Seven Little Australians is a classic Australian children's literature novel by Ethel Turner, published in 1894. Set mainly in Sydney in the 1880s, it relates the adventures of the seven mischievous Woolcot children, their stern army father Captain Woolcot, and faithful young stepmother Esther. Turner wrote the novel in 1893 while living at Inglewood in what was then rural Lindfield (now Woodlands, Killara, New South Wales), having moved there from the inner city suburb of Paddington in 1891. The suburban bushland surroundings quickly became important in Turner's stories. On her 21st birthday, Ethel wrote in her diary, 'Seven L. Aust. – sketched it out.' (24 January 1893) In 1994 the novel was the only book by an Australian author to have been continuously in print for 100 years. The book's original handwritten manuscript is held by the State Library of NSW. The full text of the manuscript has been digitized and can be viewed on the Library's website. The original title of the novel, as written by Turner, was 'Seven Pickles'. It has been extensively adapted for other media, including as a film, two different television mini-series, various stage plays and a stage musical. Characters The book's protagonists are the seven Woolcot children, from oldest to youngest: Meg (real name Margaret), 16: naive, romantic, eldest (but immature) sister and sometime surrogate mother to the younger children. Pip (real name Philip), 14: eldest brother, handsome, intelligent but badly-behaved. Judy (real name Helen), 13: imaginative and lively, Pip's partner-in-crime, often leads the others into mischief. Nell (real name Elinor), 10: beautiful, slightly wistful child. Bunty (real name John), 6: described as 'fat and very lazy'. Bunty can be selfish and annoying but loves his family. Baby (real name Winifred), 4: the most well-behaved of the lot, was only a baby when her mother died. 'The General' (real name Francis Rupert Burnand), the baby; only natural child of Esther, who is stepmother to the other children. Plot summary The seven children of the title live in 1880s Sydney with their father, an army Captain who has little understanding of his children, and their 20-year-old stepmother Esther, who can exert little discipline on them. Accordingly, they wreak havoc wherever possible, for example by interrupting their parents while they entertain guests and asking for some of their dinner (implying to the guests that the children's own dinner is inadequate). After a prank by Judy and