Serials

SerialsSerials

Lots of Mary Grant Bruce’s longer stories were serials when first published.  They mainly appeared in The Leader (Melbourne), the weekend newspaper that was read all over Victoria.  It was the counterpart to The Age, which ran from Monday to Friday, and had only city circulation.

Mary was ‘Cinderella’ at The Leader, as the writer of their page “The Children’s Column” was always known.  It carried all her earliest serials.  Starting with A New Year’s Dawn in 1904, she also had stories in the adult literature section, “Tales and Sketches”.  Interestingly, three of her ‘Billabong’ serials appeared there.

Book publishers later used ten of these serials, sometimes with substantial re-writing.  A New Year’s Dawn was the basis for a story 33 years later in the prestigious Blackwood’s Magazine.

 

TitleSectionFirst IssueFinal IssueRepublished as
A Little Bush Maid
The Children's Column
7 October 190517 August 1907A Little Bush Maid (1910)
A New Year's Dawn
Tales and Sketches
2 January 190416 January 1904A Rider of the Sixties (1937)
Dick's Schooldays
The Children's Column
24 July 190922 October 1910Dick (part) (1918)
Dick
The Children's Column
7 March 19086 March 1909Dick (part) (1918)
From Billabong to the War
Tales and Sketches
2 October 19151916From Billabong to London (1915)
Glen Eyre
Tales and Sketches
23 March 19123 August 1912Glen Eyre (1912)
Jim and Wally
Tales and Sketches
2 September 19161917Jim and Wally (1916)
Mates at Billabong
The Children's Column
28 January 19117 September 1912Mates at Billabong (1911)
Norah of Billabong
Tales and Sketches
To be advisedTo be advisedNorah of Billabong (1913)
Ragamuffins
The Children's Column12 October 19011 November 1902Not republished
The Adventures of Timothy
The Children's Column
10 January 190319 December 1903Timothy in Bushland (1912)
The Interlopers
The Children's Column
23 January 190412 October 1905Gray’s Hollow (1914)

Please Note:  We have only shown here  “substantial” serials, meaning they ran over at least three issues.  Or they were far longer than Mary’s other, shorter, stories.  Several works listed in our Short Stories section actually ran over two issues in their periodical of publication.

Another serial, which has not yet been republished, is ‘Wing Ho, of China‘.  It appeared in issues of Woman’s World from March to October 1926.


The Trustee of The Mary Grant Bruce Family Trust owns the extant copyrights to her works listed on this page.  All are under copyright in Australia.

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