More than anything he was against the big town elites who looked down upon the bush. His way with words was uncanny.

Murray first hove into my literary awareness in 1980 at my initial teaching practicum. My supervising teacher had chosen him for HSC class study, and I heard his poems read with passion and respect. When I taught Murray myself a few years later, I remembered best the joy of reading him aloud, the encounter between me and my class of urban faux-sophisticates, and the engagement with Australian history, landscape and environment. There was nothing parochial about versifying the local, because Murray's humanity was universal and his voice was authentic.

From Widower in the Country

"Coming on dark, I’ll go home, light the lamp
And eat my corned-beef supper, sitting there
At the head of the table. Then I’ll go to bed.
Last night I thought I dreamt – but when I woke
The screaming was only a possum skiing down
The iron roof on little moonlit claws."


Vale Les Murray