DAWE, WILLIAM CARLTON LANYON (18651935)

belonged to an old Cornish family, and was born at Adelaide on 30 July 1865. He came to Melbourne with his parents about 1880, and in 1885 published at London Sydonia and other Poems. In 1886 Love and the World and other Poems was published at Melbourne. Though the merit of these poems is possibly a little higher than the average of most youthful verse, they did not suggest any particular promise. In the same year he published at Melbourne his first attempt at fiction, Zantha, and in 1889 another volume of poetry, Sketches in Verse, was published in London. Dawe travelled round the world more than once and lived for a time in the east, but appears to have settled in London about 1892. For over 40 years he was writing a long series of popular sensational novels; E. Morris Miller in his Australian Literature lists over 70 of them. Some of the earlier novels had Australian themes, and there are occasional references to the land of his birth in the later books. Dawe wrote a few plays; The Black Spider was produced in London in 1927, and he also had two plays filmed. He died at London on 30 May 1935.