Joseph Furphy wrote the Australian literary classic, Such is Life, in 1903, under the pen name of ‘Tom Collins’, slang for ‘a tall story’. With its unreliable narrator travelling the countryside and telling the stories of the people he meets, the alias was certainly appropriate.
His brother John, a blacksmith, created agricultural implements, most notably the water carts used by forces during the First World War. Around these carts, stories were told, legs were pulled, rumours gathered momentum, and the term ‘furphy’ became part of the Australian lexicon.
The Furphy Literary Award, established in 1992, became a national competition for the first time in 2020. In 2022 it attracted over 600 entrants who took up the challenge to tackle its topic: ‘Australian Life in all its diversity’. The Furphy Anthology 2022 features the sixteen short stories judged to be the best of the best in this year’s competition.
