His work, according to the critics, could not be regarded as literary and has not aged well. His legacy persists, however - in the sporting record books.

When Garvice wrote Her Heart's Desire in 1897 he named the heroine Decima Deane.

A reader in Perth, Western Australia, was so taken with the book that she persuaded a friend to name her daughter Decima.

The child had been christened Clara Norman but, from then on, would be known as Decima.

In time, Decima would become "Dashing Dess", the first female superstar of what would become the Commonwealth Games, and one of Australia's greatest athletes.

Australia won six golds when the Sydney Cricket Ground hosted the 1938 athletics, and five of them went to Dashing Dess, a record that still stands.

When she moved to Sydney in 1939, the year when she equalled the world record for 100 yards, she was feted and photographed wherever she went, and given a newspaper column and a regular slot on radio.

If only she had been born in another part of Australia, Dashing Dess might have been a rival to "The Flying Housewife", Fanny Blankers-Koen, the Dutch heroine of the 1948 Olympic Games who was named female athlete of the century in 1999.

Norman surely had the ability, but the problem was she was on her own.

There was no women's athletic club in Western Australia in the 1920s and early 1930s, and she could not qualify for national selection without a club.

In 1932 she was spotted by a coach, Frank Preston, who saw great potential despite Norman running "like a hen in flight" with her head over her left shoulder and her arms flapping.

Norman was taken aback.

"My leg action was wrong, my arm action was wrong, I did not run sufficiently on my toes, my balance was not good, my breathing had to be corrected, and so on," she said. 

"He pointed out so many faults and corrected me so many times.

"It did not seem possible that a person could have so many faults and still appear a potential champion."

Preston helped to bring about improvement, and Norman also wrote to a top American coach for advice.

She finally got her chance in 1937 when three women's clubs were formed and Western Australia was part of the athletics establishment at last.

At the National Championships in Melbourne she kept winning, and made headlines in all the newspapers.

At the age of 28 Norman was able to show the world what she could do.

For winning the 100 yards, 220 yards, long jump and two relays at the 1938 Games, Norman was "given the sort of ovation at the Sydney Cricket Ground usually reserved for Donald Bradman", according to one report.

That was some achievement, given that Bradman, the greatest cricketer who ever played the game, was at the height of his fame and popularity.

Had war not intervened, Norman would have competed at the Olympic Games planned for Helsinki in 1940.

Had Perth existed on the athletics map a decade earlier, she could have competed internationally many more times.

Dashing Dess was awarded an MBE.

As Clara Hamilton - she reverted to her real forename and married New Zealander Eric Hamilton - she went to Buckingham Palace to receive The Queen's message for the 1982 Brisbane Games.

She was presented with her MBE in Perth in 1983 by Prince Charles, during a royal tour with Princess Diana and their son William.

She died later that year of lung cancer, although she never smoked.