Herb Wharton

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Herb Wharton (born 1936) is an Indigenous Australian former stockman and now internationally recognised poet and novelist.

A Murri man, his maternal grandmother was Kooma, and both grandfathers Irish.^[1] He was born in Yumba, an Aboriginal camp in the south-western Queensland town of Cunnamulla.

Wharton has worked as a stockman, a drover and a labourer, but did not begin his writing career until in the 1980s, when he was around 50, he sat down under a tree and began to write. Through his writing he tried to answer questions about his people's past.

Eventually Wharton considered publishing his writing and, after buying an electric typewriter with a grant from the Australia Council for the Arts, he wrote his first book of poems, Kings with Empty Pockets.

In 1990 Wharton entered some of his poems in the David Unaipon Award for unpublished Indigenous writers. His work was highly commended, and the University of Queensland Press commissioned him to write a novel. The resulting novel, Unbranded, published in 1992, relates his experiences on the stock routes of the Australian outback. This was followed by Cattle Camp in 1994, Where ya' been, mate? in 1996, and by the young adult novel Yumba Days in 1999. Herb recently finished a first draft of a novel called The Munta and the Mob.

In 1998 Wharton participated in an international book promotion tour of France and the UK, and won a residency at the Australia Council studio at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris. When not travelling internationally to attend literary festivals he lives in Brisbane and now writes full-time.

Wharton is also been made a member of the Australian Stockman's Hall of Fame in Longreach.

A second volume of poetry, Imba (Listen): Tell You A Story has been published. In each of his books of poetry, a glossary is included to assist readers understand all the Murri language words (Murrayisms), he uses throughout his writing.

[edit] Works

Novels

• Unbranded (UQP, 1992) ISBN 0702224448
• Yumba Days (UQP, 1999) ISBN 9780702231131

Short stories

• Cattle Camp: Murri Drovers and their Stories (UQP, 1994)
• Where Ya Been Mate? (1996)

Poetry

• Kings With Empty Pockets (2003) ISBN 0-0581883-4-3 Review
• Imba (Listen): Tell You a Story (2003) ISBN 0958188335

[edit] References

Persondata
NAME	Wharton, Herb
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	Contemporary Indigenous Australian poet and novelist
DATE OF BIRTH	1936
PLACE OF BIRTH	Cunnamulla, Queensland, Australia
DATE OF DEATH
PLACE OF DEATH