AustLit

'As "paradoxical as a platypus"; a combination of "Mrs Pankhurst and Mary Poppins"; a vivaciously "fascinating little rascal" (Roe 533, 568, 172). Such endearments by colleagues, friends, and suitors alike of the effusive Stella Miles Franklin allude to the intriguing puzzles associated with her life and works. "secretive and outspoken; loyal in friendship yet prickly and even at times malicious," she has been described as "gregarious, witty and deeply depressive" (Martin 89.1). "This great bag of words" (Roe 127), to coin Franklin's own phrase, describes the enigma that is Miles. Indeed, describing the irrepressible Franklin reminds me of a saying from my childhood, "there's nowt as queer as folk." And Franklin was as oddly queer as they come: a quirky thinker and compulsive writer who left behind a bewildering quagmire of stories, novels and plays, some in fragments, some scrawled over in indecipherable scribbles, and some edited, carefully bound, and yet still roundly rejected by publishers.'

Source: Abstract.