A Drum for Ben Boyd

by Francis Webb

Major poem by Webb, originally published in The Bulletin which reflects on the complicated history of entrepreneur, merchant, and sometime slaver Ben Boyd, who lived in Australia during the 19th century.

This is a limited edition with illustrations by Norman Lindsay.

37 pages, Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 1948

About the author

There is more than one author with this name on Goodreads. This item is for the Australian poet.

One of the most important Australian poets of the 20th century, Francis Webb wrote his first poems as a birthday present for his grandmother at age 7, and he began publishing poems in The Bulletin at age 18.

After commencing his career, Webb was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Although he received a Commonwealth Literary Fund Fellowship in 1958, he spent most of the remainder of his life in and out of psychiatric institutions. Supported by a range of famous poets of the day, Webb continued writing, with a volume of Collected Poems issued in 1969. He died in hospital in 1973, the same year he won the Australian Literature Society Gold Medal.