Arthur Maquarie, described by Morris Miller as 'a son of the parsonage' (70), was taken to England at an early age, returned to Sydney where he was educated at Sydney Grammar School and the University of Sydney, and returned to London in about 1895-96. He then changed his birth name Mullens by deed poll and worked as a freelance writer. He also taught English in Italy and travelled widely. Miller claims that Maquarie wrote his first play when wrecked on a Pacific island.
Maquarie provided assistance to Henry Lawson (q.v.) in London in the early 1900s, an association described by Lawson in '"Succeeding": A Sequel to "Pursuing Literature"'. By Lawson's description, Maquarie was living in very reduced circumstances, 'in a narrow little room upstairs in a narrow little cheap lodging house in a narrow little shabby street' and 'his case was hopeless'. Maquarie, Lawson said, 'tackles London every spring but he doesn't stay over spring because he can't afford a fire and his frock coat is getting very threadbare. He flies south with the swallows.' However, Maquarie introduced Lawson to a couple of the 'right' people in London and wrote articles about him.
Maquarie married Mary Campbell Lintner, a sculptor, in 1902. Mary Lintner Maquarie (q.v.) illustrated The Dance of Olives (1905), a selected work of poetry by Maquarie. He was active in the Royal Society of Literature and organised the British committee which promoted intellectual harmony (entente) among the Allies in the First World War.
