AustLit

'The Meeting of the Waters has been specially written for Anniversary Day by Edmund Barclay. It introduces the listener to a typical Australian family celebrating the Aniversary Day [sic] holiday.

'There is Grandad, a gentle-voiced, imaginative old man who glories in Australia’s colourful past, but is still vitally interested in her future; there is Mum, who lost her husband in World War II; there is Glenny, her younger son, still very much the schoolboy; and Douglas, her elder son, a young man in his early twenties, who is overjoyed because he has just landed a job as a surveyor on the Snowy River Scheme. Daphne, Douglas’ pretty but spoiled girl friend, is at first petulant when she learns that Douglas is going so far away to work.

'Her father has already offered him a good job. But Grandad, with his tales of the havoc wrought in the past by drought and flood, makes her see that Douglas will be taking part in a scheme that will help people create a happier and more prosperous Australia in the future.

'Australia’s past, present, and future are skilfully linked in this appealing play by a well-known Australian author.'

Source: 'The Week's Plays Over the ABC', ABC Weekly, 21 January 1950, p.26.