The Manliness of Radical Sentiment: The Case of George Napier Birks

Abstract

The life of Adelaide pharmacist, George Napier Birks, changed dramatically between 1884 and 1894. In the mid-1880s, he was a hypochondriac, and a highly religious retail-businessman who embodied mid-Victorian manliness. By 1894, he was roughing it as a member of William Lane's New Australia colony in Paraguay. In this article I explore the shifts in Birks’ gender identity that made this transformation possible. I show that he came to value a new range of feelings as a result of his involvement in Adelaide's radical circles—especially righteous passion and strong affection—and that this changed his understanding of himself as man. I also show that Birks’ relationship with his feminist wife Helen played a crucial role in his decision to go to Paraguay, as did his own tentative attempts to embrace feminist principles. Through a detailed discussion of George Napier and Helen Birks’ lives, my aim is to provide insights into the relationship between radical manliness and first-wave feminism in Adelaide. More broadly, my aim is to reconsider prevailing views about the relationship between Australian manliness and sentimentality. Birks provides us with an example of Australian manliness that was not based on toughness and anti-sentimentality. His case suggests that affection and sentiment were indeed more important to turn-of-the-twentieth century Australian men—and to understandings of manliness in this period—than usually believed.