Kenneth Mackenzie’s Followers (2)

Kenneth Mackenzie

Born

in South Perth, Australia

September 25, 1913

Died

January 19, 1955

Genre

Classics

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Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Kenneth Ivo Brownley Langwell (Seaforth) Mackenzie (1913-1955), poet and novelist, was born on 25 September 1913 in South Perth, son of Australian-born parents Hugh Mackenzie, farmer, and his wife Marguerite Christina, née Pryde-Paterson. After his parents were divorced in 1919, Kenneth was raised by his mother and maternal grandfather. Educated at South Perth and Pinjarra state schools, and (as a boarder) at Guildford Grammar School, he took no interest in sport and studied only when he felt inclined. At 16 he ran away from school and refused to return. Finding Muresk Agricultural College even more uncongenial than boarding school, he entered the Universit Librarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads database.

Kenneth Ivo Brownley Langwell (Seaforth) Mackenzie (1913-1955), poet and novelist, was born on 25 September 1913 in South Perth, son of Australian-born parents Hugh Mackenzie, farmer, and his wife Marguerite Christina, née Pryde-Paterson. After his parents were divorced in 1919, Kenneth was raised by his mother and maternal grandfather. Educated at South Perth and Pinjarra state schools, and (as a boarder) at Guildford Grammar School, he took no interest in sport and studied only when he felt inclined. At 16 he ran away from school and refused to return. Finding Muresk Agricultural College even more uncongenial than boarding school, he entered the University of Western Australia in 1932 to read law. He gained a reputation for spasmodic brilliance and eccentricity, and left before the end of his first year.

Following occasional employment as a journalist on the West Australian, Mackenzie travelled to Melbourne in 1933. In the height of the Depression he took a job as a scullery-assistant and survived on the charity of his father's sisters. He moved to Sydney in the following year. There he reviewed books, films and drama for the Sydney Morning Herald, wrote for Fox Movietone News and contributed to Smith's Weekly, through which he met Kenneth Slessor. Impressing Norman Lindsay, he was admitted to his Bohemian circle: wherever Mackenzie was, 'wild comedy and wild adventures tended to break out'. He was strong, muscular and blonde, and immensely attractive to certain women. On 24 December 1934 at the registrar general's office, Sydney, he married Kathleen Bartlett, née Loveday; born in England, she was a 25-year-old widow who had taken a job as a pastry-cook.

His first novel, The Young Desire It, was published (1937) under the pseudonym 'Seaforth' Mackenzie by Jonathan Cape in London; sensitive, vital and erotic, it was to win the Australian Literary Society's prize in 1939. A sense of moral ambiguity and impending chaos, evident in Mackenzie's second novel, Chosen People (London, 1938), began to invade his own life as he became addicted to alcohol. The outbreak of World War II destroyed what vague plans he had to make a name as a writer in England. Mobilized in the Australian Military Forces, he began full-time duty on 8 April 1943, but was rejected for active service because of poor eyesight. Mackenzie was posted to the 22nd Garrison Battalion at Cowra prisoner-of-war camp. In August 1944 he witnessed the Japanese break-out, the subject of his third novel, Dead Men Rising (New York, 1951). Two collections of his poetry were published in his lifetime, Our Earth (Sydney, 1937) and The Moonlit Doorway (Sydney, 1944). Medically unfit, he was discharged from the army on 11 June 1945. His drinking habits (claret with breakfast) and lack of qualifications meant that he was virtually unemployable.

In 1948 the family moved to Kurrajong at the foot of the Blue Mountains where Kate had bought 14 acres (6 ha) with her child-endowment money. When they failed to make a living there, she returned with the children to Sydney. Left alone, Mackenzie devoted himself to his writing. He was awarded a Commonwealth Literary Fund fellowship for that year and for 1955; he edited (1951-52) Australian Poetry and published another novel, The Refuge (London, 1954). None the less, his financial situation and personal life were fast deteriorating. He was accidentally drowned on 19 January 1955 while bathing in Tallong Creek, near Goulburn; survived by his wife, daughter and son, he was cremated with Anglican rites. Douglas Stewart edited the Selected Poems of Kenneth Mackenzie (Sydney, 1961), and Evan Jones and Geoffrey Little co-edited a further anthology in 1972.
http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/macke... ...more

Combine Editions
Kenneth Mackenzie’s books

Average rating: 3.64 · 178 ratings · 31 reviews · 4 distinct works • Similar authors

	The Young Desire It by Kenneth Mackenzie, David Malouf (Introduction) 3.66 avg rating — 151 ratings — published 1937 — 10 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Refuge by Kenneth Mackenzie, Nicolas Rothwell (Introduction) 3.62 avg rating — 26 ratings — published 1954 — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Dead Men Rising by Seaforth Mackenzie (Pseudonym), Kenneth Mackenzie it was ok 2.00 avg rating — 1 rating — published 1951 — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Poems of Kenneth Mackenzie 0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Quotes by Kenneth Mackenzie (?)

“I could impersonally imagine a father willingly and painlessly ending the life of a son before that life should fade and fray into the common background pattern of greedy passions and deliberate violence which is also the pattern of inevitable self-destruction.”
― Kenneth MacKenzie, The Refuge

tags: parenthood

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“All children think unkindly of their parents at some time or another”
― Kenneth MacKenzie, The Refuge

tags: parenthood

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“We cannot alter other people, or their lives, or their destinies, by offering them sweets to take away the bitter taste, any more than they can alter us.”
― Kenneth MacKenzie, The Refuge

tags: destiny

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See all Kenneth Mackenzie's quotes »

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