The Drovers is a 1921 Australian play by Louis Esson. According to Esson's obituary the play was his "finest piece... one scene, one simple incident; it was what he could do; be never did anything better; and no one else did, either."[1]
It was published in a collection of plays in 1920[2] and 1945. The play was published before it had been performed.
A play that will stand reading and rereading... Each character is dry-pointed, hardly more than a line-sketch in so brief a compass—... but definite and clear. The situation has some of the inevitability of a Greek tragedy. No play of ours more powerfully shows the grimness of a fate that broods over men who pit themselves against our vast inland wilderness.[3]
Radio adaptations
The play was adapted for radio in 1940, 1943[4] and 1946.[5]
Premise
"The Play tells of Briglow Hill, the injured drover, left to die on the track because the parched cattle must be driven on to a distant waterhole at all costs."[6]
^"Friday, Sept. 17", ABC Weekly, Sydney: ABC, 11 September 1943, nla.obj-1315921724, retrieved 28 February 2024 – via Trove
^"MONDAY", ABC Weekly, Sydney: ABC, 26 January 1946, nla.obj-1353597165, retrieved 28 February 2024 – via Trove
^"FRIDAY . . . . . MAR. 1", The Wireless Weekly: The Hundred per Cent Australian Radio Journal, Sydney: Wireless Press, February 24, 1940, nla.obj-718401287, retrieved 28 February 2024 – via Trove
