When Leah Purcell was five years old, she liked nothing better than climbing into her mother's bed at night and listening to her recite Henry Lawson's The Drover's Wife.
"I was a mongrel sleeper,” she says, tossing her curly blonde head and laughing. “So I'd say, ‘Mum, recite that story.' I know I was five years old because, in the margins of the book, I wrote, “Dora, Dick, Nip and Fluff,' the characters from my Grade One reader. I was practising my writing." And she still has that book today.
Leah was drawn to the strong, “sun-browned bush-woman" in Lawson's tale and her irrepressible son, the little man of the house, who was determined to protect his fatherless family from all comers. Leah's reimagining of The Drover's Wife, which she's written over and again as an award-winning play, a novel, and now a feature film, breathes especially vivid life into those two characters.
"I was that boy in the story," she tells The Weekly, sitting by a roaring fire in the comfy lounge of an old pub, after an afternoon roaming with a camera crew through a paddock of eucalypts and golden, waist-high native grass.
“My father wasn't around. I felt like I was there to protect my mother. I was making adult decisions by the time I was 10 years old ... When that boy comes out swingin' and fightin', that was me. And my mother was the drover's wife. She taught me how to split a log, she taught me how to stack the wood heap. She would say, “Don't stack it hollow because snakes will get in under there," just as they did in the Lawson classic.
This story is from the {{IssueName}} edition of {{MagazineName}}.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the {{IssueName}} edition of {{MagazineName}}.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Hitting a nerve
Regulating the vagus nerve with its links to depression, anxiety, arthritis and diabetes - could aid physical and mental wellbeing.
Take me to the river
With a slew of new schedules and excursions to explore, the latest river cruises promise to give you experiences and sights you won’t see on the ocean.
The last act
When family patriarch Tom Edwards passes away, his children must come together to build his coffin in four days, otherwise they will lose their inheritance. Can they put their sibling rivalry aside?
MEET RUSSIA'S BRAVEST WOMEN
When Alexei Navalny died in a brutal Arctic prison, Vladimir Putin thought he had triumphed over his most formidable opponent. Until three courageous women - Alexei's mother, wife and daughter - took up his fight for freedom.
The wines and lines mums
Once only associated with glamorous A-listers, cocaine is now prevalent with the soccer-mum set - as likely to be imbibed at a school fundraiser as a nightclub. The Weekly looks inside this illegal, addictive, rising trend.
Jenny Liddle-Bob.Lucy McDonald.Sasha Green - Why don't you know their names?
Indigenous women are being murdered at frightening rates, their deaths often left uninvestigated and widely unreported. Here The Weekly meets families who are battling grief and desperate for solutions.
Growing happiness
Through drought flood and heartbreak, Jenny Jennr's sunflowers bloom with hope, sunshine and joy
"Thank God we make each other laugh"
A shared sense of humour has seen Aussie comedy couple Harriet Dyer and Patrick Brammall conquer the world. But what does life look like when the cameras go down:
Winter baking with apples and pears
Celebrate the season of Australian apples and pears with these sweet bakes that will keep the midwinter blues away.
Budget dinner winners
Looking for some thrifty inspiration for weeknight dinners? Try our tasty line-up of low-cost recipes that are bound to please everyone at the table.