The Big Chariot

The real value of the High Valley award was that it assured the writers of publication. On the strength of it, they were given what were called ‘three book contracts’ by publishers in Britain and America as well as in Australia. While these committed the publishing companies to produce three books, they also meant that the authors had to write two more collaborative novels. For novice author Charmian Clift, this seemed at first a golden opportunity; it quickly became an albatross around her neck.

From 1948 until 1951, the couple worked together on a novel, titled The Piping Cry, set in the art world of contemporary Sydney. When this book on which they had pinned all their hopes was rejected, George took it to mean that international publishers did not want books set in Australia. Charmian, meanwhile, was already feeling that the process of collaboration was crippling her as a writer.  

It was under these inauspicious circumstances that in mid 1952 the couple — now living in London — began a new novel, titled The Big Chariot. A tale of heroism and adventure set in seventeenth century China, this was a return to the exotic territory that had proved so successful with High Valley.

Unable to keep up with the phenomenal production speed that Johnston had developed as a journalist, Clift’s main role in The Big Chariot was to be (in her words) 'a literary hod-carrier' —doing library research in the brief hours of the day when the children were at their Montessori kindergarten, and at night acting as sounding board and editor for the pages of typescript that her husband would hammer out when he got home from his demanding day-job.

Although The Big Chariot was a historical novel, it was also was an attempt to educate readers about the people and politics of contemporary China. The foreword claims: 'It is, in its picture of the struggle of a traditional idealism against a vigorous, brutal and machine-forged tyranny, not without its parallel today.' This was a reference to the struggle of the People’s Army of Mao Tse Tung (as he was then known) against the Kuomintang.

 The Big Chariot was completed at the end of 1952 and accepted by February of the next year.  At first it seemed as if this novel might do well but, althoug it was favourably reviewed, sales in all three countries were disappointing. 

Photograph L: Charmian and George at work in London, c. 1953

Photograph R: Charmian with Shane and Martin in a London park, c. 1953