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Issue Details: First known date: 2017... 2017 Loving Words : Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909 - 1914
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"These letters provide a remarkable, bird's eye view of the friendship, courtship and love of two `colonial intellectuals' played out in Melbourne, London and Brisbane. Their deep interest in knowledge, ideas and culture shapes their growing commitment to each other - their letters bring a relationship to life and capture a time. The tentative and increasingly passionate youthful correspondence sets the scene and tone for a life-time of collaboration and activism. Reading these moving and tender letters is a timely reminder of the enduring nature of love, the value of partnership, and the importance of engaging with the world." Professor Julianne Schultz, editor of Griffith Review

"The great originality of Deborah Jordan's collection of Vance and Nettie Palmer's love letters is that it shows us not just the private life-the desire, the love, the searching for self-behind the public life of two of Australia's most significant literary figures but the private in the public life and the public in the private life, revealing how their private and public selves were intimately entangled." David Carter, Professor of Australian Literature and Cultural History, University of Queensland

"The Palmers were prolific letter writers and their observations on the people around them, their social and cultural circumstances and the natural world make for rich reading. We are privy to the emotional, intellectual, political and spiritual development of one of the most significant partner - ships in Australian literary history, that of Janet (Nettie) Higgins and Vance Palmer." Elaine Lindsay, author of Rewriting God: Spirituality in Contemporary Australian Women's Fiction

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Blackheath, Blue Mountains, Sydney, New South Wales,: Brandl and Schlesinger , 2017 .
      image of person or book cover 69836095950574995.jpg
      Image courtesy of publisher's website.
      Extent: 435p.
      Note/s:
      • Published February 2017

        Includes index

      ISBN: 9780994429674, 9780994429667

Works about this Work

Deborah Jordan, Ed., Loving Words: Love Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer 1909–1914 Ashley Barnwell , 2019 single work review
— Appears in: JASAL , vol. 19 no. 2 2019;

— Review of Loving Words : Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909 - 1914 Nettie Palmer , Vance Palmer , 2017 single work correspondence
'Deborah Jordan has edited the early letters between Nettie Higgins (1885–1964) and Vance Palmer (1885–1959) into a fascinating longitudinal study of blossoming love. Born in Melbourne and Brisbane respectively, the Palmers played a formative role in the literary culture of a newly federated Australia. Both were key voices in cultural criticism. They wrote journalism, biographies, reviews, literature, and featured on radio programs. Jordan discovered the courtship letters—all 350, 000 loving words of them—as a postgraduate student in the 1970s amidst the National Library of Australia’s collections. Published in 2018, this book is clearly a project that, in a fitting mirror of the love letters themselves, reflects both the first hook of fascination and the slow burn of a deep commitment.' (Introduction)
[Review] Loving Words: Love Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909-1914 John McCollow , 2019 single work review
— Appears in: The Queensland Journal of Labour History , Autumn no. 28 2019;

— Review of Loving Words : Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909 - 1914 Nettie Palmer , Vance Palmer , 2017 single work correspondence
[Review] Loving Words : Love Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909-1914 Elizabeth Webby , 2018 single work review
— Appears in: Southerly , vol. 78 no. 2 2018; (p. 197-201)

— Review of Loving Words : Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909 - 1914 Nettie Palmer , Vance Palmer , 2017 single work correspondence
'The Palmer Papers are one of the largest collections of Australian literary manuscripts currently preserved in the National Library of Australia. While they have been consulted by many researchers over the years, no one perhaps knows their contents as well as Deborah Jordan. In Loving Words, she introduces us to a less well-known aspect of the lives of Nettie and Vance Palmer: their lengthy courtship by correspondence. Given the major role the Palmers were to play in the development of Australian literature from the 1920s to 1960s, it is fascinating to learn how their personal and professional partnership began.' (Introduction)
Nettie and Vance : The Uncertain Beginnings of a Remarkable Partnership Brenda Niall , 2018 single work essay
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , September no. 404 2018; (p. 12, 14)

'When Vance Palmer met Nettie Higgins in the summer of 1909 in the sedate setting of the State Library of Victoria, they were both twenty-three years old. Yet even to speak to one another was a breach of convention; they had not been introduced, and Nettie at least felt quite daring. An arts student at Melbourne University, she had never been far from her parents’ house. Vance had made the break with home and travelled the world: he had worked as a teacher and a freelance journalist, and nourished hopes of becoming a full-time writer.'  (Introduction)

[Review] Loving Words : Love Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909-1914 Elizabeth Webby , 2018 single work review
— Appears in: Southerly , vol. 78 no. 2 2018; (p. 197-201)

— Review of Loving Words : Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909 - 1914 Nettie Palmer , Vance Palmer , 2017 single work correspondence
'The Palmer Papers are one of the largest collections of Australian literary manuscripts currently preserved in the National Library of Australia. While they have been consulted by many researchers over the years, no one perhaps knows their contents as well as Deborah Jordan. In Loving Words, she introduces us to a less well-known aspect of the lives of Nettie and Vance Palmer: their lengthy courtship by correspondence. Given the major role the Palmers were to play in the development of Australian literature from the 1920s to 1960s, it is fascinating to learn how their personal and professional partnership began.' (Introduction)
[Review] Loving Words: Love Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909-1914 John McCollow , 2019 single work review
— Appears in: The Queensland Journal of Labour History , Autumn no. 28 2019;

— Review of Loving Words : Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909 - 1914 Nettie Palmer , Vance Palmer , 2017 single work correspondence
Deborah Jordan, Ed., Loving Words: Love Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer 1909–1914 Ashley Barnwell , 2019 single work review
— Appears in: JASAL , vol. 19 no. 2 2019;

— Review of Loving Words : Letters of Nettie and Vance Palmer, 1909 - 1914 Nettie Palmer , Vance Palmer , 2017 single work correspondence
'Deborah Jordan has edited the early letters between Nettie Higgins (1885–1964) and Vance Palmer (1885–1959) into a fascinating longitudinal study of blossoming love. Born in Melbourne and Brisbane respectively, the Palmers played a formative role in the literary culture of a newly federated Australia. Both were key voices in cultural criticism. They wrote journalism, biographies, reviews, literature, and featured on radio programs. Jordan discovered the courtship letters—all 350, 000 loving words of them—as a postgraduate student in the 1970s amidst the National Library of Australia’s collections. Published in 2018, this book is clearly a project that, in a fitting mirror of the love letters themselves, reflects both the first hook of fascination and the slow burn of a deep commitment.' (Introduction)
Nettie and Vance : The Uncertain Beginnings of a Remarkable Partnership Brenda Niall , 2018 single work essay
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , September no. 404 2018; (p. 12, 14)

'When Vance Palmer met Nettie Higgins in the summer of 1909 in the sedate setting of the State Library of Victoria, they were both twenty-three years old. Yet even to speak to one another was a breach of convention; they had not been introduced, and Nettie at least felt quite daring. An arts student at Melbourne University, she had never been far from her parents’ house. Vance had made the break with home and travelled the world: he had worked as a teacher and a freelance journalist, and nourished hopes of becoming a full-time writer.'  (Introduction)

Last amended 26 Jun 2019 11:47:38
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