Making Trouble (Tongued with Fire): An Imagined History of Harriet Elphinstone Dick and Alice C. Moon

Table of Contents

Prologue, Why Me?

1. Cheltenham, Melbourne, 1902

2. Brighton Beach, England, 1860

3. The West Pier, Brighton, 1869

4. A Visit, The Steine, 1869

5. Friendship, Brighton, 1871

6. Lovers, Brighton, 1874-1875

7. The Challenge, Brighton, 1875

8. Harriet Elphinstone Dick, Brighton, 1875

9. Leaving Home, Brighton to Gravesend

10. Arriving, Melbourne, 1876

11. A Home, Carlton, 1876

12. Swimming, St Kilda, 1876

13. Christmas Dinner, Carlton, 1876

14. The Challenge, St Kilda, 1877

15. A Return Visit to England, 1878-1879

16. The Ladies Gymnasium, Melbourne, 1879

17. Consolidation, Melbourne 1879-1880s

18. Notoriety, Melbourne, 1882-1884

19. The Tasmanian Connection Begins, Melbourne, 1881

20. Watershed Moment, The Call of the Wild, 1884

21. A Tree Change, Beaconsfield, 1883-84

22. Tuesday Evening, April Fools Day, 1884

23. The Train Wreck, Werribee, 1884

24. Abbotsford, Thursday, 3rd April 1884

25. The Steyne, Beaconsfield, 1883-87

26. On the Road, Beaconsfield, 1886

27. Under Pressure, Beaconsfield, 1886

28. An Imagined Summer, Beaconsfield, 1887

29. Alice’s Dream, Beaconsfield, 1887

30. Alice Changes Direction, Melbourne, 1888

31. Alice’s Restaurant, Melbourne, 1888

32. Love Ends, Melbourne, 1889

33. Goodbye Melbourne, Hello Sydney, 1890

34. Harriet’s New Gymnasium, Sydney, 1893

35. Afternoon Tea at Quong Tart’s Tearooms, Sydney, 1893

36. Meeting John McGarvie Smith, Sydney, February 1894

37. To Please a Man? Woollahra, 1894

38. This Man Is the Very Devil. Sydney, 1894

39. The Worst News in The World, Double Bay, 21 April 1894

40. The Funeral, South Head Cemetery, 23 April 1894

41. The Will, Double Bay, June 1894

42. Revenge, ‘Lurlie’, July 1894

43. Alone, Sydney, 1894

44. Return, Melbourne, 1898-1902

Endnotes

Afterword - Who was John McGarvie Smith?

And what was his connection to the Anthrax vaccine?
Endnotes to Afterword

Reviews

Actor and comedian Sue Ingleton's "imagined" biography - there are few primary sources to draw on - reads like a hybrid of speculative biography, novel and a kind of turn-of-the-century piece of theatre, the author narrating their tale both to readers and an imagined audience. It's entertaining, informative and would make fun theatre. But serious themes are also addressed - the rise of early feminism - and there's a sting in the tale: Alice dying suddenly in suspicious circumstances at the age of 37, after the couple had split.

—Cameron Woodhead, SMH / The Age

Sue’s immersion in story-telling from every perspective, as actor, director, writer has transformed an historical footnote into a wonderfully vivid book: Making Trouble: Tongued with Fire – an imagined history of the two women. Drawing on fact and years of research, as well as her very pronounced and sometimes pretty whacky instinct, Sue has been able to transform the findings of her obsessive sleuthing: official records, newspaper clippings, odd photographs and so on, into a narrative filled with great dialogue and vibrant scenes that one can picture effortlessly through her vivacious command of language and very skilled understanding of how to hold an audience – or reader – captive. With her customary wit, a beguilingly fluent historical literary style, a great command of description and an ability to free fact into fully winged fancy, I think Sue has probably come closer to the truth of these women than she could ever prove. By incorporating the sensibilities of the time they lived, with their imagined individual yearnings, triumphs, flaws, indiscretions and powerful convictions, they become three dimensional protagonists who carry the past to us. And it helps that Sue –unlike many male historians – is unafraid to draw down on her own her own experience and sensibility, and her femininity, to make them live. If it weren’t for this unconventional freedom, Harriet and Alice would remain footnotes. Sometimes it takes an imagination to free history and invigorate it for the present. But such a tactic is courageous. Luckily, Sue is brave in everything she tackles.

—Joanna Murray-Smith, playwright, Launch

FOUR STARS. I was fascinated by this story of two little known women who made such great inroads into women’s health and fitness and also women’s rights in Australia. The author narrates the story more like a fictional tale than a biography bringing the reader right into the home, and daily life, of these women. ...Recommended for anyone who is interested in learning more about the women who pioneered our health and fitness regime and pushed for women’s rights. Read the full review here.

—Veronica Joy, The Burgeoning Bookshelf