JIM OF THE HILLS book cover
  Jim of the Hills
C.J. Dennis
1919

Cover illustration by Hal Gye
   

 

Dustjacket synopsis:
"In Jim of the Hills C.J. Dennis takes us to the bush-clad hills of Victoria and introduces "Lonely Jim, the bloke that don't say much". But, having arrived at thirty, Jim's been doing some thinking:

"Me an' my old dog's been talkin' quite a lot - of love and things:
Weighin' matters; an' we reckon this here love is full of stings . . .
Love an' all that talk, we reckon, is a silly sort of fake -
What's a plain man wantin' further is his wife can wash an' bake?"

"Jim, of course, is heading for a fall for which he'll earn the scorn of his old dog before both of them are captured by the "vision with the sunlight in her hair."

"First published in 1919, and not since republished, Jim of the Hills reveals in some measure Dennis's reaction to the world around his home at Toolangi in the hills near Melbourne. The birds, the trees, the work of the timbermen and the menace of forest fires - all were recorded in this warm and wryly romantic story in verse."

Contents:

I. SWINGIN' DOUGLAS
II. A LONELY MAN
III. A MORNING SONG
IV. A FREAK OF SPRING
V. THE VISION
VI. OLD BOB BLAIR
VII. THE WOOER
VIII.RED ROBIN
IX. MURRAY'S RIDE
X. THE REAPER IN THE BUSH
XI. FLAMES
XII. GREY THRUSH

From the Angus & Robertson hardback edition, 1983.

Notes:
Dennis dedicated the book to his publisher, George Robertson. He discussed his plans to do this in a letter to George Robertson, dated 2nd October 1919.

Copyright © Perry Middlemiss 2002-05