MY COUNTRY by Dorothea

Mackellar
● Purposes of this lesson:
- This lesson is a logical following to the one about
Australia. Learning a bit of literature helps foreigners to
get the country sensibility
- Understanding the compound nouns and adjectives.
- Learning some literary words.
- studying the shades of the colour words
- Using an appropriate software to illustrate a poem and
explaining how using it
- Meeting an Australian poet...which is a rare opportunity
in Europe
MY COUNTRY by Dorothea
Mackeller

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hquYbyViZzI
 MY COUNTRY by Dorothea Mackeller

●
The love of field and coppice ●
Core of my heart, my country!
● Of green and shaded lanes, ● Her pitiless blue sky,
● Of ordered woods and gardens ● When, sick at heart, around us
●
Is running in your veins. ●
We see the cattle die
●
Strong love of grey-blue distance, ●
But then the grey clouds gather,
●
Brown streams and soft, dim skies ●
And we can bless again
●
I know, but cannot share it, ●
The drumming of an army,
● My love is otherwise. ● The steady soaking rain.
●

●
I love a sunburnt country, ●
Core of my heart, my country!
●
A land of sweeping plains, ●
Land of the rainbow gold,
●
Of ragged mountain ranges, ●
For flood and fire and famine
● Of droughts and flooding rains. ● She pays us back threefold.
●
I love her far horizons, ●
Over the thirsty paddocks,
● I love her jewel-sea, ● Watch, after many days,
● Her beauty and her terror ● The filmy veil of greenness
●
The wide brown land for me! ●
That thickens as we gaze ...
●

●
The stark white ring-barked forests, ●
An opal-hearted country,
●
All tragic to the moon, ●
A wilful, lavish land
● The sapphire-misted mountains, ● All you who have not loved her,
●
The hot gold hush of noon, ●
You will not understand
● Green tangle of the brushes ● though Earth holds many splendours,
● Where lithe lianas coil, ● Wherever I may die,
●
And orchids deck the tree-tops, ●
I know to what brown country
● And ferns the warm dark soil ● My homing thoughts will fly.
Act n° 1: find all the words used as adjectives
which end by “ed”:
Act n° 1: answers and Act n°2 find their translation
in a dictionary

● Shaded
● Ordered
● Sunburnt
● Ragged
● Barked
● Misted
● Hearted
● Loved
 Act n°2 (answers)

● Shaded ● Ombragé
● Ordered ● Ordoné
● Sunburnt ● Brulé par le soleil
● Ragged ● Déchiqueté, accidenté
● Ring- Barked ● Encerclé d’ écorce
● Sapphire-Misted ● À la brume couleur de
saphir
● Opal-Hearted
● Au coeur d’ opale
● Loved
● aimé
 Act n°3: Explain how they are composed

● Shaded
● Ordered
● Sunburnt
● sweeping
● Ragged
● Barked
● Misted
● Hearted
● Loved
 Act n°3 : answers

● Shaded: past participle of a verb used as an adjective

● Ordered: past participle of a verb used as an adjective
● Sunburnt: past participle of a verb preceded by a noun
● Sweeping: present participle used as an adjetive
● Ragged: past participle of a verb used as an adjective
● Barked: noun transformed in adjective
● Misted: noun transformed in adjective
● Hearted: noun transformed in adjective
● Loved: past participle of a verb used as an adjective
 Grammar points

● Adjectives can be: a true adjective like blue, big,

a present participle like sweeping plains, a
participle like shaded lanes or a compound
adjective like grey-blue.
● Some other words can be considered as
adjectives such as nouns such as opal-hearted
which gathered two nouns linked by an hyphen. In
this case, the second noun gets a “ed” end and is
invariable. The first word can be also an adjective
for example a blue-eyed girl and follows the
same rules. The second word can also be a
participle such as a good-looking man.
 Grammar point n° 2
● Take a look at the following words and observe
them:
- jewel-sea
- tree-tops
 Grammar point n° 2
● Take a look at the following words and observe
them:
- jewel-sea
- tree-tops →they are composed of two words
linked by an hyphen
● But some other forms exist:
- two separate words: rain forest
- a single word: rainbow
 Act n° 4: Lexical difficulties

● Coppice ● Coil
● Dim ● Soaking
● Stream ● Drumming
● Otherwise ● Threefold
● Drought ● Paddock
● Flood ● Filmy
● range ● Veil
● Stark ● Gaze
● Hush ● Wilful
● Tangle ● Lavish
● Ferns ● thoughts
● Lithe ● Homing
 Act n°5: each group looks for the translation of
three difficult words

G1 G2 G3
● Coppice ● Drought ● Hush
● Dim ● Flood ● Tangle
● Stream ● Range ● ferns
● Otherwise ● Stark ● Lithe

G4 G5 G6
● To coil ● Paddock ● Wilful
● Soaking ● Filmy ● Lavish
● drumming ● veil ● thoughts
● Threefold ● Gaze ● Homing
 Act n° 6 answers and Act n° 7: Each group leader
gives the answer to the class

● Taillis ● Sècheresse ● Silence

● Sombre ● Innondation ● Enchevètrement
● Courrant ● Chaîne ● Fougères
● Par ailleurs ● désolé ● Souple
● Serpenter ● Enclos ● Volontaire
● Trempant ● Pelliculé
● Fastueux
● Pensées
● Tambourinant ● Voile ● Instinct de retour au
● Tripler ● Regarder pays
 Act n° 8 : working on lexical fields

● 1) Quote all the colours in the poem

● 2) Find all the words linked to nature
 Act n°8 answers and act n° 9: use them in
sentences using at least one of the words of each
columns
● Green ● Field
● Coppice
● Grey-blue ● Woods
Gardens
Brown
●
●
● Mountains
● White ● Plains
● Tree
● Sapphire ● Soils
● Gold ● Brushes
● Skies
● Blue ● Clouds
● grey ● Rain
● Rainbow
● Earth
 Context of the poem writing and clues to help its
understanding
● Dorothea Mackellar was born on 1st July 1885. She was an Australian poet and fiction writer. Mackellar was
educated at home and began writing at a very young age. Her best-known poem is My Country, written at age
19 in 1904, while homesick in England;
● The title 'My Country' immediately converses up images of the unique countryside and diverse oceans.
● The poem begins with Mackellar describing another country. This is because she has portrayed it as "ordered
woods" and “soft, dim skies". But then she continues and the tone becomes more of a love affair with Australia
with Mackellar saying "My love is otherwise". This brings to mind Australia's natural assets. The beauty is in
the abundant and varied landscapes. “otherwise” is a key word which allows the author to change the
described place.
● My Country is a rhyming poem, fourteen stanzas in length. The opening two stanzas describe the British
landscape, but this is not the country the young Dorothea Mackellar yearns for. The genre is part of bush
poetry and does not tell a story.
● This poem deals with nature descriptions about Australia. It was written in order to inform people about the
beauty and the wilderness of this country. Dorothea Mackellar ‘My Country’ is a poem expressing her deep
passion and love for her country, Australia. The whole poem’s intention seems to evoke the sense of praising
for the country.
● Literary devices: ---
-Onomatopoeia : “drumming of an army” creates a feel that soldiers are marching to the beat of nature;
-Alliteration - "lithe lianas", "flood, fire and famine". The use of alliteration helps to emphasize the
characteristics of Australian rural life.
-Imagery: An example of this is "of droughts and flooding rains". This describes Australia as cruel in times of
droughts and unpredictable in the rainy season.
-Personification: By using words like, "she" and "her" the poet personifies Australia. The audience gets a feel
that Australia is not just lifeless piece of land.
 Literary word definitions
● Onomatopoeia: word that imitates the sound of what it
means.
● Alliteration is formed by words beginning by the same
consonant.
● Imagery: figurative or descriptive language in a literary
work.
● Personification: the attribution of human characteristics to
things, abstract ideas, etc...
 Act n°9 : Literary word definitions and now find
some examples in the poem for each of them.
● Onomatopoeia: word that imitates the sound of what it
means.
● Alliteration is formed by words beginning by the same
consonant.
● Imagery: figurative or descriptive language in a literary
work.
● Personification: the attribution of human characteristics to
things, abstract ideas, etc...
Act n° 10: CROSSWORD
INTERMEDIATE TASK: each group takes a paragraph in
charge and tries to translate theses few lines

The love of field and coppice I love a sunburnt country, The stark white ring-barked forests,
Of green and shaded lanes, A land of sweeping plains, All tragic to the moon,
Of ordered woods and gardens Of ragged mountain ranges, The sapphire-misted mountains,
Is running in your veins. Of droughts and flooding rains. The hot gold hush of noon,
Strong love of grey-blue distance, I love her far horizons, Green tangle of the brushes
Brown streams and soft, dim skies I I love her jewel-sea, Where lithe lianas coil,
know, but cannot share it, Her beauty and her terror And orchids deck the tree-tops,
My love is otherwise. The wide brown land for me And ferns the warm dark soi

Core of my heart, my country! Core of my heart, my country An opal-hearted country,

Her pitiless blue sky, Land of the rainbow gold, A wilful, lavish land
When, sick at heart, around us For flood and fire and famine All you who have not loved her,
We see the cattle die She pays us back threefold. You will not understand though
But then the grey clouds gather, Over the thirsty paddocks, Earth holds many splendours
And we can bless again Watch, after many days, Wherever I may die, I
The drumming of an army, The filmy veil of greenness know to what brown country
The steady soaking rain. That thickens as we gaze My homing thoughts will fly
 Answers
L’amour des champs et des taillis J’aime un pays brûlé par le soleil Les forêts désolées aux anneaux d’ écorce
Des vertes allées ombragées Un pays aux plaines balayées blancs
Des forêts ordonnées et des jardin Aux chaînes de montagnes Tous tragiques à la lumière de la lune
Coulent dans vos veines. déchirées Les montagnes embrumées de couleur
Un amour fort de la grande De sécheresse et aux averses saphir
distance gris-bleue innondantes Le chaud silence doré de midi
Des courants bruns et doux et des J’aime ses horizons lointains Les enchevêtrements verts des brosses
cieux sombres Où les lianes souples serpentent
J’aime sa mer précieuse
Je le connais mais ne peux le Et les orchidées parent le sommet des
Sa beauté et sa terreur
partager arbres
Et pour moi la grande étendue
Mon amour est ailleurs brune Et les fougères réchauffent le sol sombre

Du fond du coeur, mon pays Du fond du coeur, mon pays Un pays au coeur d’ opale
Son ciel bleu implacable Pays de l’arc-en-ciel doré Un pays volontaire et fastueux
Quand, à bout de force autour de Pour les inondations, le feu et la Vous ne comprendrez pas
nous famine Où que je puisse mourir
On voit le bétail mourir Elle nous paye au triple en retour Je sais que mes pensées
Puis par la suite les nuages gris Depuis les enclos assoiffés S’ envoleront vers le pays brun
se rassemblent Regardez, après plusieurs jours, Où mon instinct me ramène
Et nous pouvons bénir encore La fine pellicule du voile de
Le tambourinage d’une armée verdure
De la pluie trempante intense Qui s’épaissit quand nous la
regardons
 Explanation of the poem
● This cherished, timeless poem by Dorothea Mackellar clearly describes the Australian landscape,
which is an important part of identity. The landscape is important to Australians because of its diversity
which provides a very wide range of lifestyles and occupations, culture and history.
● The poet personifies Australia by using words like "she" and "her". By doing this the reader gets a feel
that Australia is not just a lifeless piece of land, but sharing the same characteristics of a person. Just
as sailors refer to their boats as “her” or “she”, because they have a deep affection for the sea. I
believe Mackellar is using the same affection when describing her love of the Australian landscape.
Feminine affection is usually stronger hence the use of “she” and “her”.
● In the first stanza the poet is comparing the natural landscape of another country to that of Australia.
She describes the other country (England) as tame because it is portrayed with "ordered woods" and
"soft skies". However Mackellar characterizes Australia as wild with a vivid description of the starkness
and cruel beauty of the country she loved by using words like "ragged mountains" and "sweeping
plains”. As well as the rugged mountains and plains, Australia’s landscape boasts deserts, surf
beaches, beautiful reefs and majestic forests. All of these enable us to enjoy the best of both worlds in
our own country. Mackellar is emphasizing the differences between England and Australia to highlight
the unique identity of her adopted country.
● Mackellar paints a picture which takes the reader on a descriptive journey of Australia's natural
environment. An example of this is shown in the line, "of droughts and flooding rains". This describes
Australia as cruel in times of droughts and unpredictable in the rainy season. Throughout this
absorbing poem Dorothea uses the poetic technique of alliteration, such as "lithe lianas", "steady and
soaking," and "flood, fire and famine." Mackellar uses this alliteration to emphasize the characteristics
of Australian rural life and to create the effect that Australia is sometimes harsh and unpredictable.
●
Dorothea's endearing description of the country she loved with its ragged ranges, cruel and dark
landscape and sweeping vistas, captivates the reader and engages them on a journey through her
imaginative portrayal of the Australian landscape.
 FINAL TASK

● Each group of the class choose a paragraph

and its translation and some pictures which are
linked to. With the help of “publisher” or
“scribus” create a poster. At the end of your
task, you gather all the posters and you
decorate your classroom with bright coloured
English and Australian landscapes and a
famous poem.