Interview relating to Bruce Dawe's Poems.

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Interviewer: Today we have Bruce Dawe on the show, prominent Australian Poet. Good Morning Mr. Dawe.

Dawe: Good morning.

Interviewer: As any reader of yours would know, you use a distinctive style in your poetry, a main characteristic of which is direct speech, this features in your Poems Big Jim and Enter Without so Much as Knocking, can you tell us why do you do this?

Dawe: Yeah the two poems are pretty similar, in Enter Without So Much as Knocking, the poem actually sagas over the entire life of a male, in one part, once he had became a man, I use direct speech, "It's number one every time for this chicken, hit wherever you see a head and kick whoever's down!" I do this to create his new character, and to reveal the nature of the character, this shows the reader he had become abit of a lowlife coward, and allows them an insight into his character.

For Big Jim it was similar, but a little different as well, with Big Jim I really wanted to create a distinctly Australian character, so I used direct speech, but I also used Australian colloquial language, in things like "Bee-yoo-tiful" which is very Australian, and in "... but what I am saying is that I'm every bloody bit as good as you are!" this direct speech reveals the nature of the character, especially the second quote, but the Australian colloquial language of 'bloody' and 'bee-yoo-tiful' creates the atmosphere of Australia and adds layers to the character of Big Jim, the end result of this is a easily identifiable character in both nature and in country.

Interviewer: Would you agree that Ray Lawler's Summer of the 17th Doll is a good example of Australian colloquial language?

Dawe: Yeah very much so,