My Country
poem by Dorothea Mackellar
"My Country" is a poem written by Dorothea Mackellar (1885–1968) at the age of 19 about her love of the Australian landscape. After travelling through Europe extensively with her father during her teenage years, she started writing the poem in London in 1904 and re-wrote it several times before her return to Sydney. The poem was first published in The Spectator in London on 5 September 1908 under the title "Core of My Heart". It was reprinted in many Australian newspapers, such as The Sydney Mail & New South Wales Advertiser, who described the poem as a "...clear, ringing, triumphant note of love and trust in [Australia]." The poem quickly became well known and established Mackellar as a poet. The first stanza describes England while the rest of the poem refers to Australia. "My Country" is one of the best-known pieces of Australian poetry and is considered by many Australians to present an overtly romanticised version of "The Australian condition".
Mackellar's family owned substantial properties in the Gunnedah district of New South Wales and a property (Torryburn) in the Paterson district of New South Wales. The poem is believed to have been inspired in part by Mackellar's love of the Allyn River district in NSW.
In an interview in 1967, Mackellar described her reasons for writing the poem.
Not really a special reason. But a friend was speaking to me about England.
“My Country” enters the record as poem by Dorothea Mackellar. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Country, poem and Dorothea can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“My Country” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Country, poem and Dorothea provides the most credible route into that argument.
Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6945183. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1885, 1968, 1904 and 1908.
Later fame can flatten the distinction between original context, subsequent adaptation and institutional collecting history. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “My Country”, its source revision and the description used here.
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “My Country” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.