Sydney Morning Herald: Poetic licence to save pets
THE copyright on one of Australia's greatest poems is up for sale to fund an animal welfare group on the state's Far North Coast.
Kenneth Slessor's Five Bells, in which the poet muses on a drowning in Sydney Harbour, is being sold by his son Paul, who volunteers with the Animal Rights and Rescue Group in Lismore.
There are no takers yet, but Mr Slessor believes an advertising agency may be willing to pay a six-figure sum for the poem's remaining 30-year copyright.
Five Bells is regarded by some as Slessor snr's greatest work, and one of the nation's most significant poems. It is on the high school English syllabus in NSW.
"I couldn't bear to see this group disappear, and selling the copyright is what I can do to provide some hope," Mr Slessor said. "Without that, it's hard to see what will happen to the stray pets in the area."
Kenneth Slessor was not noted for his love of nature. The writer Hal Porter, who lived with him in the 1930s, said he was "incapable of sentimentalising over vegetation".But Mr Slessor said his father, who died in 1971, would have been proud to help the group.