Louis Esson - Digger's Rest: A Comedy in Three Acts (a.k.a.The Battler)

Brief description

Louis Esson's Digger's Rest: A Comedy in Three Acts (a.k.a The Battler) forms part of the Campbell Howard Collection of Australian Plays in Manuscript, a resource that provides a unique body of research material concerning Australian drama of the period 1920–55.

Full description

Play Length: Three Acts
Synopsis: The Battler-Oglive-has returned after striking it rich in Western Australia. He discovers gold in an old abandoned working and the Digger's Rest community has wealth and life for a short while. But the mine folds and the prosperity is gone, though not for the Battler-his Southern Cross mine in Western Australia comes good. He sets off for the West, and the Digger's Rest community sinks back into torpitude.
Setting: An old deserted gold field.
Characters:
TERRIBLE MICK, an old fossicker
ANDREW, an old fossicker
JACK CONROY, estate agent and auctioneer
SAM CLARKE, a bullock driver
WATTY, Mrs Smith's son
CLARA, a girl working at the shanty
BILLY, a rouseabout
BELLA, Sam's wife
MRS JONES, an immigrant
MRS SMITH, the store and shanty keeper
GEORGE OGILVIE, a mining man

Notes

NUNE: Campbell Howard Collection. [Two versions held in the Campbell Howard Collection]ANL holds a collection of Louis Esson papers, MS 3185, and Esson playscripts in the British Drama League (Australia) manuscript collection, MS 5579.

Details for description taken from the Campbell Howard Annotated Index of Australian Plays 1920-1955, compiled and edited by Jack Bedson and Julian Croft.