Marshall, Alan

Born May 2, 1902, in Noorat, Victoria, Australia. Australian writer.

Marshall began his literary career in the 1920’s. In the 1930’s he wrote short stories. During World War II, Marshall was a correspondent for a newspaper at the front. He is the author of the travel essays These Are My People (1944), the novel How Beautiful Are Thy Feet (1949), which is about Melbourne boot and shoe workers, short stories about children, and humoresques. As a short-story writer, he has followed the tradition of H. Lawson, for example, in his collections Tell Us About the Turkey, Jo (1946) and How’s Andy Going? (1956).

Marshall’s autobiographical trilogy, comprised of I Can Jump Puddles (1955), This Is the Grass (1962), and In Mine Own Heart (1963; Russian translation of the trilogy, 1969), is the story of his childhood and youth; it tells of Marshall’s struggle with disease and about his choosing of a path in life. In the book of essays Ourselves Writ Strange (1948; Russian translation, 1965), Marshall condemned discrimination against Australian aborigines. He collected and edited the legends of the aborigines in People of the Dreamtime (1952; Russian translation, 1958). His Whispering in the Wind (1969) is a fairy tale for children. Marshall is the vice-president of the Australian-Soviet Friendship Society.