This little phrase of three one-syllable words has gone down in legend as the last words of Ned Kelly.
The bushranger was ‘hanged from the neck until dead’ on November 11, 1880.
But historian Dr Stuart Dawson of Monash University says this belief that Ned ended his life saying, ‘Such is life!’ is (in his words) ‘pure fiction.’
The problem is that there are many reports of his death in various newspapers of the time—and they are not all in agreement.
Some claim he said ‘’Ah, well, I suppose it has come to this—such is life.’
While others leave off the last words and so he only dies admitting it has come to this.
Nevertheless, the expression entered Australian legend as Ned Kelly's final words that were fatalistic and courageous… well, perhaps.
But whether truth or legend, the words are part of the myth.
In 1903 Joseph Furphy (under the pen name of ‘Tom Collins’) published a novel called Such is Life—a very Australian novel that famously starts with the words, ‘Unemployed at last!’
And the novel’s title is said to come from the bushranger’s reputed last words.
But while this strikes many Aussies as a typically Australian pragmatic expression it turns out that it’s not Australian at all!
Charles Dickens used the expression in 1864 in his novel Our Mutual Friend—in a similar mournful and fatalistic way.
And the Oxford English Dictionary lists lots of related expressions—using the formular ‘such is…’—from as long ago as 1297.
So, sorry, Aussies can claim a lot of verbal inventions—but not this one.
Tonight I'll join Peta Credlin on Sky News for 'Words Matter.'
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BY THE WAY...
If you'd like to see my A-Z list of Aussie slang, you'll find it here in the Australian Geographic website -- A-Z list of Aussie slang. Here’s the link: The A-Z of Aussie slang - Australian Geographic
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