Futility Closet

In 1943, fed up with modernist poetry, two Australian servicemen invented a fake poet and submitted a collection of deliberately senseless verses to a Melbourne arts magazine. To their delight, they were accepted and their author hailed as "one of the most remarkable and important poetic figures of this country." In this week's episode of the Futility Closet podcast we'll tell the story of the Ern Malley hoax, its perpetrators, and its surprising legacy in Australian literature. We'll also hear a mechanized Radiohead and puzzle over a railroad standstill. Intro: In 1896 an English statistician decided that "brass instruments have a fatal influence on the growth of the hair." The Lincoln Electric Company presented a check made of steel to each winner of a 1932 essay contest. Sources for our feature on Ern Malley: Michael Heyward, The Ern Malley Affair, 1993. Brian Lloyd, "Ern Malley and His Rivals," Australian Literary Studies 20:1 (May 2001) 20. Philip Mead, "1944, Melbourne and Adelaide: The Ern Malley Hoax