A Convict's Tour of Hell

"A Convict's Tour to Hell"
by Francis MacNamara
Writtenca. 1832-1839
CountryAustralia
LanguageEnglish
PublisherThe Cumberland Times
Publication date27 December 1900
Lines228
Full text
A Convict's Tour of Hell at Wikisource

"A Convict's Tour to Hell" is a poem by Australian author Francis MacNamara, also known as "Frank the Poet", written some time in the 1830s.[1]

It is believed to have been written in 1839 when the author was working at Establishment Station in Stroud, New South Wales,[2] although a manuscript of the poem, held in the Mitchell Library in Sydney, indicates a composition date of 23 October 1832, at the same location.[3]

The poem's first known publication was in The Cumberland Times, 27 December 1900, under the title "A Tour to Hell". This publication was accompanied by a note indicating that the poem had not been published anywhere previously.[1] The first book publication of the poem later in 1900, along with a poem by Henry Kendall, was a copy of this version.[4]

Synopsis

"'A Convict's Tour to Hell' chronicles Frank's tour of the underworld, where he discovers the notorious penal administrators such as Captain Logan and Governor Darling are suffering the kind of hellish punishment that they inflicted on the convicts."[5]

Critical reception

The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature states that the poem is "modelled on the satires of Jonathan Swift".[5]

Publication history

The poem has appeared under the alternate titles of "A Tour to Hell" and "A Convict's Tour of Hell".[1]

After the poem's initial publication in The Cumberland Times in 1900[1] it was reprinted as follows:

  • Frank the Poet : The Life and Works of Francis MacNamara edited by John Meredith and Rex Whalan, Red Rooster Press, 1979[6]
  • The New Oxford Book of Australian Verse edited by Les Murray, Oxford University Press, 1986[7]
  • The Penguin Book of Australian Satirical Verse edited by Philip Neilson, Penguin, 1986[8]
  • The Irish-Australian Connection (An Caidream Gael-Astralach) edited by Seamus Grimes and Gearoid O Tuathaigh, University College Galway, 1988[9]
  • Exiles from Erin : Convict Lives in Ireland and Australia edited by Bob Reece, Macmillan, 1991[10]
  • The Penguin Book of Australian Ballads edited by Elizabeth Webby and Philip Butterss, Penguin, 1993[11]
  • The Sting in the Wattle : Australian Satirical Verse edited by Philip Neilsen, University of Queensland Press, 1993[12]
  • A Working Forest : Selected Prose by Les Murray, Duffy and Snellgrove, 1997[13]
  • Australian Verse : An Oxford Anthology edited by John Leonard, Oxford University Press, 1998[14]
  • The Turning Wave : Poems and Songs of Irish Australia edited by Colleen Burke and Vincent Woods, Kardoorair Press, 2001[15]
  • Hell and After : Four Early English-language Poets of Australia edited by Les Murray, Carcanet, 2005[16]
  • An Anthology of Australian Poetry to 1920 edited by John Kinsella, University of Western Australia Library, 2007[17]
  • 100 Australian Poems You Need to Know edited by Jamie Grant, Hardie Grant, 2008[18]
  • Macquarie PEN Anthology of Australian Literature edited by Nicholas Jose, Kerryn Goldsworthy, Anita Heiss, David McCooey, Peter Minter, Nicole Moore, and Elizabeth Webby, Allen and Unwin, 2009[19]

Notes

  • Australian cultural historian Warren Fahey used the poem as the basis for an episode of his Sydney Stories historical video series[20]

References

  1. ^ a b c d "Austlit — "A Convict's Tour to Hell" by Francis MacNamara". Austlit. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  2. ^ "Francis MacNamara (1810–1861) by R. H. W. Reece". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  3. ^ ""A Convict's Tour to Hell"". State Library of NSW. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  4. ^ ""The Song of Ninian Melville / A Tour to Hell" by Henry Kendall and Francis MacNamara". Cumberland Times. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  5. ^ a b The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature edited by Wilde, Hooton and Andrews, 2nd edition, 1986, pp 179-180. Accessed: 10 February 2026
  6. ^ "Frank the Poet : The Life and Works of Francis MacNamara edited by John Meredith and Rex Whalan". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  7. ^ "The New Oxford Book of Australian Verse edited by Les Murray". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  8. ^ "The Penguin Book of Australian Satirical Verse edited by Philip Neilson". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  9. ^ "The Irish-Australian Connection edited by Seamus Grimes and Gearoid O Tuathaigh". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  10. ^ "Exiles from Erin : Convict Lives in Ireland and Australia edited by Bob Reece". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  11. ^ "The Penguin Book of Australian Ballads edited by Elizabeth Webby and Philip Butterss". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  12. ^ "The Sting in the Wattle : Australian Satirical Verse edited by Philip Neilsen". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  13. ^ "A Working Forest : Selected Prose by Les Murray". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  14. ^ "Australian Verse : An Oxford Anthology edited by John Leonard". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  15. ^ "The Turning Wave : Poems and Songs of Irish Australia edited by Colleen Burke and Vincent Woods". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  16. ^ "Hell and After : Four Early English-language Poets of Australia by Les Murray". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  17. ^ "An Anthology of Australian Poetry to 1920 edited by John Kinsella". Austlit. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  18. ^ "100 Australian Poems You Need to Know edited by Jamie Grant". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  19. ^ "Macquarie PEN Anthology of Australian Literature edited by Nicholas Jose, Kerryn Goldsworthy, Anita Heiss, David McCooey, Peter Minter, Nicole Moore, and Elizabeth Webby". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
  20. ^ ""A Convict's Tour of Hell – Sydney Stories with Warren Fahey"". National Film and Sound Archive. Retrieved 10 February 2026.
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