Struggle and Storm: The Life and Death of Francis Adams

Francis William Lauderdale Adams (1862-1893)—poet, novelist, social analyst and journalist—made a significant place for himself in Australian literary and cultural history. Born in England, he was a self-consciously modern writer of the fin de siècle; the theme of suicide figured frequently in his writings, and in death he embodied the romantic myth of the consumptive artist.

Adams arrived in Australia in 1884, full of democratic and literary aspirations, and set out to explore the cultural...