Like a moth to the flame
Sharon Hollingsworth
September 2003

How does a 21st century American woman fall in love with a couple of 19th century Australian outlaws? Quite easily actually! But why?  Perhaps there is something  special or different and exotic or romantic about someone the further away they are from you in either space or time... And the Kelly Gang fits the bill nicely on both counts.

Falling for a man who is in another hemisphere and another century is as easy as falling off a log. He is immutable and never changes. HIs fire remains never to be extinguished. And I have been drawn like a moth to the bright shining flames of those bushrangers, the Kelly Gang! I cannot get enough of them as I read and study all I can get my hands on about them. That is no easy feat being in the States! I find myself thinking of them nearly all the time, they have become quite an obsession!  As I go into town I pass a horse paddock, and always think of Ned and Joe and wonder which bit of horseflesh they would "borrow"... I sit at railroad crossings as trains pass by and I wonder what if someone had stopped Curnow? I go about my regular daily routines and think about the Kelly Gang and wish that I could be back in the 19th Century with them and not in this go-go-go rat race of a century. Oh, to feel a good horse under me and to have the fresh Australian breeze in my hair as I ride along with the Gang... The country is ours and we go where we please!.... Why Ned and Joe? They were both handsome, charismatic men who deserved so much more than they were offered in life due to many social and economic forces. I can certainly relate to that.

These men had dreams and hopes, and intellects that were not nurtured, particularly Joe, who was more than a little bit talented with wit and writing ability. He espoused another culture, his keen mind absorbing what was best from the Chinese and worst (opium smoking)... These were men who were hampered and hindered at every turn. They were meant never to rise above their circumstances, but they did not take injustice lying down... They did rise, a most glorious rising and they did it with style and panache! I thrill when I read about the gentlemenly, courtly way they treated the fairer sex, the kindness and compassion, the humour, their loyalty to one another, their reluctance to kill in cold blood (not withstanding that Sherritt business)... I am beyond thrilled when I read about Joe Byrne the versifier, the larrikin-heeled lover with a bad boy streak running right up and back down his spine! Even the way he dressed and comported himself had "rock star" written all over it! He reminds me very much of the 19th century Romantic poets like Shelley, Keats and Byron... All who lived fast, loved hard, died young and left a damn goodlooking corpse!

But that bit of Sherritt business... What an interesting triangle and tableau that Ned,  Joe and Aaron made. That is one of the more intriguing aspects of the whole saga. Gave it truly a soap opera aspect! I don't forget Dan and Steve who had their supporting parts to play but it is Ned and Joe who are the stars who stalk this stage.  I don't see how anyone cannot be drawn in and caught up and not fall in love with any of these wild colonial boys.

I get a little upset when someone in history or modern times tries to hurt them or talk them down. I have gotten angry over the mere mention of all the names like Hall, Fitzpatrick, Curnow, Steele and Barry. Yet if they had not played their given parts to the hilt, how would the drama have come out differently? I know that I  would have played the role of sympathiser given a chance. When I read about the gang being hungry, cold and wet, I wish I could have been there to offer hot food, a warm fire and  a soft pillow. And a little respite from the storm. That is what Ned and Joe offer me right now. That is the least I could do in return for them.  I often stop and think and smile about Ned Kelly, proud, tall and defiant in that iconic armour of his as he emerges from the pre-dawn mists of Glenrowan and enters into my heart never to fall or to falter or to die and of Joe Byrne, as he hangs from the Benalla lock up door,  having a bit of flash left even then and a bit of dignity as well which could not be said of the human vultures as they circled! Ah, well...