Harris was born in Adelaide, South Australia, and raised in the town of Mount Gambier where his father was based as a travelling salesman. His early poetry was published in the children's pages of the Adelaide newspaper, The Sunday Mail. He continued to write poetry through his secondary schooling on scholarship to St Peter's College, Adelaide, and by the time he attended the University of Adelaide, he already was recognised as a poet and intellectual. He edited two editions of Adelaide University's student newspaper On Dit in 1941 when John Allison resigned.
Harris's involvement in poetry and his passion for the burgeoning European modernist movement underscored the creation of a modernist literary journal called Angry Penguins. This name was taken from one of his poems, Mithridatum of Despair. Fellow founders of Angry Penguins in 1940 were D.B. "Sam" Kerr, Paul G. Pfeiffer and Geoffrey Dutton. The first issue of the journal attracted the interest of the Melbourne lawyer and arts patron John Reed who sought out Harris in Adelaide, suggesting a collaboration in publishing the journal. Harris, already active in trying to establish a Contemporary Art Society in South Australia, was lured to the Reed's Melbourne art enclave at Heide wherein Sidney Nolan was the primary artist under Reed's patronage. By the second issue of Angry Penguins, Harris had incorporated visual art into the journal - and, later, Nolan became an active member of the editorial team. Other artists such as Albert Tucker, James Gleeson, Arthur Boyd and John Perceval also came under the wing of Angry Penguins and, through their careers and into posterity, have been known as "Angry Penguin artists".
Harris was too vivid and charismatic a young intellectual for the conservative Establishment of the period and, particularly the traditionalist poets, were outraged by the success of Angry Penguins with its progressive content and promotion of surrealism. It was publishing the works of Dylan Thomas, Gabriel García Márquez, James Dickey and the American poet Harry Roskolenko.
The poet and critic A. D. Hope was among those most virulently opposed to Harris and the modernists and inspired two young poets serving in the army, Harold Stewart and James McAuley to "get Maxy". Under the name of "Ern Malley", the poets crafted a series of poems in the modernist style and submitted them to Harris at Angry Penguins. The poems were accompanied by a letter from the poet's supposed sister, Ethel Malley, explaining that Ern had died of Graves' disease and she did not know if the poems were any good so she was giving them to Max Harris to do what he wished with them. Harris thought the poems were brilliant and he published them with some fanfare in Angry Penguins.
The poems were controversial but well received - except by the police in South Australia, where Angry Penguins was published. The police interpreted some lines in the poetry as lewd (one poem used the word "incestuous") and Harris was charged with obscenity.
Reed and Harris who, by this time, also were publishing books, employed a detective to discover more about the mystery poet - and then word emerged that Ern Malley was a hoax. The poets were unrepentant. The trial went forward, its bizarre constabulary logic and valiant defence arguments from Harris and noted literary critics attracting international press attention. Harris was found guilty and fined five pounds.
Harris never wavered in his belief in the quality of the poetry - and Ern Malley has lived on to some acclaim. His poetry continues to be published and studied, his story dramatised and fictionalised.
Max Harris went on, partnered by his university friend Mary Martin, to run the Mary Martin Bookshop in Adelaide, publishing a monthly newsletter which continued literary criticism and comment as well as listing and reviewing books for a clientèle which stretched into remote regions of Australia. Mary Martin moved to India and Harris expanded the book empire with shops around Australia and in Hong Kong. He championed the rights of Australian readers by fighting the stranglehold of overseas publishers over the Australian book market, founding the book remainder industry in Australia, and taking on the major publishing houses to ensure accessibly-priced supplies for the Australian market. He also rose to the forefront of the movement against literary and art censorship in Australia and was an early voice in the Australian republican movement.
He founded and co-edited the literary journals Australian Letters and the Australian Book Review. He continued to encourage a relationship between visual artists and writers by commissioning artists to illustrate poetry in Australian Letters. In the quest of Australian books for Australians, he also was one of the instigators and founders of Sun Books.
Meanwhile, he became a long-serving and controversial columnist for the national newspaper, The Australian, many of his "Browsing" columns later published in book form. It was in this context that he was dubbed "Australia's Cultural Catalyst". He also wrote columns for Adelaide newspapers and contributed to literary publications.
He published his poetry privately, although much was included in classic Australian anthologies. A collection of his work was published posthumously by the National Library of Australia as The Angry Penguin.
As a founder of the Contemporary Art Society, a champion of the surrealist movement and an art critic, he was later awarded the title of "Father of Modernism in the Australian Arts" by the Alumni Association of Adelaide University. His contribution to Australian Arts and Letters was recognised with an appointment as Officer of the Order of Australia.
Although he was not a Roman Catholic, Harris championed the then little-known Australian nun and teacher, Mary MacKillop, founder of the Josephite Order, calling her "a saint for all Australians". He became a prominent lay spokesman for her cause - which now is being realised. In return, the Josephites took him into their care when he died. His ashes lie in a park between the Mary MacKillop College and the Josephite Convent in Adelaide.
