Maggie May Gordon lives in outback NSW on a sheep and wool grazing property 18 km from Trangie. She grew up in Sydney and, after completing the Intermediate Certificate, left school at 14 to take up a career in clerical and then secretarial work. A holiday visit to an uncle living in the western region 38 years ago changed her life and she left the city to make a new home on the land and raise a family. Maggie has pursued a writing career without having completed any writing courses, and self-publishes her poems and short stories. From these humble beginnings Maggie has achieved an amazing dream of seeing an Australian musical she wrote, called Eureka, go into full production at Her Majesty’s Theatre in Melbourne as part of the 2004 Melbourne Festival.

What gave you the motivation/inspiration to follow your dream?

I feel I have a creative gift, and living on the Western Plains is very inspiring and conducive to creativity. I started to write during the early 1980s drought. I’d sit by the roadside looking after 1000 ewes and inspiration would just come to me. You have a lot of time out here to think. It was at that time that I began to write short stories, and then I had the idea of writing the musical, which is a love story set in the goldfields. Of course, winning the occasional award is always motivational! In 1985 I won The Land (newspaper) literary contest for a short story, and in 1990 my first lyric as a song was released through Festival, to raise funds for the Nyngan Flood Appeal. That’s when I realised that my writing did have a certain appeal.

At what point did you realise that your dream was actually possible and what was it that made you think you could really do it?

After I wrote the original script and lyrics from which Eureka evolved, it was put in a cupboard for about 10 years. I always believed so much in the characters and scenario that I knew I wanted it to be staged, but living out here meant it was difficult to make connections with classical composers. After having a few other lyrics performed as songs, and having my poems win a few awards, I began reworking the musical again... and it has taken many, many rewrites, and even underwent a massive rewrite by the creative team for the full production in Melbourne—that is the nature of the business, but of course, it is still based on the original script. About eight years ago I wrote a song called ‘Lest We Forget’ and in the process of talking about that to the singer Normie Rowe I mentioned my Eureka work, and he suggested I contact Australian composer Michael Harvey. The major breakthrough came when Michael wanted to compose the music for my lyrics. The next challenge was to workshop the musical, which we did in 2001. The positive feedback from this confirmed that ‘our baby had feet’. From here we had to find funding and prepare it for public performance. It has been a long journey!

When you were a child, what did you want to ‘be’ when you grew up?

I didn’t have any clear idea of what I wanted to be—one just left school and got a job (there were abundant jobs back then in the clerical line for which you didn’t need a degree). I did love going to the movies as it is a way of taking you out of your everyday existence. I also loved reading and enjoyed English History and Art at school. Perhaps these interests hinted at the road my creativity would eventually take. The Eureka Stockade of course was a momentous time in our nation’s history!

How did your childhood influence you in later life?

As a child our holidays were spent in the country near Grenfell, then later at Trangie. This probably influenced me greatly as I longed to live in a rural area. In fact my first acquisition when I started work was to save up and buy a horse—fortunately there was a paddock nearby in Sydney at that time! Dorothea Mackellar’s My Country poem left a lasting impression on me after I first read it as a schoolgirl. I don’t think she has been given as much credit as other Australian poets such as Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson.

Who are your role models?

The poet Dorothea Mackellar and Rodgers and Hammerstein have been an inspiration. I think The Sound of Music was one of the all-time great Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals. On the whole, I think R&H wrote a higher volume of songs per musical that the average person could sing, compared with the more recent musical composer–lyricists.

What does success mean to you?

Success means recognition of my work. I will continue to promote a strong focus on our unique Australian culture and hope it will lead to having my other works published. It’s nice to know that someone living out here, as I do, can achieve in the area of a classical musical, and that you don’t have to go to the big centres to do so—of course modern technology helps! Once again, I have found that living out here in what I term ‘the real Australia’ gives you the time and inspiration to write!

What has been one of the biggest barriers you have had to face, what happened, and how did you overcome it?

Obviously, a major musical takes money, which is a challenge. It was a huge step to take when I became one of the investors for a Eureka concert performance tour through Queensland in 2003. The tour was a great success and inspired the staging of the full production and involvement by other investors.

Where do you see yourself in 10 years time? What is your vision for the future?

I hope I will still be living in the country and see the ‘major dream’ of Eureka the musical become a worldwide success with more accolades for our nation and its talent. Currently I recite my poems on local ABC radio each week as ‘The Cocky’s Wife’. I’m also working on another Australian musical, and of course the poetry is inspirational and ongoing, so I will continue to focus on that and keep self-publishing my books: A Land Called Country and In a Country Garden etc. To that end, I have now combined my literary talents with the artistic skills of a well-known regional artist—all part of the ‘growing’ from the ‘dreaming’ process!

What would you like to say to other women who may be just starting out on a ‘daring to dream’ journey?

Calvin Coolidge, the 30th president of the United States, once said ‘Greater than talent or genius is persistence!’ I kept that item of wisdom on the fridge for quite some time—and persisted! I think everyone has a gift and it is your journey in life to find your gift and do something with it. Daring to dream is fine, but you also have to have the strength of your convictions, and the tenacity and courage to bring the dream to reality. It is not easy and it doesn’t happen overnight. Because of where I live, I have had to sell most of my ideas over the phone and it is a skill I have had to develop. You’ve got to get out there and inspire others to see the originality and marketability of your dream. You can’t sit around and wait for it to happen—so that’s the double dare of the dream!