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My Brilliant Career




It is the first of many novels by Stella Maria Sarah Miles Franklin (1879-1954), one of the major Australian writers of her time. It was written while she was still a teenager, as a romance to amuse her friends. Franklin submitted the manuscript to Henry Lawson who contributed a preface and took it to his own publishers in Edinburgh. The popularity of the novel in Australia and the perceived closeness of many of the characters to her own family and circumstances as small farmers in NSW near Goulburn caused Franklin a great deal of distress and led her to withdrawing the novel from publication until after her death.

The heroine, Sybylla, a headstrong girl growing up in early 20th Century Australia, has the opportunity of marriage to a wealthy young man (Harry) whom she loves, but rejects it in order to maintain her independence, preferring to take a job as governess/housekeeper to the family of an Illiterate neighbour to whom her father owes money.

In the 1979 Film Adaptation , Sybylla was played by Judy Davis and Harry by Sam Neill . The film was directed by Gillian Armstrong and produced by Margaret Fink . It won numerous awards and was nominated for an Academy Award For Costume Design .

Shortly after the publication of ''My Brilliant Career'', Franklin wrote a sequel, ''My Career Goes Bung,'' which would not be published until 1946.

Western Australia n band The Panics released a song of the same name on their debut EP in 2002, which is presumably named after the book.


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