Prof Ralph Elliott
Portrait Anecdotes
by Heide Smith
The Sitting
The Elliott duo, Margaret and Ralph, are well known Canberrans, obviously in academic circles, but also to the wider community through Ralph Elliott’s radio and public appearances. The effervescent professor had jointly, with Professor Manning Clark, opened one of my “Tiwi” exhibitions at the Menzies Library at ANU. Now, he was to be my sitter.
The shoot took place at his home in Fisher in February 1994, under the gaze of “Monty” the cat, who commandeered the top of the writing desk. I wanted to photograph Professor Elliott in his library, and I asked him to choose a book to read by his favourite author; I recall he chose Thomas Hardy. The light was not good, too little and too flat, but it would have to do; I did not want to interrupt the shoot by stopping to set up lights. By changing to a lower camera angle, I excluded the domestic aspects of the background, and brought the diagonals of the bookshelves in towards the subject; I increased the light contrast later in the film processing.
The portrait now hangs in the library, which is named after Professor Elliott, in the W H Stanner Building at ANU. It was also exhibited as part of my “Canberra Collection - a Vintage Selection” at the ACT Legislative Assembly in 1994, for the Council on the Aging. When asked for a brief quotation on aging, to be used at the exhibition, Professor Elliott chose “My age is as a lusty winter, frosty, but kindly” from “As You Like It” by Shakespeare.
The Sitter
Ralph Elliott was born in Berlin in 1921, but left Germany to escape persecution in 1936, joining relatives in Edinburgh. In 1938 he was accepted at St Andrews University, but after two years study, was interned as an enemy alien in 1940. After detainment in England and Canada, he was released to enlist into the British Army in 1941. Three years later he was selected to attend the Royal Military College Officer Cadet Training Unit, where he won the Sword of Honour (whilst still technically a German national), and was commissioned into the prestigious Queen’s Royal Regiment. He returned to Germany in 1944 as a British Army Lieutenant, under the command of Field Marshall Montgomery in the Allied invasion of Germany, where he was wounded, and invalided back to England.
After the war Ralph returned to St Andrews University and graduated in 1949 with, in his words, an honours degree in English and golf. For the following ten years, Ralph lectured in Medieval English Language & Literature, first at St Andrews, and then at the University College of North Staffordshire. A chance meeting with Colin Horne, on a coach between Leeds and Bradford, led to the Elliotts emigrating to Australia in 1959, where Ralph became a Senior Lecturer at Adelaide University. Two years later he was appointed Reader. In 1963 he moved to Flinders University as Professor of English, where he remained for the next ten years. Since 1974 the family have lived in Canberra. Professor Elliott was Master of University House at ANU from 1974 to 1986, when he retired to become Honorary Librarian of the Humanities Research Centre. He is a Foundation Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London. He holds an Honorary Doctor of Letters from Flinders University, and is a Member of the Order of Australia.
