Publisher
Lawson used the money saved while running her boarding houses to purchase shares in the radical pro-federation newspaper The Republican in 1887. She and son Henry edited the Republican in 1887–88, which was printed on an old press in Louisa's cottage. The Republican called for an Australian republic uniting under 'the flag of a Federated Australia, the Great Republic of the Southern Seas'. The Republican was replaced by the Nationalist, but it lasted two issues.
With her earnings and her experience from working on The Republican, Lawson was able in May 1888, to edit and publish The Dawn, Australia’s first journal produced solely by women which was distributed throughout Australia and overseas. The Dawn had a strong feminist perspective and frequently addressed issues such as women's right to vote and assume public office, women's education, women's economic and legal rights, domestic violence, and temperance. The Dawn was published monthly for 17 years (1888–1905) and at its height employed 10 female staff. Lawson's son Henry also contributed poems and stories for the paper, and in 1894 The Dawn press printed Henry's first book, Short Stories in Prose and Verse.
Around 1904 Louisa published her own volume, Dert and Do, a simple story of 18,000 words. In 1905 she collected and published her own verses, The Lonely Crossing and other Poems. Louisa likely had a strong influence on her son's literary work in its earliest days.
Read more about this topic: Louisa Lawson
Famous quotes containing the word publisher:
“To me a book is a message from the gods to mankind; or, if not, should never be published at all.... A message from the gods should be delivered at once. It is damnably blasphemous to talk about the autumn season and so on. How dare the author or publisher demand a price for doing his duty, the highest and most honourable to which a man can be called?”
—Aleister Crowley (1875–1947)
“No publisher should ever express an opinion on the value of what he publishes. That is a matter entirely for the literary critic to decide.... I can quite understand how any ordinary critic would be strongly prejudiced against a work that was accompanied by a premature and unnecessary panegyric from the publisher. A publisher is simply a useful middle-man. It is not for him to anticipate the verdict of criticism.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
“A publisher is a specialised form of bank or building society, catering for customers who cannot cope with life and are therefore forced to write about it.”
—Colin Haycraft (b. 1929)