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My comments and shared reviews on a series of publications read during the final two months of 2022, as listed below [four of which were published this year].

• The Boy from Boomerang Crescent’ by Eddie Betts [2022];
• The Rouseabout’ by Rachael Treasure [2007] ;
• Exiles by Jane Harper [2022];
• The Opera House by Peter FitzSimons [2022];
• The Stockmen by Rachael Treasure [2004];
• Heart of Dreaming by Di Morrissey [1991];
• A Riverman’s Story’ by E.M. ‘Mick’ Kelsall [1986] and,
• The Book of Roads and Kingdoms [2022].

1. ‘Eddie Betts: The Boy from Boomerang Crescent’ by Eddie Betts, published in 2022, 289 pages

A fairly basic, easily read auto biography by Eddie.  As someone wrote – “Betts is a true giant of the AFL. With a career boasting 350-plus games, over 600 goals, multiple All-Australian nods and Goal of the Year awards, he has earned a rare league-wide popularity”. As noted on the front cover – ‘Sometimes funny, sometimes tragic, and always honest’  – a lot of pre-publication publicity was centred on his views about racism and associated factors, but Eddie was fairly [in my view]  ‘calm’ on that side of things, saying it as he saw it, but not going over the top in terms of massive tirades about the problem, simply highlighting the various issues when they arose, and providing an honest but reasoned view in each instance. He was in Adelaide of course when the ‘pre-season training course saga’ occurred and was also there when the Adelaide coach was murdered by a family member – honest descriptions of the trauma, and heart ache etc, that arose at those times. He highlighted the return to Carlton for his final two seasons, considered that time to be his ‘return home’ in football terms.

The theme of his book – “It’s a long hard road from the Nullarbor to the MCG’

A popular comment shared by most book sellers, etc was –

“How does a self-described ‘skinny Aboriginal kid’ overcome a legacy of family tragedy to become an AFL legend? One thing’s for sure: it’s not easy. But then, there’s always been something special about Eddie.
Betts grew up in Port Lincoln and Kalgoorlie, in environments where the destructive legacies of colonialism – racism, police targeting of Aboriginal people, drug and alcohol misuse, family violence – were sadly normalised. His childhood was defined by family closeness as well as family strife, plus a wonderful freedom that he and his cousins exploited to the full – for better and for worse.
When he made the decision to take his talents across the Nullarbor to Melbourne to chase his footballing dreams – homesickness be damned – everything changed. Over the ensuing years, Betts became a true giant of the sport with a league-wide popularity rarely seen in the hyper-tribal AFL.
Along the way, he battled his demons before his turbulent youth settled into responsible maturity. Today, the man the Melbourne tabloids once dubbed ‘bad boy Betts’ is a dedicated husband and father, a respected community leader and an increasingly outspoken social activist”

From a series of reviewers, the following are some of the principal facts about Eddie and the book that are highlighted.

Eddie Betts takes us from his humble beginnings as a kid chasing a footy around a park in contests with his brothers and extended family, to a stellar 17-year career in the AFL. A small forward with an uncanny ability to read the play, he played 350 games with Carlton (2005 to 2013, 2020 to 2021) and Adelaide (2014 to 2019), kicked 640 goals, was a member of three All Australian teams (2015, 2016, 2017), won four AFL Goal of the Year Awards (2006, 2015, 2016, 2017) and was chosen as a member of Indigenous All-Stars, All-Stars and (Australian) international teams (against Irish Gaelic Football players). He participated in one Grand Final in 2017 when Adelaide were soundly defeated by Richmond.

But this is much more than a ‘Glory Book’.

Eddie Betts is an Indigenous Australian. He begins his book by paying tribute to the football skills of his grandfather, Edward Frederick Betts, and recounting his death on the floor of a Port Lincoln prison cell. In 1968, his grandfather attended a hospital feeling unwell, but was only given a cursory examination. He checked himself out, but later returned to the hospital, complaining of a pain in his stomach. He became ‘increasingly agitated’ about the lack of attention. The hospital called the police and he was arrested for being intoxicated. He died of heart failure later that day; he was not intoxicated. Eddie Betts sees the major function of his book as being to educate readers to what it means to be a Blackfulla (his spelling) in contemporary Australia. He writes:

I know that playing footy has given me a platform and if I can use it to educate people about what it’s like growing up in an environment where it’s seen as normal for the police to take people away, then it might help.

Throughout The Boy From Boomerang Crescent Betts emphasises the importance of being with his mob and how it gives him a sense of stability and belonging.

When I think back to my childhood, what I really recall is that it was all about family. We never went without and we were raised with a strong sense of belonging. Our family made sacrifices for each other and we learned to put others before ourselves. We were taught to respect our Elders and our traditions, and, most importantly, we were taught to have a strong sense of self-identity.

Betts provides accounts of how mobs – whether a group of Indigenous players, or a family – help each other out; how people open up their homes to young players, giving them somewhere to stay and a place to feel welcome as they embark on their footy careers. He always seems to be happiest when there are lots of people around, with everyone sharing babysitting, child-minding, food preparation and other chores. When he was drafted by Carlton, his mother, aunt, sisters and cousins came across from Kalgoorlie to keep him company as he embarked on his career.

On a couple of occasions Betts refers to racism he experienced as a player. After he won the Goal of the Year Award in 2006, he received a new car (which he could keep for a year). Driving around Melbourne he was stopped by police who assumed he had stolen this flash new car. He also refers to hate mail he received on social media and racist abuse from fans at games. Once he wanted to go public on a racist letter he had received and was talked out of it by Adelaide, something that he regrets.

… essentially they talked [me] into not saying anything. Upon reflection, they were trying to minimise any type of media circus before my game, but maybe this was more important than the game itself?

This seems to have occurred at about the same time that the Indigenous Sydney Swans star Adam Goodes was being routinely booed by spectators, which the AFL failed to address. On another occasion, a spectator at a ‘Showdown’ in a game against Port Adelaide racially abused Eddie Betts and threw a banana at him. To their credit, the Port Adelaide supporters called it out. On this occasion both clubs

Clubs look for an edge in trying to achieve sporting success. Adelaide was one of the stronger clubs during the time Eddie Betts was there, reaching, and ultimately losing, the 2017 Grand Final. Following this loss, Adelaide entered into an arrangement with a group called Collective Minds. The longest chapter in the book is devoted to Collective Minds and a training camp they held prior to the 2018 season. This involved placing players under physical and psychological pressure that, it was claimed, would enhance their ability to perform and compete. As part of this, participants were given a one-hour phone consultation with a counsellor.

While at the camp participants were restrained and required to perform a physical task while under duress. While this was going on, Betts says,

I heard things yelled at me that I had disclosed to the camp’s counsellors about my upbringing. All the people present heard these things. By the time I got my teammates off my back, I was exhausted, drained and distressed about the details being shared. Another camp-dude jumped on top of me and started to berate me about my mother, something so deeply personal that I was absolutely shattered to hear it came out of his mouth.

Then:

This scenario was repeated for each and every one of the boys and we were all recruited to provide the verbal abuse aimed at our teammates. I will live with this shame for the rest of my life.

The camp finished and what had transpired was supposed to be kept in-house, presumably with Adelaide marching on to football glory. The story got out, it split the club, heads rolled, and Adelaide has been in the bottom half of the ladder ever since. It is difficult to escape the conclusion that Adelaide failed in its duty of care to provide its employees with a safe working environment. A similar fate befell Essendon when they experimented with drugs to enhance success on the field in 2013; it is still languishing in the bottom half of the table.

Eddie Betts comes across as a person for whom the glass is always half full. He realises that his skills as a footballer have given him a happy and fulfilled life. When he embarked on his second year with Carlton he was unable to read or write. The Australian Football League Players’ Association provided tutors to help players like him, and he was smart enough to jump on board and learn how to read and write and help others in a similar position. He has gone on to publish two children’s books, My Kind and My People, as part of his Eddie’s Lil’ Homies series.

2. ‘The Rouseabout’ by Rachael Treasure, pub in 2007,  343 pages.

This was the 4^th of Rachael’s novels I have read, as usual, set in a rural Australian environment, this time, in the main, in Tasmania, about rural families. An easy to read and entertaining book. I am one of Rachael’s hundreds of Face Book friends, and apart from her novels [still a few to catch up on] I enjoy her many ‘rural’ related postings of her farm life, her animals, and her attitudes to environmental issues, all of which come in varying degrees through her novels.

A brief summary – “ Kate Webster is a loveable larrikin who likes to play hard now and worry about the consequences later. She can’t help mucking up the opportunities life gives her. Rocked by the death of her mother, she takes on a dare at one of Australia’s wildest rural social events – a Bachelors & Spinsters ball – to ‘scalp’ gorgeous farm boy Nick McDonnell. It’s a dare that changes everything. For just as Kate is ready to start her new life, away from her grieving father and the pressures of the family farm, she discovers she is pregnant. Now, several years later, with toddler Nell by her side, it’s time for Kate to come home to face the music – and the father of her child . . .”

Set on the beautiful island of Tasmania, where Rachael Treasure once kicked up her own heels at B&S balls, The Rouseabout is an unforgettable story about discovering the things that truly matter, and finding love that lasts

[Rachael Treasure lives in Southern Tasmania with her two teenage children and husband Daniel. Together they are establishing the educational Ripple Farm Landscape Healing Hub to share regenerative agricultural principles and Natural Sequence Farming techniques. Rachael’s first novel, Jillaroo, blazed a trail in the Australian publishing industry for other rural women writers and is now considered an iconic work of contemporary fiction.
Rachael began her working life as a jillaroo before studying at Orange Agricultural College (now University of Sydney), and received a BA of Communications at Charles Sturt University. She has worked as a journalist on many publications in Australia’s rural print sector and for ABC rural radio.]

3. ‘Exiles’ by Jane Harper, published in 2022,  410 pages.

Another of Harper’s  mystery rural environment novels set mainly here in Victoria.

Not sure why, but I found this novel a little too drawn out, with a rather tame ending as the ‘villains’ in the story were revealed… a quiet mystery that centres on two unsolved crimes in a small town in Southern Australia. I took myself away from a couple of quite serious and heavier books for a bit of light reading, which Exiles proved to be.

As a brief summary –  At a busy festival site on a warm spring night, a baby lies alone in her pram, her mother vanishing into the crowds.  A year on, Kim Gillespie’s absence casts a long shadow as her friends and loved ones gather deep in the heart of South Australian wine country to welcome a new addition to the family.
Joining the celebrations is federal investigator Aaron Falk. But as he soaks up life in the lush valley, he begins to suspect this tight-knit group may be more fractured than it seems.
Between Falk’s closest friend, a missing mother, and a woman he’s drawn to, dark questions linger as long-ago truths begin to emerge.  An outstanding novel, a brilliant mystery and a heart-pounding read from the author of The Dry, Force of Nature, The Lost Man and The Survivors

But as I suggested, a little drawn out –  yet I suppose that is the essence of a mystery!!

 4. ‘The Opera House’ by Peter Fitzsimons’, published in 2022, 560 pages.

 A wonderful and interesting read  –  the story extended over many years with the planning, construction, and early years of the completed building. A great deal of architectural and engineering detail, which at times was well beyond my comprehension. The human side of the whole process dealt with in considerable detail, and the long term affect on the original  architect, Jorn Utzon from Denmark, his family, and many of the other individuals associated with the project over two or three decades. Written in Fitzsimons’  typical writing style

From the general  shared synopsis of this book, we read – “Epic and engaging, in The Opera House Australia’s greatest storyteller captures the drama and history of Australia’s most iconic building.

On a sacred site on the land of the Gadigal people, Tubowgule, a place of gathering and storytelling for over 60,000 years, now sits the Sydney Opera House. It is a breathtaking building recognised around the world as a symbol of modern Australia. Along with the Taj Mahal and other World Heritage sites, it is celebrated for its architectural grandeur and the daring and innovation of its design. But this stunning house on what is now called Bennelong Point also holds  many sorrows, secrets and scandals. In this fascinating and impeccably researched biography, Peter FitzSimons exposes these secrets, marvels at how this magnificent building came to be, details its enthralling history and reveals the dramatic stories about the people whose lives were affected, both negatively and positively, by its presence. Ambition, dispossession, betrayal, professional rivalry, sexual intrigue, murder, bullying and breakdowns are woven into the creation of this masterpiece of human ingenuity. The Opera House shares the extraordinary stories connected to this building that are as mesmerising as the light catching on its white sails”.

Now in looking for a professional review of the book, I turned to the MusicTrust.com for the opinions of the writer there, Loretta Barnard [from the 3^rd July, 2022]

“Where a more academically inclined text might prompt a bit of skim-reading, The Opera House is utterly engrossing. Definitely no skimming.”

‘I sometimes wonder whether those future architectural historians who will write about the Sydney Opera House will understand how largely its fate was influenced by the politics of the state of New South Wales – straight, knock-down, drag-out party politics’. So wrote John Yeomans back in 1968. Construction on this challenging project began in 1959, and at the time Yeomans was writing, it was still be another five years before completion. At its opening in  October 1973, Queen Elizabeth remarked that while the Sydney Opera House had captured the world’s imagination, ‘I understand that its construction has not been totally without problems’. An understatement, to say the least.

In this weighty tome, author Peter Fitzsimons takes us on a journey detailing the extraordinary history of arguably Australia’s most iconic building, one of the most recognisable buildings in the world. From the prologue right through to the epilogue, he tells a sprawling story, one that encompasses many changes not only to Sydney but to the nation. The place we know as Bennelong Point, named because it was ‘gifted’ to senior Aboriginal man Bennelong by Governor Phillip in 1791, was always a place of music and storytelling; men and women of the Eora Nation maintaining their ceremonies in spite of the unwelcome presence of the white invaders. By 1821, however, Governor Macquarie’s fort, designed by convict architect Francis Greenway, had well and truly replaced Bennelong’s stone hut and wiped out any prospect of ceremony, music or even simple enjoyment of the natural environment. But the new building, intended to defend the colony, was ridiculed as a useless fortification and by 1830, officers were putting on theatrical performances at the site. By the turn of the twentieth century, Fort Macquarie was demolished to make way for a tram depot. But something more ambitious was in the offing for Bennelong Point, something that would change the face of Sydney forever, and – as befits the site – music and storytelling were at its core.

The Opera House is structured to allow readers to gain a sense of various relevant events happening simultaneously but in different places, with the result that the overall historical picture and context of these events is immediately apparent. It’s a terrific approach, and while some purists may not like his occasional novelistic writing style, FitzSimons succeeds in making the reader feel immersed in the subject rather than simply reading about it.

Chapter 1, for instance, interweaves significant events such as the establishment of the Australian Broadcasting Commission in 1932 and its effect on the national landscape – by the end of the 1930s, the ABC’s reputation as a source of news and quality entertainment was unequalled – with an introduction to the young Jørn Utzon, who by the end of his architecture studies in Denmark in the 1940s, was already garnering praise for his exceptional and unorthodox designs. We move then to the ABC’s visionary general manager Charles Moses who by 1946 had convinced the board to establish full ABC orchestras in every state, beginning with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. Sydney’s Town Hall was then the major venue for such artistic events, but the idea of an opera house, first mooted back in 1928 by noted theatrical entrepreneur Benjamin Fuller, was now at the forefront of the NSW premier’s mind.

By now I’ve read only about 35 pages, and while, like many people interested in Australia’s yesteryears, I already knew much of the history of these early times, already I’ve learned a great deal more – and in cracking detail. This is a meticulously researched and referenced work, FitzSimons acknowledging his masterful team of researchers. And it’s a real page turner. It’s not for nothing that he’s a best-selling author. Where a more academically inclined text might prompt a bit of skim-reading, The Opera House is utterly engrossing. Definitely no skimming.

It’s difficult writing a short review when there’s so much to say about this book. FitzSimons appears to have covered everything: from the nitty-gritty of how the planning committee settled on an international competition to find a suitable architect and how they reached their decision; to the myriad steps and legion of professionals needed to make Utzon’s design a reality; and even how the project played a part in the 1960 abduction and murder of eight-year-old Bondi boy Graeme Thorne, a tragic case that gripped the nation.

The main players are many and varied. That their roles and personalities are described so well gives the whole book a tangibility, a characteristic not always evident in dry historical accounts. Of course, Jørn Utzon is a towering presence. Obviously his inventive, brilliant design is central to the book, but there’s a great deal about his pre-Opera House years, the way he worked, his family and colleagues; and notably the way he was received in Australia. He was embraced by Sydneysiders, who were excited about having a world-class opera house in their city, one that would rival the greatest opera houses in Europe.

There’s a wealth of stories told across 18 chapters, with much to relish, such as the exceptional cultural legacy of celebrated English conductor Eugene Goossens, who headed both the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and the NSW Conservatorium of Music between 1947-1956, and the public shame of his ignominious fall from grace. It was a sad end for a man whose personal vision of a grand opera house on Bennelong Point played a large part in giving us the architectural masterpiece that sits there today. From 1956 onwards, his early contribution was shamelessly ignored by the powers that be, and it was with a happy sense of justice that I read the final paragraphs of the last chapter.

There’s the political wherewithal and ‘let’s get it done’ manner of NSW Labor premier JJ Cahill, who’s surely worth a biography of his own. That Cahill’s Labor government was keen to surge ahead with Utzon’s inspired design surprised many who carried the stereotypical attitude that the so-called working class isn’t interested in culture. Indeed, over the turbulent period of the building’s construction, the most obstructionist views came from the conservative side of politics. In fact, it’s fair to say that the Liberal government was openly antagonistic towards the entire enterprise. Robert Askin, Liberal premier between 1965-1975, had long been vehemently opposed to the idea of an opera house. His Minister for Public Works, Davis Hughes, was particularly aggressive in his dealings with Utzon. Of course, in a project of this magnitude, things didn’t always go to plan. There were setbacks aplenty and costs soared, helping to feed the staggering political argy-bargy surrounding the project.

One of the book’s strengths is that FitzSimons not only includes such things as the combative correspondence between Utzon and Hughes, but also media reports, and letters from the general public to newspaper editors. By 1965, the architect was being viewed as either a visionary or as an ‘irresponsible artist’; he was pilloried in the press for not foreseeing any logistical contingencies, thus allowing costs to blow out. Readers are thus given a very rounded picture of the changing fortunes of both Utzon and his creation. As we know, Utzon resigned in 1966 and went back to Denmark. He never returned to see the how his Opera House was ultimately completed by architects Peter Hall, David Littlemore and Lionel Todd.

The Opera House contains many little-known nuggets of information about the project and the people involved. I found the story of filmmaker John Weiley and his documentary made in the mid-1960s startling. Readers are given insights into crucial roles played by engineers such as Ove Arup and Jack Zunz; we learn about public protests following Utzon’s resignation; and we see the personal toll that Stage III of construction put on those tasked with completing the job.

This is a thoroughly researched examination of the history of the Sydney Opera House from conception to completion, with a concluding epilogue that tells us what happened to the major and minor players in the whole story. I would have liked more photographs, but perhaps that’s quibbling. The book also contains detailed endnotes, a wide-ranging bibliography and comprehensive index. This is not only a valuable reference book on the building that American architect Frank Gehry said ‘changed the image of the entire country’, it’s also a smashing read.

5. The Stockmen’ by Rachael Treasure’, published in 2004. 374 pages.

Written with the normal theme  basically  of a rural landscape and environment about the people of small town scenarios.  Easily read over a short period in a style that you don’t want to put it aside, but continue to search for the mystery sitting behind the broad storyline.  It’s one of those novels that moves between two periods of time.

Thoroughly enjoyable, perhaps dragged out a bit too much to the ultimate revelations of the story-line.  There are in fact a number of female Australian authors, who perhaps write on a similar theme, each having produced a series of successful novels which tend to reflect a rural and/or small-town lifestyle.

The generally accepted review of the book reads as follows:

“Rosie Highgrove-Jones grows up hating her double-barrelled name. She dreams of riding out over the wide plains of the family property, working on the land. Instead she’s stuck writing the social pages of the local paper.
Then a terrible tragedy sparks a series of shocking revelations for Rosie and her family. As she tries to put her life back together, Rosie throws herself into researching the haunting true story of a 19th century Irish stockman who came to Australia and risked his all for a tiny pup and a wild dream. Is it just coincidence when Rosie meets a sexy Irish stockman of her own? And will Jim help her realise her deepest ambitions – or will he break her heart?
The Stockmen moves effortlessly between the present and the past to reveal a simple yet hard-won truth – that both love and the land are timeless” .

As with the earlier reviewed novel [The Rouseabout], a great bit of light pleasant reading.

6. A Riverman’s Story’ by E.M. ‘Mick’ Kelsall, published in 1986, 265 pages.

Much of the story centred around the Moama area and adjacent towns in the area of the Murray River during the1920’s/1930’s period.  This book certainly brought out the difficult conditions that many had to live under in that period, especially with no permanent employment and the dangers of alcohol for eg as being the only really option of release from the daily grind. Seemingly, the author takes it all with a ‘grain of salt’ despite the many challenges that life throws up for him, from a very young age. Described by one commentator, referring to the author ‘Mick’,  as ‘one of the great characters of the Riverboat days of the Murray River’.

In our modern relative comfort and security, I have to say this book does not depict a very pleasant way of surviving from day to day in those times for the less well-off!!

‘Goodreads’ reviews the ‘A Riverman’s Story’ as follows.

The Murray River was young Mick Kelsall’s playground as he grew up among the battlers in the Echuca district in a time of chronic rural un-employment. Later, like his father, he gave his strength in the tough world of the barges and timber getters, fruit pickers, labourers and tramps who struggled for survival around the river towns.
Mick’s story of a rough and tumble life on the edge of disaster is full of gusto- the rough schooling, the riverside gangs, the fruit stealing, hunting, fishing, trespassing and troublemaking have Mick and his mates a mere half step ahead of authority.
But the Murray River, finding any work and helping to keep his family together are the three forces in Mick’s life and draw him inevitably to follow two old drinking mates, his cantankerous father and the scandalous Uncle Bob, on their forays on the river and in the bush.
The river is always part of life- it’s beauty and tranquility touching a young man’s soul, its floods and hidden hazards treating life, its currents carrying his outrigger barge, like a floating juggernaut, to the mills.
A Riverman’s Story is a story as rich and varied as the river itself-always moving, sometimes turbulent and a witness to a great parade of life.

7. ‘Heart of Dreaming’ by Di Morrissey’, and early novel published in 1991, this was a PAN paperback edition of 640  pages.

I read this over about 3 days, easy read, finishing in a rather tearful manner, with one of Di’s ‘happy’ endings!  Although some of these stories tend to be a bit ‘over the top’ in terms of imagination, like the novels of Rachael Treasure and other Australian female authors, I enjoy collecting and reading their novels, generally, though not always in Di’s case, based in a rural Australian setting  –   this one centred in western and central NSW outback areas, and also Sydney in the 1980s [the Opera House has being open for a while] around the Balmain and Randwick areas, and also up in the Blue Mountains.

From the general publicity blurb about this novel, we read:

“The book that launched Di Morrissey as Australia’s most popular female novelist.
At twenty-one, Queenie Hanlon has the world at her feet and the love of handsome bushman TR Hamilton. Beautiful, wealthy and intelligent, she is the only daughter of Tingulla Station, the famed outback property in the wilds of western Queensland.  At twenty-two, her life is in ruins. A series of disasters has robbed her of everything she has ever loved. Everything except Tingulla – her ancestral home and her spirit’s Dreaming place…
And now she is about to lose that too………An extraordinary story of thwarted love and heroic struggle, Heart of the Dreaming is the tale of one woman’s courage and her determination to take on the world and win”

I think this was in fact her debut novel and formed part of a series. I believe I only have three of Di’s novels to track down of the 29 she has now written – The Last Rose of Summer [1992], The Last Mile Home [1994] and Kimberley Sun [2002].

8. ‘The Book of Roads & Kingdoms’ [From the wonders of imperial Baghdad to the dark-lands at the ends of the earth] by Richard Fidler, published in 2022, 430

As with Fidler’s previous books a lot of fascinating history, much detailed material, names and places – my only difficulty was keeping track of the various characters and place names over the centuries covered by the book.  I soon realised it was essentially a history of the rises and falls of Islam, and the many associated powers and kingdoms that won, dominated and usually eventually lost to a stronger power, so much cruelty over the centuries as one group of people replaces another.

I guess there is little surprise in that –  when brother plots against brother, or son murders father to achieve his ‘believed’ right –  no surprise that an invading force would show no compassion or care for those they are invading, repeated time and again over the centuries, Christian annihilating Muslim cities,    Islamic armies destroying Christian civilisations., and of course the Mongol generations of Genghis Khan and their paths of destruction for the power of domination and ownership, to name just a few examples.

As just one depiction from hundreds of years  of invasion and counter-invasion,  and the regular ‘slaughter’ of peoples that accompanied such incursions, we look at the early 1200’s and the lead-up to the destruction of the Islamic 500 year domination through Baghdad, as the then city to the north, Merv, is obliterated

From pages 348-349:

“With his enemy dead and his need for vengeance satisfied, Genghis Ghan could now return to the East to resume his invasion of China. Before leaving, he entrusted his youngest son, Tolui with the task of subduing all of Khorasan and capturing the great city of  Merv. Once again, the city’s garrison  refused to surrender, but the civilian leaders, torn by dissension, buckled under the pressure and opened the city’s gates.

Bukhara and Samarkand would one day recover from the Mongol assaults, but Tolui ensured that Merv never would. Seated in a golden chair outside the city, he ordered every last inhabitant to leave the city and then looked on impassively as almost every one of them was slaughtered. Historians place the city’s population at the time at 200,000. The killing took four days and nights to complete.

Merv, now emptied of its population, was sacked and its complex irrigation system wrecked. The gleaming mausoleum of the Sultan Sunjar, capped with a glazed turquoise dome, was Rnsacked and demolished in the search for treasure. Three weeks after the massacre, thousands of people who had been hiding in boltholes and cellars emerged from the rubble, but were picked off by Mongol patrols kept behind for this purpose. Afterwards, Mongol soldiers built towering pyramids with the skulls of the dead.

Having won control  of these emptied cities, the Mongols would here and there attempt to rebuild and repopulate them. But Merv, a metropolis once renowned for its orchards, gardens, mosques and palaces was too far gone. Today the site of what was briefly  one of the world’s largest cities, is a forgotten, silent ruin in modern-day Turkmenistan. Mammoth brickworks poke up from the arid ground like broken teeth…”

Using the blurb from the book’s cover, and as repeated through many publisher’s promos , we read:

“A lost imperial city, full of wonder and marvels. An empire that was the largest the world had ever seen, established with astonishing speed. A people obsessed with travel, knowledge and adventure.  When Richard Fidler came across the account of Ibn Fadlan – a tenth-century Arab diplomat who travelled all the way from Baghdad to the cold riverlands of modern-day Russia – he was struck by how modern his voice was, like that of a twenty-first century time-traveller dropped into a medieval wilderness. On further investigation, Fidler discovered this was just one of countless reports from Arab and Persian travellers of their adventures in medieval China, India, Africa and Byzantium. Put together, he saw these stories formed a crazy quilt picture of a lost world.  The Book of Roads & Kingdoms is the story of the medieval wanderers who travelled out to the edges of the known world during Islam’s fabled Golden Age; an era when the caliphs of Baghdad presided over a dominion greater than the Roman Empire at its peak, stretching from North Africa to India. Imperial Baghdad, founded as the ‘City of Peace’, quickly became the biggest and richest metropolis in the world. Standing atop one of the city’s four gates, its founder proclaimed: Here is the Tigris River, and nothing stands between it and China.  In a flourishing culture of science, literature and philosophy, the citizens of Baghdad were fascinated by the world and everything in it. Inspired by their Prophet’s commandment to seek knowledge all over the world, these traders, diplomats, soldiers and scientists left behind the cosmopolitan pleasures of Baghdad to venture by camel, horse and boat into the unknown. Those who returned from these distant foreign lands wrote accounts of their adventures, both realistic and fantastical – tales of wonder and horror and delight.  Fidler expertly weaves together these beautiful and thrilling pictures of a dazzling lost world with the story of an empire’s rise and utterly devastating fall.

In searching for a professional review of this book, I settled on the Russell Wenholz commentary, which appeared in the Canberra Times of the 26 November 2022

“The latest book by Richard Fidler is more about kingdoms than roads, and rather than kingdoms, it is about caliphates – caliphates ruled by a line of Caliphs; from the birth of Muhammad (c.570) to the taking of Baghdad by the Mongols of Genghis Khan (1258). For most of that time, the Caliphs were based in Baghdad.

Fidler chose to give his book the same title as one of his favourite sources – The Book of Roads and Kingdoms, compiled by Ibn Khordadbeh, “a compendium of maps, trade routes, and descriptions of foreign lands lying north, south, east and west of Baghdad”.

He warmed to his subject. “Medieval Baghdad…an immortal city of the imagination, as a dream-like labyrinth filled with bold thieves and bottled jinn, giant birds and talking fish, with princes and princely doppelgangers with hidden gardens and houses inhabited by strange and dangerous women…”

Fidler’s work is divided into six “books”. The first begins with the Roman and Persian empires contesting to control the region. Then out of Arabia, led by Muhammed, comes a third power which eclipses them both.

A sequence of Caliphs, their conquests, births, deaths – often assassinations – and battles take the reader to the year 762 and the founding of Baghdad. Wisely, Fidler includes a timeline listing all the events described.

Early in this first book, Fidler makes the point that “the invasion of Christian-dominated lands by the early Islamic State were often cruel and brutal, but they were not the totalising campaigns of religious extermination associated with the modern Islamic army….the early Arab conquests fought to impose political rather than religious supremacy over the subject population.”

The next four books are titled West, East, South and North – the directions of expansion of the Moslem empire from Baghdad.

West: Moslems cross northern Africa, then to Spain, and the Islamic influence on the history of Sicily. There’s also an unsuccessful attempt to conquer Constantinople; they negotiate with Charlemagne and realise the limit of their advance into the Holy Roman Empire.

East: In search of a fabled wall constructed by Alexander the Great, Moslems find traces of ancient cities buried in the sands of the Talamakan desert.

Fidler here, moves forward to the nineteenth century to relate how Europeans investigated this region and found a branch of the Great Wall of China and unique Buddhist habitations – including a repository of ancient documents.

South: Moslem seafarers who sail to East Africa, India and Sri Lanka, and became involved in local rebellions. This Book contains several stories and legends from these regions.

North: A Moslem expedition travels from Baghdad, north, between the Caspian and Aral Seas to the kingdom of the Bulgars on the Upper Volga River – a distance of over 4,000 kilometres.

Fidler’s source for this journey is the work of a conscientious diarist, Ibn Fadlan. He witnessed a horrific Viking funeral ceremony.

The sixth book covers the devastating incursion of Genghis Khan and his “Mongol hordes”. Their brutality exceeded that displayed by the earlier Moslem armies; the word “slaughter” occurs frequently in this final Book. The Mongol campaign culminates with a grandson of Khan reaching Baghdad.

There are a multitude of historical figures in the narrative, with unfamiliar Arabic names. Again, wisely, preceding each of Fidler’s books is a list of the major characters involved. There are also good maps.

The Book of Roads and Kingdoms encompasses a period of 700 years, so Fidler has had to decide which historical persons are most relevant to his story and, having made that decision, he then has to decide which events in the chosen persons’ lives were the most significant and interesting.

This, Fidler has done successfully – all the while being aware that “medieval accounts of true historical events were often spiced with exaggerations and fabrications slanted to suit the prejudices of their intended audiences”.

This shorter contribution looks at two recently read novels [birthday gifts in October], and also includes a brief reference to two small booklets principally dealing with the gold rush history of Ballarat [site of the 1854 Eureka Stockade rebellion in Australia].

I recently finished reading ‘The Night Tide’ by Di Morrissey [published 2022], 403 pages – another excellent & interesting novel from this author, most of whose novels I have read and possess.  As before, a story that was easy to read [unlike a couple of more serious historical books I’m ploughing through at the moment] and was difficult to put down, as evidenced by the speedy read over two days. And, being set in Australia, while not necessarily parts of the country I was intimately familiar with, her stories so often add a touch of local nostalgia.

From general reviews – After an election upheaval, Dominic Cochrane decides it’s time to leave his twenty-year political staffer career behind. He opts to stay at a friend’s converted waterside boatshed in a quiet bay in a Sydney backwater.  The long-time neighbours take Dom into their fold, but his peaceful retreat is quickly upended as he becomes embroiled in a tragic mystery.
As money sharks circle treasured family homes in the secluded community, tensions mount as their way of life is threatened, secrets are exposed and old wounds reopened. Can Dom unravel what really happened so many years ago, or have the secrets been swept away on the dark night tide?

A reflection on DI Morrissey’s inspiration in her words for the book, taken from Channel 9’s ‘A Current Affair’

Pittwater, on Sydney’s northern peninsula, could very well be the prettiest place to call home.

It’s where author Di Morrissey spent her childhood and it’s the inspiration and location of her latest novel, The Night Tide.  “I was about four when my mother moved down from the country and the biggest memory probably is that big house up there. That’s Dorothea Mackella’s house, Tarrangaua,” Morrissey told A Current Affair.

With her daughter Gabrielle by her side, Morrissey has returned home for the first time in decades.

“She came out and she caught me looking around the house and she said, ‘what do you think you’re doing?’,” Morrissey recalled about her childhood neighbour, Mackellar.

“And I said quite cleverly, ‘I’m looking for fairies’ and she said, ‘how terribly splendid, I’ll help you look’.

“She said, ‘do you like to read’? and I said, ‘I don’t have many books so I make up my own’ and she said, ‘when you grow up you must put your stories down in books for other people to read’. I thought ‘what a good idea’.”

After a short journey onboard historic Elvina, the same ferry Morrissey once took to school, we arrived at Lovett Bay. Caretaker Gerty was there to greet us and to give us a much-needed push up the steep, dirt road to Tarrangaua.  A secluded sandstone retreat among the gum trees is the home of the acclaimed poet and Morrissey’s childhood neighbour, Mackellar.  “You couldn’t ‘movie set’ this, you couldn’t make a place up like this, which is why I wanted to use this setting in the book,” Morrissey said while looking out at the view.  “I can imagine now how natural it would’ve been to develop all the imagination that you have,” Gabrielle said.

Her first was Heart of Dreaming in 1991 and she’s hardly missed a year since without having a novel published.

But there’s something special, indeed nostalgic, about her latest book.

“The people that lived here – Chips Rafferty’s house was straight over there – Chips was like my godfather, Dorothea Mackellar was living here, George English the composer was over there,” Morrissey said.

“So, I thought everybody did things like this.  “You need trees and you need places you can sit and be still and be silent and imagine things. There are too few.”

The book focuses on a mystery and a family tragedy, which unfortunately Morrissey’s encountered herself.

“My father and baby brother drowned off Scotland Island. He had a little water taxi service. Michael fell overboard and my father jumped in after him in his winter clothes,” Morrissey said.

“I never went to the funeral, I never had closure. So to have my daughter here with me today, it’s kind of the closing of one book and opening of another.”  With a story as much about family, as it is about place, it’s only fitting that Gabrielle has returned home from the United States to be closer to her mum.

She calls it a perk of COVID-19.  “Happy doesn’t even cover it, it just feels like home, it feels right to be raising my kids here,” Gabrielle said.

[Di Morrissey is one of the most successful authors Australia has ever produced. She trained as a journalist, working in the media around the world. Her fascination with different countries; their landscape, their cultural, political and environmental issues, forms the inspiration for her novels. Di is a tireless activist for many causes: opposing large scale development and commercial food chains into Byron Bay NSW, fighting gas and mining intrusion into sacred lands in the Kimberly, and stopping massive and unnecessary power lines intruding into the Manning Valley NSW. Di also established The Golden Land Education Foundation in Myanmar. Di lives in the Manning Valley, NSW].

Another birthday gift in 2022 was –  ‘Bodies of Light’ by Jennifer Down, published in 2021,427 pages –  as one description put it about this winner of the 2022 Miles Franklin Literary Award, ‘Bodies of Light is Jennifer Down’s third book and her best yet… A brilliant, sharply observed and deeply affecting epic that secures Down’s status as one of the best writers in Australia today. ‘ ‘A remarkably empathic book…a life that the reader cannot deny.’

This was a very confronting book, written in the first person, given the impression it was a direct biography of the writer’s life  –  it is a story of a life in full – tragedy, heartbreak, sexual abuse, alcohol, drug abuse,  the loss of babies, short-lived relationships, and constant reminders of a traumatic past in the absence of family, friends, psychiatric breakdowns  –  the full gambit of things which can go wrong from a child initially passed through various care and foster homes, most of which were totally inadequate in terms of permanence, safety and life style guidance.

I was attracted to the book from an ABC ‘book review’ program earlier this year, but didn’t really anticipate what I was letting myself into, as far as a view into the life of someone who would face so many obstacles and tragedies in her life.

The following opening three paragraphs from an article in Guardian Australia, from the Australian Book Review sets the scene for the book and what follows, written by Declan Fry, on 1/10/2021  –
“When musician Liz Phair sang her 1991 song, Fuck and Run, I couldn’t help wondering at the irony of her choral lament – “Fuck and run, fuck and run / even when I was 12” – lyrics that claimed something akin to agency in a situation which, read a certain way, could be considered exploitative. In doing so, it becomes a form of self-protection: I did it so you didn’t.  Bodies of Light, Jennifer Down’s second novel, is a meditation on what it means to experience this vulnerability. Its narrator, Maggie Sullivan, is institutionalised, caught up in a world of “foster families, group homes and resi units”, of “scheduled mealtimes bathtimes playtimes sleeptimes and joints laced with speed and grilles on windows”. Her father is a drug addict, jailed after injecting and killing one of his friends while Maggie is young; her mother is dead by the time she is two, OD’ing in a public toilet. At the age of 4 she is molested; at the age of 11, she is molested again.    Maggie’s voice has the verisimilitude of memoir. When she recalls “showers in the dark and lithium and coppers exploring my arsehole with a five-cent coin and sucking lolly snakes to get the taste of cock out of my mouth”, we credit her bitterly nonchalant sense of shock. Maggie is a person who has learned to be guarded and become adept at making herself as small as possible: “Picture me in that summer slick, newly fifteen and in search of a hollow to fall through.” By the age of 19 she has entered a psych ward (“clinical depression, catatonia, psychosis”); in her 20s, she experiences postnatal depression. We follow her into adulthood and late middle-age, witnessing incidents which will, quite literally, transform her life….”

I have used part of an article from the Sydney Morning Herald [Giselle Au-Nhein Nguyen, Oct 22, 2021] to provide a more concise description of the book, which may either encourage or discourage future readers. In the first part of the book, I was not sure that I was going to want to continue reading, so raw and ‘unpleasant almost’ was the way the story was developing. But despite that feeling, it became difficult to put down, and was read over two or three days.   The reviewer writes as follows:

“Bodies of Light is many things at once: a crime novel, a mystery novel, an epic, a testimony. The third book from Jennifer Down is staggering in its scope, encompassing half a century of life lived by its magnetic and mystifying central character, Maggie Sullivan – or Josephine, or Holly, depending on who you’re asking.

The year is 2018 when the Facebook message arrives: “Wondering if you are any relation of Maggie Sullivan (Aussie), she went missing a long time ago.” The sender has seen a viral image, and is struck by how much the woman known as Holly – at this stage living a simple life in the US – looks like someone he lived in foster care with as a child. Panicked, Maggie deletes the message and blocks the sender – and begins, privately, to excavate the life she has deliberately buried.

From the Victorian suburbs and shorelines to Sydney, to New Zealand to the US, the story that follows is a sweeping, breathless saga that charts a life that could be two, or three, or more. Maggie’s life is undoubtedly tragic, beginning with her removal from her family at the age of five and years moving from home to home, frequently enduring horrific abuse at the hands of her guardians.

Down drew inspiration from first-person accounts by residential and out-of-home care leavers to bring this part of the story to life in a realistic way. She does not shy away from the grim realities and failings of the system, or the ways in which girls and women are routinely used and discarded by society, shown through Maggie’s transient, often transactional relationships.

Maggie is a perplexing character, equal parts lucid and foggy. The book shines in the middle section, in which a police investigation takes place regarding a crime that she may or may not have committed. Here, Maggie’s occasional role as an unreliable narrator emerges. Down expertly plays intimate scenes depicting the character’s actions and thoughts against police interview transcripts, and the reader is left with little clarity as to what actually happened.

There are also moments when Maggie herself is unsure whether she has blacked out and forgotten something; after this, the character’s first vanishing act occurs. It’s incredibly clever writing that fortifies Down’s point about the fallibility of trauma-impacted memory – the novel is Maggie’s testament to herself, her mind the only proof she has of her existence at all, yet there are still gaps that cannot be filled, even by herself.

What’s remarkable about the novel is the way in which Down balances this darkness with small moments of beauty, rendering Maggie’s complex, harrowing life with grace, humanity and hope. One particularly memorable scene sees Maggie and her first husband observing the brilliance of bioluminescence at Phillip Island in the dead of night, lending a brief moment of awe and magic to their relationship, dying under the weight of grief’.

Finally, another pair of little booklets, written and produced by Ballarat historical writer, Doug Bradby

[1]:  ‘The Astonishing History of Ballarat’ Vol. 2 [1856-1883] by Doug Bradby, pub.2019, 256 pages.

Interesting as always, particularly the references to so many sites around Ballarat –  though I did this edition a little over-whelming in respect to the volume of mining and other statistics, much of which because of the detailed involved floated over my head!  However, from the back cover – ‘A crucial time in Ballarat’s mining history, 1856 was the year the miners first went ‘below the blue rock’ into the deep leads of Ballarat West. Redan and Sebastopol. There they would find and extract about five million ounces of gold. This incredible achievement took twenty years and would completely transform Ballarat’.

And from Collins Booksellers, Ballarat  –  ‘It was the men who first went below the blue rock who made the reputation of Ballarat. ”We have shallow sinking, deep sinking, ground sluicing and quartz mining, and we had to learn everything. All this has been taught us by the pick and shovel of the miner. There have been none to help us, and the knowledge we have has been slowly gained and dearly paid for.’ ‘The miners of Ballarat, have, in a few years, changed a wilderness into a great and important centre of wealth and progress.’ It is a wonderful story, worth knowing, worth understanding, and worthy of reflection. The second book in a trilogy exploring Ballarat’s astonishing history.

Written by Doug Bradby. Illustrated by Carson Ellis.

[2]  ‘Unsung Heroes: Ballarat’s Bravest Citizens, introduced by Doug Bradby [from the ‘Ten Delightful Tales’ series, published 2022, 32 pages –   another short but interesting series of snippets and stories from the early days of life in the Ballart gold fields and beyond Couldn’t find any reviews of this, but  most of the ‘stories’ covered involved mine accidents, together with  various drowning and water occurrences.

In this Contribution, I examine the following quite different publications read recently, which I felt I wanted to briefly comment upon, while at the same time  providing a few [perhaps more professional] opinions  of various reviewers.

• ‘Dark Palace’ by Frank Moorhouse;
• ‘This Much Is True’ by Miriam Margolyes; and
•  ‘Quarterly Essay: No. 86  – Sleepwalk to War: Australia’s Unthinking Alliance With America” by Hugh White;
• AFA15: Our Unstable Neighbourhood;
• ‘Amnesia’ by Peter Carey;
• ‘Horse’  by Geraldine Brooks;
• Quarterly Essay No. 87 –  ‘Uncivil Wars: How Contempt is Corroding Democracy  by Waleed Aly & Scott Stephens

‘Dark Palace’ by Frank Moorhouse, published in 2000, 678 pages.

This is the  story of the League of Nations, told with a mix of fact and fiction  – quite a fascinating story, the historical part about an organisation I knew about broadly but had little notice of it’s ‘life’ and demise [when it was replaced by the United Nations after WW 2]. 

Dark Palace is a novel by the Australian author Frank Moorhouse that won the 2001 Miles Franklin Literary Award. The novel forms the second part of the author’s “Edith Trilogy”, following Grand Days, which was published in 1993; and preceding Cold Light, which was published in 2011.

From Goodreads –  For those who loved Grand Days, this is its sparkling sequel, following Edith Campbell Berry through the war years in Geneva at the heart of the League of Nations. Her marriage is falling apart but she is reunited with her enigmatic soulmate Ambrose. Edith is a literary creation to rival a Jane Austen character, and the force of her character, as well as the humour and spirit of the book, power the reader through. The backdrop is not only Geneva, but Australia too, and both are rich with atmosphere.

Potts Point Bookshop –  Winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award.
Five years have passed since Edith Campbell Berry’s triumphant arrival at the League of Nations in Geneva, determined to right the wrongs of the world. The idealism of those early Grand Dayshas been eroded by a sense foreboding as the world moves ever closer to another war. Edith’s life too, has changed- her marriage and her work are no longer the anchors in her life – she is restless, unsure, feeling the weight of history upon her and her world.
As her certainties crumble, Edith is once again joined by Ambrose Westwood, her old friend and lover. Their reunion is joyful, and her old anxiety about their unconventional relationship is replaced by a feeling that all things are possible – at least in her private life.
But World War II advances inexorably, and Edith, Ambrose and their fellow officers must come to terms with the knowledge that their best efforts – and those of the well-meaning world – are simply useless against the forces of the time. Moving, wise and utterly engrossing, this is a profound and enriching novel. Grand Days and Dark Palace confirm Frank Moorhouse as one of our greatest writers – a master of tone and timing, an elegant and exuberant stylist, and an unerring chronicler of the human spirit.

Author description

About the author:  Frank Moorhouse was born in the coastal town of Nowra, NSW. He worked as an editor of small-town newspapers and as an administrator and tutor for the Workers’ Educational Association, and in the 1970s became a full-time writer. He has written prize-winning fiction, non-fiction and essays. He is best known for the highly acclaimed Edith trilogy, Grand Days, Dark Palace and Cold Light, novels that follow the career of an Australian woman in the League of Nations in the 1920s and 1930s through to the International Atomic Energy Agency in the 1970s. Frank has been awarded a number of fellowships, including writer-in-residence at King’s College, Cambridge, a Fulbright Fellowship and a fellowship at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington. His work has been translated into several languages. He was made a member of the Order of Australia for services to literature in 1985, and was made a Doctor of the University by Griffith University in 1997 and a Doctor of Letters (honoris causa) by the University of Sydney in 2015.

The three books of Frank Moorhouse’s Edith Trilogy (Grand Days, Dark Palace and Cold Light) follow the adult life of the ambitious, and somewhat eccentric, Edith Campbell Berry.

As a young woman in the 1920s, Edith travelled from Australia to Geneva to join the League of Nations, and stayed there through WW2 until the collapse of the League in 1950.  By the third book, she has moved back to Australia and went to the developing city of Canberra where her life changed – yet again.

Edith is a mostly likeable character and the people she mixes with – real and imagined – are interesting and often quirky.   But these books are more than just about Edith and her ambitions and private life. They are set in times of upheaval and change and that, to me, is a big part of what makes these books such a good read.  But, be warned, you have to be strong to read them – they are big books!

[Wendy Kaye – Tom Keneally Centre volunteer].

‘This Much Is True’ by Miriam Margolyes [published 2021], 438 pages.

Interesting, entertaining, and a times a little crude [well more than a little!!]  But overall, a fascinating read – her recollection of names and events at aged 80 years is amazing [and encouraging!!]

Hadley Freeman, writing for the Guardian  on 22 September, 2021 had the following to say, in part, about Miriam’s book.

“With her naughty stories and cutting remarks, the comic actor spares no blushes – but her account is poignant too. As Miriam herself says ‘And, of course, there’s the sex. “I am now better known for my naughty stories than almost anything else,” she writes, a little regretfully, although that then sparks a thought about the hilarity of penises (“Such an odd dangler to have”).

She never needed them anyway. She worked her way through radio, voiceovers, drama and then Hollywood, winning a Bafta for her performance in Martin Scorsese’s The Age of Innocence. Yet, she is probably best known – certainly to younger generations – for her recent turns on talkshows, shocking the hosts and fellow guests with her tales of licentiousness. “Jesus, Miriam!” one guest shouted, after she recalled the time she gave a handjob to a soldier she discovered masturbating in a tree in Edinburgh. “You’ve got to support the troops,” Margolyes replied. She has become a regular on Graham Norton, who, rightly, finds her an absolute hoot.

But I have had mixed feelings about Margolyes’s talkshow appearances. Partly because, as she says, they have a tendency to overshadow her work, which really has been magnificent (I was especially pleased that her brilliantly weird performance in Kenneth Branagh’s 1991 film, Dead Again, gets a mention in the memoir.) But also because it sometimes feels as if she’s reducing herself to parody, playing the overweight older lesbian who talks – ooh! – about sex. Margolyes is aware of this concern and sweeps it away: “Not a lot of gay women front up on TV, so I hope I give courage to young dykes to be proud and confident. If you tell the truth – and I always do – you shame the devil.”,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, Despite all the talk about penises and celebrity prats, The main impression readers are left with is of her kindness. The friends she sweeps up along the way are friends for life, and as a result she has 11,833 names in her phone, and I dearly wish mine was among them. She and I would disagree about Israel, of which she is very much not a fan, and she knows fellow Jews get cross with her about that. But as she says: “How can I not be controversial? It’s like my parents not wanting me to be a lesbian.” A French teacher had her bang to rights: “You were naughty, Miriam, but you were never wicked.”

I include here some quotations directly from the book, which perhaps indicate that Miriam’s writing is more than simply about  the more ’crude’ aspects referred to above, there is so much more to her persona.

• [on Palestine] : “Compassion has always being a Jewish tradition. WE are urged to be as compassionate people, but when it comes to the Palestinians, all our compassion evaporates. Jews are taught, like Christians, to love your neighbour as yourself, to treat the stranger with respect and kindness, and yet, here, the opposite is true. The appalling acts of Palestinians  and Arab terrorism are not ignored by me. I loathe them and will never defend such things. Their cruelty, insanity and continual murder are facts. But ask yourselves: Why? I don’t acknowledge the claims of history, I care about now, the present. That land must be shared, people must be .treated equally. It is possible, if the will is there…..”
•  [about Prince Charles now King Charles III – “I think he’s a good man who cares a great deal for the country, and I can’t bare the horrid things people write about him and the other members of the royal family. I don’t talk politics with him. I don’t think its fair, but I’d a damn sight rather he ran the country than the incompetent buffoon who sits in Number 10” [ Boris];
• [about India]  – “E.M.Forster wrote that when you go to India you come face to face with yourself, and I hoped that would happen, but I found that the heat proved too difficult for me.  I wasn’t keen on the lack of flush toilets beyond the confines of our hotel.  The caste system and the disparity of wealth was equally hard to stomach. In one day we visited both the slums  and the palace of the royal family in Jaipur. The striking thing was the standard of politeness  and grace was the same in both milieu. The people of India – their courage, energy and intelligence – are remarkable.  I’d love to go back, despite my disgust at their prime minister, Modi. He’s one of the evil men of the world”.
• [herself]  – “My appearances on all the talk shows are fraught with danger because my language is often foul. I’ve being reported to Ofcom several times> I know I swear too much, and I’m constantly being reminded to keep it clean. I regret I offend. It’s a bad habit I got into very early……….But saying………………….isn’t as bad as racism or selling drugs. Get real!”

As she writes in the ‘Introduction’ chapter of her book, Miriam Margoyles says “Well, I can’t please everyone all the time. But I honour the Truth. And within these pages you will only find Truth, or at least ‘my’ Truth.  There will be some smut inevitably, and it might be a bumpy ride, but I promise you the REAL Miriam Margoyles”.

I think that’s what we got – warts and all –  an entertaining read!!

Quarterly essay: No. 86 – Sleepwalk To War: Australia’s Unthinking Alliance with America by Hugh White

A very disturbing but honest viewpoints [in the opinion of White at least] –  basically boiling down to the fact that Australian governments on both sides since John Howard have persisted with the line that we must continue to perceive America as the friend and saviour while recognising China as the potential enemy and danger. This view must change  – we must learn to live with China as that nation will inevitably become the power nation of the Asia/Pacific region, while America’s influence is dwindling. America will not risk a war against China over Taiwan despite the rhetoric of the USA [and Australia] – it could not win, but instead face catastrophic consequences over  such action if nuclear power comes into play. Did not act militarily to support Ukraine, a country whose independence it recognises, why risk all by taking on China over Taiwan which the US unofficially recognises as part of China in any case!!~

From a more professional viewpoint, from the QE promo:

“In this gripping essay, Hugh White explores Australia’s fateful choice to back America to the hilt and oppose China. What led both sides of politics to align with America so absolutely? Is this a case of sleepwalking to war? What tests might a new government face?
White assesses America’s credibility and commitment, by examining AUKUS, the Quad, Trump and Biden. He discusses what the Ukraine conflict tells us about the future. And he argues that the US can neither contain China nor win a war over Taiwan. So where does this leave our future security and prosperity in Asia? Is there a better way to navigate the disruption caused by China’s rise?
This is a powerful and original essay by Australia’s leading strategic thinker.
“Canberra’s rhetoric helps raise the risk of the worst outcome for Australia: a war between China and America, in which we are likely to be involved. Over the past decade, and without any serious discussion, Australian governments have come to believe that America should go to war with China if necessary to preserve US primacy in Asia, and that Australia should, as a matter of course, go to war with it.”—Hugh White, Sleepwalk to War::

As one critic [Chuck Sheldon]  has noted  – Hugh White makes some interesting and unique arguments in this quarterly essay. Australia should look to move away from its reliance on US power in Asia and look to engage with regional powers such as China, India and Indonesia.  He also argues that a war over Taiwan could be a catastrophic disaster in which nuclear weapons could be utilised by both China and the US. Not worth it. If China wants Taiwan, the West might just have to accept that.
The new Labor government now has an opportunity to work more with its regional neighbours and put Australia down a new path and prepare it for a new, multipolar Indo-Pacific [and this point is a clear direction of Hugh white’s essay]

And this one from a Lloyd Downey who provides a good overall view of the Essay and it’s basic contents

“Hugh White has written, what appears to me anyhow, as a reasonably objective view of Australia’s current relations and future outlook with China. Inevitably, Australia’s relations and Alliance with the USA are wrapped up in this.
The subtitle, more or less, explains White’s basic thesis that Australia has an unthinking alliance with America and this could well lead us to “sleepwalk” our way into a conflict (read war) with China. And, from Australia’s perspective, such a war would be catastrophic, to say the least.
Like many in Australia I’ve wondered how we could have gone from a very positive relationship with China just a few years ago to the situation we’ve had in the last year where the Australian Secretary of the Department of Home affairs suggested that the “drums of war” were sounding…and we needed to be prepared. This theme was enthusiastically taken up by Peter Dutton, the Minister for Defence, who suggested we needed to be prepared for war and announced the scrapping of the contract with France for submarines and the planned purchase of nuclear powered subs for Australia. As numerous commentators have pointed out the only real use for the extended range of nuclear powered subs would be to patrol the South China Sea ….much to the ire of China.
White makes the obvious point, that one way or the other we are going got have to come to terms with China being THE great power in the region. Pretty soon their economy will be larger than the US economy (probably already is so in PPP terms). And pretty soon their military might will equal or exceed that of the USA. (I think I’ve seen elsewhere that with various war-games, the US results predict that they cannot win a (conventional) war with China ….and the alternative, of a nuclear war, is both uncertain and “unthinkable”).
I found it very scary that the thinking in the USA and in Australia seemed to be so woolly or “unthinking”. White says that “the reality is that America has no clear and settled objective in its contest with China. Slogans such as ‘a free and open Indo-Pacific’ merely try to mask this crucial omission. In truth, however, America aims to retain primacy. This is no model of a new role for America in the new Asia of the twenty-first century”. Likewise, the thinking in Australia is equally woolly …more or less along the lines of “All the way with LBJ” and we can see where that got us in the Vietnam war.
And so, we are led down the pathway of the QUAD with the UK, Japan, USA and India supposedly cooperating as a bloc to counter the power of China. But I think , White argues fairly cogently that the QUAD is not going to work. For a start, India has little interest in the Pacific; Britain’s interests are pretty remote; the USA will probably decide that it really doesn’t need to be a power in East Asia …especially if it involves confrontation with China. And all that would leave Australia really in the lurch.
As I read him, White is saying that Australia needs to grasp the nettle and acknowledge that China, for all its faults, is going to become THE great power in our region and we need to deal with that as best we can. And that doesn’t mean going to war with China. In fact, the large proportion of Chinese already living in Australia (and expressing views through the recent election) is indicative of the fact that we probably can come to some sort of mutually beneficial relationship with China. But we also need to be talking-up some sound reasoning to the USA and we should not underplay the significance of our voice in Washington. And we should CERTAINLY NOT be goading the USA into war with China or talking ourselves into war with China.
White mentions…but without much detail …..that we should be taking a lot more notice of Indonesia and the other SE Asian nations. But especially Indonesia, one of the putative great powers, and sitting right on our doorstep. I was glad to see measures being taking yesterday to provide significant resources to Indonesia to help it combat foot and mouth disease. Clearly, a few hundred million dollars of aid here could potentially save many billions of dollars if F&M found its way into Australia.
The scariest aspect of White’s essay is that he underlines the sloppy thinking in both Canberra and Washington. In fact, the lack of thinking. And leaving the thinking up to the likes of the Departments of Defence and the Spooks is a recipe for disaster. I mean. basically, these establishments really thrive best in conflict situations. That’s when they have a purpose and when they get unlimited funding and promotional opportunities. In short, they should never be the source of objective information about international strategy. Contributors? Yes. But not the originators or source of advice.
Can the Labor party undo the work of Dutton and the right of Australian Politics? It remains to be seen. Certainly, the jingoistic appeal to danger and the need to bolster our defences has been an election winner in Australia over many years. But I would hope that saner voices (like those of Hugh White) might gradually start to have some impact on Australia. Though, I know, even among my well educated friends, the number who have (rather suddenly) come to see China as aggressive and a threat which we should resist with all our might is significant. The idea that we are going to have to learn to deal with China as THE great power in our region seems to have escaped them. And the idea that America, when the chips are really down, might abandon us, has not entered their heads. Nor has the idea that there might be other pathways than blindly following the USA into a conflict situation with China over Taiwan.
Really, quite a powerful essay. Well worth reading and worth five stars by my reckoning.”

Overall, an important read, which would generate a mix of support and criticism, when responses from a number of opinion makers appeared in the following Quarterly Essay [see below]

Australian Foreign Affairs [AFA]: Issue 15: Our Unstable Neighbourhood,

Some interesting articles and essays;  in  this issue of the AFA, which examines the challenges and opportunities for Australian diplomacy in South-East Asia – a region that is at the centre of the contest between the United States and China.  Our Unstable Neighbourhood explores the prospects for Australia as it seeks to enhance ties with nations with which it has differing interests, outlooks and anxieties.  Leading writers and thinkers – Allan Gyngell, Sebastian Strangio, Nicole Curato and Kishore Mahbubani – look at the future of a fast-growing region that is being reshaped by developments such as China’s rise and the emergence of strongmen rulers.

Also in this issue, Sheila Fitzpatrick examines why the road to peace in Ukraine is not straightforward.

Our Unstable Neighbourhood looks at the fragile state of democracy and the growing threat of instability in the region, as well as the risks for Australia as it navigates ties with nations which have vastly differing interests and outlooks.

Other articles by various writers covered in this Issue include:

• reviews Australia’s diplomacy in the region and puts a case for a new kind of statecraft.
• explores the increasing influence of China in South-East Asia.
• looks at the Marcos comeback in the Philippines and what it reveals about attitudes towards democracy in South-East Asian countries.
• explains how South-East Asia views China differently to Australia and advocates for Australia to change its course.
• examines the war in Ukraine and why the road to peace is not straightforward.
• a call on Australia to bid to host the next major UN climate conference in 2025.

\‘Amnesia’ by Peter Carey [published in 2014, 377 pages’.

This book did not impress me in the slightest [purchased in Daylesford in May this year]  –  the writing style to me was like a dog’s breakfast, all over the place, couldn’t wait to get to the end of the book, if there was an ending??   No doubt, more expert opinion-makers than myself would praise the style of writing by the author [as per the example below] – but I’m sorry it did nothing for me, other turn me off Peter Carey, even though I’d read one of his books previously – ‘Jack Maggs’ ’in 2013, but at that  time, I didn’t actually  record any comment about it, so can’t recall my opinion on that occasion. To me, the main interest of the novel was the constant references to contemporary historical events of the 1970s, specifically, the sacking of PM, Gough Whitlam, and associated events. Apart from that, I didn’t get ‘engaged’ with the book to the degree described below.

Writing in the Guardian back in 2014 [30 October], Andrew Motion described the book as follows [partly quoted as follows  – the storyline is included in Motion’s article, but I’ll leave that to potential readers to come to grips with!!

‘A novel about internet hacking and 1970s Australian history – few writers mix farce with ferocity to such engaging effect.  Peter Carey’s fiction is turbo-charged, hyperenergetic. His language has little time for quiet passages; his minor characters, even at their most incidental, are endowed with details of appearance and speech that belie their status; his narrative lines, when they run into difficulties of any kind, blast through them by introducing new inventions and new possibilities. This is what makes him Dickensian. Amnesia, his 16th book, follows many of its predecessors in yoking these energies to a historical moment, then associating it with something urgent in contemporary times. It is a novel about hacking, and because it shows the revenge of a disaffected Australian on colonial powers, is therefore bound to bring Julian Assange to mind; specifically, it is concerned with the notorious moment in mid-70s Australian history, when the Whitlam government was brought down by American and British interference [the writer’s view], in a way that is now largely forgotten (hence the title)………………..Like many of Carey’s books, Amnesia generates an aura of the fantastical but is completely grounded; it is high-spirited but serious, hectic but never hasty. Sometimes the vital elements of the story don’t all move at the necessary speed ……………. But this doesn’t stop Amnesia being a deeply engaging book. It responds to some of the biggest issues of our time, and reminds us that no other contemporary novelist is better able to mix farce with ferocity, or to better effect’.

‘Horse’ by Geraldine Brooks, published in 2022, 401 pages .

In contrast to the previous book mentioned, this was a truly wonderful read.  As I would post to my Face Book page, after reading:

Looking for a gift for your ‘book loving’ Dad, especially if a mix of true history and fiction is his thing? You can’t go past ‘Horse’ by Geraldine Brooks, published this year – a brilliant and intriguing story about a famous horse and the black boy/man who cared and loved the animal throughout it’s life. That horse was Lexington, the greatest horse in US racing history. Go to Google, look for Lexington where you’ll read that Lexington (March 17, 1850 – July 1, 1875) was a United States Thoroughbred race horse who won six of his seven race starts [his career coming to a sudden end, when he went blind]. Perhaps the horse’s greatest fame, was after he became blind, as the most successful sire of the second half of the nineteenth century; he was the leading sire in North America for 16 consecutive years, and broodmare sire of many notable racehorses in the US.

Brooks uses detailed research, historical facts, and the times of US slave labour before, during and after the Civil War in the US, to produce a wonderful read about the life of this horse and the little black boy who cared for the horse for 25 years from it’s birth until death – from a discarded painting in a roadside clean-up, forgotten horse bones in a research archive, and the story of Lexington, Geraldine Brooks has used the strands of fact to create a sweeping story of spirit, obsession and injustice across American history. As described elsewhere, this enthralling novel is a gripping reckoning with the legacy of enslavement and racism in America. Get hold of a copy, a brilliant read!!

One commentary I found about this book [the source of which I’ve mislaid], describes the storyline as follows:

‘Kentucky, 1850. An enslaved groom named Jarret and a bay foal forge a bond of understanding that will carry the horse to record-setting victories across the South, even as the nation reels towards war. An itinerant young artist who makes his name from paintings of the horse takes up arms for the Union and reconnects with the stallion and his groom on a perilous night far from the glamour of the race track.

New York City: 1854: Martha Jackson, a gallery owner  celebrated for taking risks  on edgy contemporary painters, becomes obsessed with a nineteenth-century equestrian oil painting of mysterious provenance.

Washington, DC: 2019: Jess, a Smithsonian scientist from Australia, and Theo, a Nigerian-American art historian, find themselves unexpectedly connected through their shared interest in the horse – one studying the stallion’s bones for clues to his power and endurance, the other uncovering the lost history of the unsung  Black horsemen who were critical to his racing success.

This enthralling novel is a gripping reckoning with the legacy of enslavement and racism in America. Horse is the latest masterpiece from a writer with a prodigious talent for bringing the past to life’.

Quarterly Essay No. 87:  ‘Uncivil Wars: How Contempt is Corroding Democracy  by Waleed Aly & Scott Stephens

Waleed Aly: writer, academic, lawyer & broadcaster, and Scott Stephens: ABC’s Religions and Ethics online editor; widely published on moral philosophy, etc.

Looking at those two authors, it’s little wonder that I struggled through this Essay – a very difficult read, much of which I found beyond the scope of this reader’s ability to retain, fully understand or comprehend the degree of arguments and theories being presented.  – [I found I was more readily anticipating the responses to the previous essay by Hugh White [Sleepwalk to War, mentioned above,  which included reactions from people like Malcolm Turnbull and Kevin Rudd].

While I understood I think the broad theory behind the Essay has some realism to it, I just found that ploughing through the authors’ writings to be  a rather painstaking exercise!!

Promoting the Essay however, we read that:

In this original, eloquent essay, Waleed Aly and Scott Stephens explore the ethics and politics of public debate – and the threats it now faces.  In a healthy democracy we need the capacity to disagree. Yet Aly and Stephens note a growing tendency to dismiss and exile opponents, to treat them with contempt. This toxic partisanship has been imported from the United States, where it has been corrosive – and a temptation for both left and right. Aly and Stephens analyse some telling examples and look back to heroes of democracy who found a better way forward.  This compelling essay draws on philosophy, literature and history to make an urgent case about the present.

‘So what do we owe those with whom we might profoundly, even radically, disagree? In our time, the answer increasingly seems to be- Nothing. Absolutely nothing. We’ve come to regard our opponents as not much more than obstructions in the road, impediments standing between us and our desired end. We have grown disinclined to consider what it might mean to go on together meaningfully as partners within a shared democratic project. To put it bluntly, we see no future with our political opponents because we feel we have nothing to learn from them.’ Waleed Aly & Scott Stephens, Uncivil Wars

Certainly, from my vague understanding of the gist of this Essay, it painted a very dismal  approach to the future of mankind’s understanding and acceptance of one another, not a promising scenario to leave to our descendants!!

Finally, with the passing a few days ago, of Queen Elizabeth II,  I have returned to a book I began to read some years ago  [I got through about  100 odd pages at the time]  –  the forced change in the Monarchy following the Queen’s passing, has drawn this writer back to the 1996 publication of ‘Elizabeth’ by Sarah Bradford [564 pages] but from the beginning again, not where I left off last time.

Ironically, just prior to last week’s sad loss, I was reading about the other royal Elizabeth  –  ‘The Sultan and the Queen: the Untold Story of Elizabeth I and Islam’, by Jerry Brotton [published in 2016].

No doubt, at some future date, I will have some comments to reflect upon both these publications.

WORLD ATHLETIC CHAMPIONSHIPS 2022 OREGON {USA}

DAILY SUMMARY OF EVENTS

World Athletic Championships  – Day One highlights [15 July 2022]

The first day of the World Athletic Championships got away overnight and this morning in Oregon, US

There were 3 Medal events decided .

Women’s 20km Walk

Gold: Kimberley Garcia ]Peru] 1.26.58; Silver: Katarzyna [Poland] 1.27.31; and Bronze: Qieyang Shijie [China] 1.27.56. Australia’s Jamina Montage just missed a medal, finishing 4^th in 1.28.17, while Rebecca Henderson was 20^th in 1.34.38

Men’s 20km Walk

There were 3 Aussie walkers in this event which was won  by – Gold: Toshikazu Yamanishi [Japan] 1.19.07; Silver: Koki Ikeda [Japan] 1.19.14; and Bronze: Perseus Ksarkstrom [Sweden] 1.19.18.

The three Aussies finished 17^th, Declan Tingay [1.23.28], 19^th, Rhydian Cowley [1.23.37], and 33^rd, Kyle Swan [1.28.43].

Combined 4 x 400 metres Relay

Gold: Dominican Republic: 3.09.82; Silver: Netherlands: 3.09.90; and Bronze: USA [3.10.16],  No Aussie team in this event.

Various Australian competing in qualifying rounds and heatrs, etc of other events, the highlights being:

Women’s 1500 metre Heats

Three girls in each, qualified for the semi finals  –  Heat 1: Georgia Griffiths: 3^rd in 4.07.65; Heat 2: Jessica Hull, 2^nd in 4.04.65; Heat 3: Lyndon Hall, 3^rd in 4.03.21. The fastest heat time was recorded by Gudaf Tsegay [Ethiopia], Heat 3, in 4.02.68

Women’s Hammerthrow Qualifying:

Australia’s Alexandra Hulley finished 10^th in Group A, with a throw of 68.83, DNQ. Best throw was 74.46 by the USA competitor.

Women’s Shot Put Qualifying

No Aussies, best Put was 19.51

Women’s Pole Vault Qualifying

Australia’s Nina Kennedy qualified for the Final with a leap of 4.50, which was in fact the best leap from both Groups A and B

Men’s Hammerthrow Qualifying

No Aussies. Best throw was 80.09

Men’s High Jump Qualifying

Best jump was 2.28. Australia’s Joel Baden reached the height and qualified for the final. Yual Reath managed 2.17 but did not qualify.

Men’s 3000m Steeplechase heats,

Two Aussies in the 3 heats.  Ben Buckingham finished 9^th in Heat 1, in 8.29.13 [DNQ], and Edward Trippas finished 6^th in heat 2, in 8.23.83 [DNQ}. The fastest time was by Soufianne El Bakkari [Morocco] in 8.16.65.

Men’s Long Jump Qualifying

Again, two Aussies –  Henry Frayne jumped 7.98, finishing 6^th in his group, and qualified for the final. Not so lucky was Chrisopher Mitevski, finished 8^th in his group with 7.83 [DNQ]. The best jump was by Yuki Hashoka [Japan] of 8.18.

Men’s 100m event – Preliminary Rounds and Round One

The preliminary rounds consisted of the lower ranked runners, with best time recorded being 10.31 seconds.

In Round One, there were 7 heats – only Aussie was Rohan Browning, finished 5^th in his heat in 10.22 [DNQ}. The best  Round One time was recorded by Fred Kerley [USA] in 9.79.

Men’s Shot Put Qualifying

No Aussie starters. Best Put was by Ryan Crouser [USA} with 22.28

Finals on Day 2 include – Men’s Hammerthrow; Women’s 10,000 metres; Men’s Long Jump; Women’s Shot Put, and the Men’s 100 metres semi-finals and Final.

World Athletic Championships  – Day Two highlights [16 July 2022]

Some highlights, especially from the Australian competitor viewpoint.

Morning Session

Women’s Triple Jump Qualifying

No Aussies starters. Best jump of the two qualifying groups was by Yulimar Rojac [Venezuela] with 14.72

Women’s 3,000 metre Steeplechase Heats

We had three competitors, sadly none of them qualified for the next round  –  in Heat 1, Brielle Erbacher finished 9^th in 9.40.55; in Heat 2, Amy Cashin finished 8^th in 9.21.46; and in Heat 3, Cara Fearn-Ryan finished 11^th in 9.43.41. The best time was 9.01.54 by Norah  Jeruto [Kazakhstan] in Heat 1

Women’s High Jump Qualifying

Divided into two groups – In Group A,  Eleanor Patterson [Australia]  qualified in 4^th position with a leap of 1.93 [which was the top height jumped in the event], while in  Group B, Nicola Olyslagers also qualified for the Final with 1.93

Men’s 110 metre Hurdle Heats

Two Aussie guys – 1^st 4 in each herat and 4 fastest to the semi finals.

In Heat 2, Nicholas Hough finished  5^th in 13.51 [and qualified, 18^th fastest]; while in Heat 4, Chris Douglas finished 8^th in 13.95 [DNQ]. The fastest time in the heats was by Grant Hollaway [USA] in 13.14.

MEN’S HAMMER THROW FINAL

No Aussies.

Gold to:  Pavel Fajdek [Poland], 81.98; Silver to Wojciech Nowicki [Poland] 81.03; and Bronze to Elvind Henriksen [Norway] with 80.87

WOMEN’S 10,000 METRES FINAL

No Aussies again!

Gold to: Letesenbet Gidey [Ethiopia] in 30.09.94; Silver to: Hellen Obiri [Kenya] in 30.10.02; and Bronze to Margarewt Chelima Kipkemboi [Kenya] in 30.10.07

Men’s 400 metre Hurdle Heats

1st 4 in each heat and 4 fastest to semi finals. No Aussie compertitor.

Fastest heat time of the 5 heats  was 48.62 by Khalifar Rosser [USA]

Afternoon Session

Women’s 100 metre Heats

Just the one Aussie runners, Bree Masters, in Heat 7.. 

The 7 heat winners were: [1] Shericka Jackson, Jamaica 1102 [2] Shelly-Ann Jackson, Jamaica, 10.87 [3] Elaine Thompson-Herah, Jamaica, 11.15 [4] Marie-Josee Tahou, Cote D’Voire, 10.92 [5] Dina Asher-Smith [GBR], 10.85 [6]  Aleia Hobbs, USA, 11.04, and Heat [7] –  Mujinga Kambundji , Switzerland, 10.97. 

Australia’s Bree Masters finished in a credible 4^th place, 11.29 [a PB} but DNQ for the semi finals.

Men’s 100 metres Semi finals

No Aussies. 1^st 2 in each heat plus 2 next best.

SF 1:  won by Akani Simbine [RSA} in 9.97, same time to Trayvon Bromell [USA] in 2^nd place.

SF 2: won by Fred Kerley [USA} in 10.02, while 2^nd was Christian Coleman [USA} in 10.05.

SF 3:  won by  Oblique Seville [Jamaica] in 9.90, with Marvin Bracy [USA] in 9.93.

The other two runners to qualify for the Final were  Abdul Hakim Sani Brown [Japan], 10.05,  and Aaron Brown [Canada], 10.06

MEN’S LONG JUMP FINAL

Australia’s Henry Frayne qualified for this Final.

Gold:  Jianan Wang [China] with 8.36; Silver to Mitiadis Tentoglou [Greecfe], 8.32, and Bronze to Simon EHammer [Switzerland] 8.16.

Henry Frayne finished 12^th [of 12 finalists] with 7.80.

WOMEN’S SHOT PUT FINAL

No Aussies,

Gold:   ChaseEaley [USA] 20.49   Silver: Lijiao Gong [China] 19.389; and Bronze: Jessica Schilder [Netherlands] 19.77

Men’s 1500 metre Heats

3 Aussie guys running in these heats [two made it through]  first 6 in each heat plus the next best 6 to semi finals

Heat 1:  won by Oliver Hoare [Australia] in 3.36.17.

Heat 2: won by  Stewart McSweyne [Australia] in 3.34.91;

Heat 3: won by Josh Kerr [GBR] in 3.38.94. Australia’s Matthew Ransden finished 9^th in 3.39.83 [DNQ]

Women’s 1500 metres Semi Finals

3 Aussie girls in the semi finals of this event.

SF 1: won by Gudaf Tsegay [Ethiopia] in 4.01.28. Australia’s Jessica Hull finished 3^rd in 4.01.81 [and qualified for the Final], while Lindon Hall finished 9^th in n4.04.65 [DNQ]

SF 2: won by Faith Kipyegon [Kenya] in 4.03.98. Georgia Griffith finished 5^th in 4.05.16, and qualified for the Final

MEN’S 100 METRES FINAL

GOLD:      Fred Kerley [USA]: 9.86;

SILVER    Marvin Bracy [USA} 9.88; 

BRONZE:  Traynor Bromell [USA]  9.88

4^th:  Oblique Seville [Jamaica], 9.97; 5^th: Alani Simbine [RSA}, 10.01; 6^th: Christian Coleman [USA], 10.01; 7^th: Aaron Brown [Canada], 10.06; and 8^th: Abdul Hakim Sani Brown [Japan], 10.07

A reflection  on the Women’s 20 km walk on Day One – Australia’s Jemima Montag finished 4^th in 28 min 17 secs – the fastest time  by an Australian woman at a World Championship or Olympic Games. Her time would have won 5 world titles previously and claimed a medal in 8 of the 11 editions of the championships.

These are the World Athletic Championships Day 3 results [17 July, Oregon, USA]

Morning Session

Men’s Marathon

Unbelievably, no Aussie marathon runners in a starting field of 63 runners, of whom 54 finished the race.

Gold: Tamirat Tola [Ethiopia]  2.05.36; Silver: Mosinet Geremew [Ethiopia]  2.06.44; and Bronze: Bashir Abdi [Belgium] 2.06.48

Women’s Heptathlon: 100 metres Hurdles  – 2 heats

No Aussies.

Heat 1: Nafissatou Thiam [Belgum] in 13.21 [1093 pts];

Heat 2: Michelle Atherley [USA] in 13.12 [1106 pts]

Men’s 400 metre Heats

1^st 3 in each heat plus 6 fastest progress

Two Aussie starters. In Heat 1, Steven Solomon finished 4^th in 46.87 [DNQ], while in Heat 5, Alex Beck finished in 5^th spot, in a time of 45.99, and qualified for the next round.  The fastest time of the 6 heats was by Bayapo Adori [Botswana] in 44.87.

Women’s Hammer Throw Final

No Aussie in the final.

Gold: Brooke Anderson [USA], 78.96; Silver: Camryn Rogers [Canada], 75.52; and Bronze: Janee Cassanavoid [USA}, 74.86.

Women’s Heptathlon, High Jump

Group A:  won by Nafissatou Thiam [Belgum]: 1.95 [1171 pts];

Group B: won by Anouk Vetter [Netherlands], 1.80 [978 pts].

Women’s 400 metre Heats

1^st 3 in each heat plus 6 fastest progress. No Aussies.

Fastest time of the 6 heats was by Stephanie Ann McPherson [Jamaica] in Heat 2 in a time of 50.15.

Men’s 10,000 metres Final

Australia’s Jack Rayner finished in 19^th position [of 24 starters] in a time of 28.24.12.  Medal results.

Gold: Joshua Cheptegei [defending champion] [Uganda], 27.27.43;  Silver: Stanley Waithaka Mburu [Kenya], 27.27.90; and Bronze: Jacob Kiplimo [Uganda], 27.27.97.

Women’s Heptathlon Shotput

Group A:  Adrianna Sulek [Poland], 14.13 [803 pts];

Group B: Anouk Vetter [Netherlands], 16.25 [945 pts]

Evening Session

Men’s 110 metre Hurdle Semi finals

1^st 2 in each heat plus 2 fastest.[3 heats]. Australia’s Nicholas Hough competed in Heat 3.

Heat 1: won by Grant Holloway [USA] in 13.02;

Heat 2: won by Trey Cunningham [USA] in 13.07; and

Heat 3: won by Hansie Parchment [Jamaica] in 13.02.   Nicholas Hough finished in 7^th position in a time of 13.42 [DNQ].

Men’s Discus Throw Qualification

Group A: Matthew Denny representing Australia.  He finished in 4th position with throw of  66.98,   and qualified for the Final.  Best Group A throw was by Mykolas Alekna [Lithuania] 68.91.

Group B; best throw was by Andrius Gudzius [Lithuania], 66.60.

Women’s Pole Vault Final

[Australia’s first Championship medal – to Nina – at Oregon]

Gold:  Katie Nageotte [USA], 4.85;

Silver:  Sandi Morris [USA], 4.85; and,

Bronze:  Nina Kennedy [AUSTRALIA}, 4.80

Women’s 100 metre Semi Finals

No Aussies.

SF 1: won by Shericka Jackson [Jamaica] in 10.84; from Dina Asher-Smith [GBR] in 10.89;

SF 2: won by Elaine Thompson-Herah [Jamaica] in 10.82, from Marie Josee Ta Lou [Cote D’Voire] in 10.87

SF 3: won by Shelley Fraser-Pryce [Jamaica] in 10.93, from Aleai Hobbs [USA} in 10.95

The other two finalists [both from Heat 2] were Melissa Jefferson [USA}, 10.92; and Mujinga Kambundju [Switzerland], 10.96

Men’s 400 metres Hurdles Semi Finals

1^st 2 in each semi final plus next 2 fastest. No Aussies.

SF 1: won by Rai Benjamin [USA] in 48.44.

SF2: won by Alison Dos Santos [Brazil] in 47.85; and

SF 3: won by  Karsten Warholm [Norway] in 48.00.

Men’s Shot Put Final

No Aussies.

Gold:  Ryan Crowther [USA]  , 22.94

Silver:  Joe Kovacs [USA], 22.89; and

Bronze: Josh Awotunde [USA}, 22.29

Women’s Heptathlon 200 metres

Heat 1: won by Annik Kalin [Switzerland] in 24.05 [976 pts],

Heat 2: won by  Anna Hall [USA] in 23.08 [1071 pts].

After the 4 events of Day 1 in the Heptathlon, the overall leader is  Belgium’s Nafissatou Thiam with 4,071 points.

Men’s 1500 Metre Semi Finals

1^st 5 of each semi final plus 2 fastest.

SF 1:  won by Josh Kerr [GBR] in 3.38.36

Australia’s Oliver Hoare in the mix until the last 80 metres when faded into 10^th position in 3.32.35

SF 2: won by Abel Kipsang [Kenya] in 3.33.68

Australia’s Stewart McSweyn, after leading into the final lap, finished in 5^th position, in 3.35.07, and Qualified for the Final.

Men’s 110 Metre Hurdles Final

Dramatic start to this race. Winner of SF3, Hansie Parchment injured himself in a warm up and withdrew. Then the 3^rd fastest in history, Stefan Allen was disqualified for a false start [by 1/1000 of a second – unbelievable]. Left just 6 starters

Gold:  Grant Hollaway [USA}  in 13.03;

Silver: Trey Cunningham [USA] in 13.08; and

Bronze: Asier Martinez [Spain] in 13.17

Women’s 100 Metres FINAL

Of the 8 starters, all but one, ran the race in under 11 seconds.  Jamaica – Jamaica – Jamaica.

Race won by arguably, the greatest sprinter ever [even over Usain Bolt] –  with 4 Olympic individuasl Gold Medals and 5 World championships.

Gold: Shelley Fraser-Pryce [Jamaica] in 10.67;

Silver: Shericka Jackson [Jamaica] in 10.73;

Bronze: Elaine Thompson-Herah [Jamaica] in 10.81;

4^th: Dina Asher-Smith [GBR] in 10.83;

5^th: Mujinga Kambundji [Switzerland] in 10.91;

6^th:Elaia Hobbs [USR} in 10.92;

7^th:  Maree Josie Ta Lou [Cote D’voire] in 10.93; and,

8^th:Melissa Jefferson [USA] in 11.03

World Athletic Championships Day 4 [Monday, 18^th July] in Oregon, USA.

Morning Session

Women’s Marathon

One Aussie competitor –  Sarah Klein. Of the  41 starters in the rce, 32 finished the course.

Gold:  Gotyton Gebreslaje [Ethiopia]  in 2.18.11;  Silver to Judith Jeptum Korir [Kenya] in 2.18.20; and Bronze to Lonah  Chemtai Salpeter [Israel] in 2.20.18.

Australia’s Sarah Klein finished in 14^th position in a PB of 2.30.18.

Women’s Heptathlon  Long Jump.

Group A:  won by  Nafissatou Thiam [Belgium] with 6.59 [1036 pts];

Group B:  won by Katarina Johnson-Thompson [GBR] with 6.28 [937 pts]

Women’s Heptathlon Javelin Throw

Group A: won by Anna Hall [USA} with 45.75 [778 pts];

Group B: won by Anouk Vetter [Netherlands] with 58.29 [1021 pts]

Evening Session

Men’s 200 metre Heats

1^st 3 in each heat plus next best 3.

Fastest time was by Noah Lyles [USA] in Heat 7, in 19.98.

Australia had two runners –  In Heat 6, 18 year old Caleb Law finished in 3^rd position, in 20.50 and Qualified for the semi finals. Adam Murphy, in Heat 5, finished 6^th in 20.75 [DNQ}.

Women’s Discus Throw Qualifying

No Aussie competitors

Group A: best throw by Valarie Allman [USA} of 68.36;

Group B; best throw by Jorinde Van Klinken [Netherlands], 65.66

Men’s High Jump FINAL

Gold: Mutaz Essa Barshim [Qatar],  2.37

Silver: Sanghyeok Woo [Korea], 2.35

Bronze: Andrey Protcenko [Ukraine], 2.33

Australia’s Joel Baden finished in 10^th position, with a jump of 2.27.

Women’s 200 metre Heats

1^st 3 in each heat plus 3 next fastest.

Two Aussies in the field – Elia Connolly & Jacinta Beecher.

Best time was by Aminatou Seyni [Nigeria] in 21.98.

Ella Connolly I Heat 5 finished in 5^th position in 23.27 [DNQ}, while Jacinta Beecher, in Heat 6, finished in  3^rd position, in 23.22, and qualified for the semi final.

Women’s Triple Jump FINAL

Gold to: Yulimar Rojas [Venezuela] with 15.47;

Silver to: Shanieka Ricketts [Jamaica], 14.89;

Bronze to: Tori Franklin [USA], 14.72.

No Aussies competing.

Women’s Heptathlon 800 Metres

Won by Anna Hall [USA] in 2.06.67 [earned 1,014 pts]

Women’s Heptathlon FINAL RESULT after 7 events

Gold: Nafissator Thiam [Belgium] with 6,947 points;

Silver: Anouk Vettor [Netherlands] with 6,867 points; and

Brnnze: Anna Hall [USA] with 6,755 points [the first US competitor to win a medal in this event since 2001]

Men’s 3000 metre Steeplechase FINAL

No Aussies. 15 starters.

Gold to: Souffiane El Bakkali [Mar], 8.25.13

Silver to: Lamencha Girma [Ethiopia], 8.26.01; and

Bronze to:  Consesius Kipruto [Kenya], 8.27.92.

Women’s 1500 metre FINAL

13 starters, including 2 Aussies in the final.

Gold to: Faith Kipyegon [Kenya], 3.52.96;

Silver to: Gudaf Tsegay [Ethiopia], 3.54.52; and

Bronze to: Laura Muir [USA}, 3.55.28.

Australia’s Jessica Hull finished in 7^th position, with 4.01.82; and

Australia’s Georgia Griffiths, finished 9^th in 4.02.26.

Day 5, World Athletic Championships, 19^th July, Oregon, USA

Just the one session of events on Day 5.

Australia don’t generally win many medals at international events of this nature, because many of our athletes don’t get the opportunity to compete regularly at the ongoing European and US circuits through the year], but today saw an unexpected performance by an Aussie in the High Jump [following on from the Tokyo Silver medal won Nicola McDermott in this event].

Women’s High Jump FINAL

GOLD Medal  to Eleanor Patterson [Australia] [on a count back] with winning leap of 2.02 metres [Australian record & PB]. A brilliant performance in view that her first two attempts at 1.98 were failures [jumpers get three attempts at each height].

Silver Medal:  Yaroslava Mahuchikh [Ukraine], 2.02;

Bronze Medal:  Elena Vallortigarg [Italy], 2.00.

Australia’s Tokyo silver medallist, now named Nicola Olyslagers, finished in 5^th position,  at the height of 1.96.

Congratulations Eleanor.

Women’s 400 Metre Hurdles Heats

This event consisted of 5 heats – top 4 in each heat plus next best 4 progress to semi finals. Australia was represented by Sarah Carli, whom about 18 months suffered a serious accident which saw  a severed artery in her neck, urgent surgery repaired the damage eventually, and she went on to be a semi finalist at Tokyo last year.  Today she repeated that effort.

Fastest heat was the 3^rd won by Femke Bol [Netherlands] in 53.90, slightly faster than the World record  holder &Olympic champion, Sydney McLaughlin [USA] in 53.95.

In Heat 4, Sarah Carli finished in 3^rd spot in 55.89 [behind the winner, from the USA, Dalilah Muhammad {54.45], and in doing, she again qualified for the semi final.

Women’s 200 Metre Semi Finals

There were 3 semi finals,  first 2 in each, plus next 2 going to the Final. Three top class fields, all worthy of a Final.

SF 1: won by Shericka Jackson [Jamaica] in 21.67, ahead of Aminatou Seyas [Belgium], 22.04.  Australia’s Jacinta Beecher found the field a bit ‘hot’, finishing 8^th [of 8] in 23.14

SF 2: won by: Tamara Clark [USA]  in 21.95, ahead of Dina Asher-Smith [GBR, the defending champion] in 2.96, both defeated the favoured Elaine Thompson=Herah who misjudged her run, and missed out on automatic qualified, yet would still, on her time  of 21.97, make it to the Final

SF 3:  won by Shelley Fraser-Pryer [Jamaica], 21.82, ahead of Abby Steiner [USA] 22.15.

The next two fastest runners to reach the Final were Elaine Thompson-Herah [Jamaica] ,21.97, and Mujinga Kambundji [Switzerland], 22.05.

Men’s Discus Throw FINAL

Australia represented by Matthew Denny [Silver medallist at last Commonwealth Games].

Gold to: Kristjan Ceh [Slovenia], 71.13;  Silver to: Mykolas Alekna [Lithuania], 69.27 [in the medal presentations afterwards, his father, an official at this competition, and a previous winner in the event, announced his name]; and Bronze to: Andrius Gudzius [Lithuania],  67.55

Matthew Denny finished in 6^th position [of 12 starters] with a best throw of 66.47.

Men’s 200 Metre Semi Finals

Again, the 1^st 2 in each SF plus next 2 best.  Australia represented  by 18 yar old Calab Law.

SF 1: won by: Alexander Ogando [Dominican Republic], in 19.91; ahead of Joseph Fahnbulleh [Liberia], 19.92. Fred Kerley [USA} the 100 metre Winner, finished in 6^th place, possibly injured.

SF 2: won by Noah Lyles [USA} in 19.62 [he is the defending champion]; ahead of Kenneth Bednarek [USA], 19.84;

SF 3: won by: Erriyon Knighton [USA< 18 yo], 19.77; ahead of Aaron Brown [Canada], 20.10.

Australia’s Calab Law finished in  7^th position, in 20.72.

The other two runners to make the Final were Jareem Richards [Trinidad & Tobago], 19.86; and Luxolo Adans [Sth Africa], 20.09.

Men’s 1500 Metre FINAL

This event represented for Australia by Stewart McSweyn, who unfortunately eventually finished well back, in a brilliant 1500 metres won by a Brit [who seemed very surprised to have crossed the line in front ahead of a class field], the first to do so since Steve Cram’s win in 1983.

Gold to:  Jake Wightman [GBR] in 3.29.23;  Silver to Jakob Ingebrigtsen [Norway], 3.29.47; and Bronze to: Mohamad Katir [Spain], 3.29.90.

Australia’s Stewart McSweyn finished 9^th  [of 12]  in a time of 3.33.24.

Men’s 400 Metre Hurdle FINAL

A brilliant win in this Final by the favoured Brazilian over two Americans, for the medals.

Gold Medal to:  Alison Dos Santos [Brazil], 46.29;  Silver to: Rai Benjamin [USA], 46.89; and Bronze to: Trevor Bassitt [USA], 47.39. The Olympic champion, Karsten Warholm [Norway] finished back in 7^th place, 48.49.

And so concludes the Day 5 events – tomorrow [Thursday in Australia], another one session program of 8 events, including 2 women’s finals in the Discus and 3,000 metres Steeplechase.

Day 6, World Athletic Championships, 20^th July, Oregon, USA [USA time]

Just reflecting back on yesterday’s High Jump medal to Australia –  for me one of the high moments when Eleanor Patterson made the winning jump, was the sheer joy and excitement expressed by her fellow Aussie competitor, Nicola Olyslagers [who finished 5^th], so genuine  and pleased for her team mate, after she herself had won the Silver Medal at Tokyo.  Eleanor also paid tribute to the many Ukrainian athletes competing at the championships, including the girl who came second to herself in the High Jump, acknowledging what that nation was going through.

Women’s Javelin – Qualifying Event

Group A: best throw was by  Liveta Jasiunaite [Lithuania], 63.80

Australia’s  Mckenzie Little finished in 5^th position with a best throw of 59.66 [her three attempts: 55.74,52.34, 59.06, all below her PB of 63.18]

Group B; best throw was by Haruka Kitaguchi [Japan] with 64.32

Australia’s Kelsey-Lee Barber [the defending champion, and scored Bronze at Tokyo, her PB was 61.77], finished in 3^rd position with 61.27 [her throws – 58.02-61.27-57.71];

Australia’s Kathryn Mitchell [PB of  68.92], finished in 14^th position [of 15] with 53.09 [her throws: x-x-53.09].

Little qualified 12^th for the Final, and Barber qualified 5^th.

Women’s 5,000 Metre Heats

2 Heats over 12 ½ laps  –  1^st  5 in each heat plus next best 5

Heat 1 [18 starters] : won by Gudaf Tsegay [Ethiopia] in 14.52.64.

Australia’s Natalie Rule  unfortunately did not finish the race [her previous  PB time was 15.06.50]

Heat 2: won by  Letesenbet Giday [Ethiopia] in 14.52.27

Australia’s Rose Davies  [whose PB was 15.07.49] finished in 15^th position [of 19 starters] in 15.45.95.

Men’s 800 Metres Heats

6 heats – 1^st 3 in each heat plus next 6 fastest

Heat 1: won by Emmanuel Kipkurai Korir [Kenya]  in 1.49.05

Heat 2: won by  Australia’s Peter Nol [PB of 1.44.00]  in  1.45.50

[Peter made the final of this event at the Tokyo Games].

Heat 3: won by Moad Zahafi [Mar] in 1.46.15

Heat 4: won by Djamel Sedjati [Nigeria] in 1.46.39]

Heat 5: won by Marco Arop [Canada] in 1.44.56

Heat 6: won by Slimane Moula [Algeria] in 1.44.90

Women’s 400 Metres Hurdles Semi Finals

1^st 2 in each Semi Final plus next 2 fastest.

SF 1: won by  Dalilah Muhammad [USA, the defending champion] in 53.29

        2^nd: to Anna Ryzhykova [Ukraine] in 54.51

Australia’s Sarah Carli [PB of 55.09] finished in 7^th position [of 8] in 55.57

SF 2: won by: Femke Bol [Netherlands] in 52.84;

       2^nd: Shamier Little [US] in 53.61

SF 3: won by Sydney McLaughlin [USA] in 53.63

      2^nd:  Gianna Woodruff [Panama] in 53.69.

Two other qualifiers  were Rushell Clayton [Jamiaica], 53.63; and Britton Wilson [USA]. 53.72’

Women’s Discus FINAL

12 starters, no Aussies

Gold:  Bin Feng [China] with throw of 69.12 [her first attempt];

Silver: Sandra Perkovic [Croatia] with 68.45; and

Bronze: Valarie Allman [USA}, 68.30 [the expected winner], while the defending champion, Yaime Perez [Cuba] finished 7^th with 63.07.

Women’s 400 Metres Semi Finals

1^st 2 in each Semi Final plus next 2 fastest. No Aussies./

SF 1: won by  Shaunae Miller-Uibo [Bahamas] in 49.55;

        2^nd:  Candice McLeod [Jamaica] in 50.05.

SF 2: won by: Fiordalize Cofel [Dominican Republic] in 50.14

       2^nd:  Lieke Klaver [Netherlands] in 50.18

SF 3: won by  Mariliedy Paulino [Jamaica] in 49.98;

      2^nd:  Sada Williams [Barbados] in 50.12

Two other qualifiers: were Stephanie Ann McPherson [Jamaica], 50.56; and Anna Kielbasinska [Poland], 50.65.

Men’s 400 Metres Semi Finals

1^st 2 in each Semi Final plus next 2 fastest.

SF 1: won by Michael Norman [USA] in 44.30;

        2^nd:  Matthew Hudson-Smith [GBR] in 44.38

Australia’s Alex Beck [PB of 45.54] finished in 8^th position [of 8] in 48.21.

SF 2: won by: Kirani James [Grenada] in 44.74;

       2^nd:  Bayapo Ndori [Botswana] in 44.94

SF 3: won by  Champion  Allison [USA] in 44.71;

      2^nd: Wayde Vanb\ Niekerk [RSA} in 44.75.

Two other qualifiers were:

  Jonathan Jones [Bar] in 44.43; and Christopher Taylor [Jamaica] in 44.79.

Women’s 3,000 Metres Steeplechase Final

No Aussies.

Gold: Norah Jeruto [Kazkhstan]  in 8.53.02;

Silver: Werkuha Getachew [Ethiopia] in 8.54.51; and

Bronze: Mekides Abebe [Ethiopia] in 8.56.08.

Day 7, World Athletic Championships, 21^st July, from Heywood Field,  Oregon, USA.

USA Oregon  time is 17 hours behind the time here in the Australian eastern states, so as a retiree, I’m grateful for the opportunity to be able to watch, at least the afternoon sessions which usually range from around 10 am – 1 pm, out time.  With the cold Winter snap we are having here at present, I haven’t quite managed to catch any of the ‘Oregon morning sessions’, which means I’ve missed the Marathons  – which admittedly are not quite the same in this era, where we don’t have the Australian top marathon and/or long distance runners of years gone past  –  but, that may be starting to change!!

Anyway back to business – just the afternoon session today [21^st July in Oregon], with the two 200 Metre Finals to round off the program.

Men’s Javelin Qualification

2 Aussie competitors.

Group A: best throw by Neeraja Chopra [Indonesia] with throw of 88.39

Australia’s Crus Hogan [PB: 79.25] finished in 13^th position [of 14] with 73.03 [his three throws were 69.74 – 73.03 – x]

Group B:  best throw by Anderson Peters [Grenada] with 89.91

Australia’s Cameron McEntyre [PB: 81.96] finished in 11^th position [of 14] with 72.81 [his three throws were  x  – 72.81  -72.35].

Women’s 800 Metre Heats

1^st 3 in each heat & next 6 fastest to next stage. Three Aussie competitors.

Heat 1:  won by: Deribe Welteji [Ethiopia] in 1.58.83

Heat 2:  won by  Keely Hodginson {GBR] in 2.00.88.

Australia’s Catriona Bisset [PB: 1.58.019]. Fell in last 200 metre, tripped up attempting to get through a break  – to qualify for an appeal, she got up & finished the race in 2.22.25. I loved the way the eventual winner went straight to the Aussie after the latter had crossed the line, and comforted her.

Bisset subsequently appealed for re-instatement as did an Italian who tripped over the prone Australian on the track, though kept her feet.  After the appeal process, the Italian was re-instated into the semi-final, while the Aussie’s appeal was rejected, Bisset subsequently re-appealed against that decision, and as a result, was granted, and placed into the semi final field.

Heat 3:  won by  Athing Mu [USA] in 2.01.30;

Australia’s Tess Kirsopp-Cole [PB: 2.01.40] finished 7^th [of 7]  in 2.05.74 [DNQ];

Heat 4: won by  Renelle Lamoite [France]  in 2.00.91;

Heat 5: won by  Raevyn Rogers [USA] in 2.01.36

Australia’s Claudia Hollingsworth [PB: 2.01.60] finished in 8^th position [of 8] in 2.04.11 [DNQ]

Heat 6: won by  Natoya Goule [Jamaica]  in 2.00.06

Men’s 5,000 Metre Heats

1^st 5 in each heat plus next 5 fastest go into Final.  Two Aussie competitors.

Heat 1: won byOscar Chelimo [Uganda] in 13.24.24

Australia’s Ky Robinson [PB: 13.20.17]  finished in 8^th position [of 21 starters] in 13.27.03  – Robinson was 3^rd with 2 laps to go, dropped back from the leaders, then rebounded to challenge again in the last lap [maybe made his run too soon], as he  then faded back to 8^th in the straight.

Heat 2: won by Jacob Krop [Kenya] in 13.13.30;

Australia’s Matthew Ramsden [PB: 13.16.63]  finished in 16^th position [of 21] in 13.52.90.

Neither Australian qualified for the Final.

Men’s Triple Jump Qualification

No Aussies competing

Group A: best jump by Pedro Pichardo [Portugal] with 17.16;

Group B; best jump by Hugues Fabrice Zango [Burundi]  with 17.15

Men’s 800 Metre Semi Finals

 1^st 2 in each SF plus next 2 fastest to the Final.

Heat 1:

Won by:  Emmanuel Kipkurai Korir [Kenya]  in 1.45.38

2^nd:  Wyclife Kingamai Kisasy [Kenya] in 1.45.49

Australia’s Peter Bol: [PB: 1.44.00, currently holds the Australian record, and was 4^th in the Final at the Tokyo Olympics last year]. Finished in 3^rd position in 1.45.58, and had to wait until the completion of the heats to see if he’d qualified into the Final.

Heat 2:

Won by: Djamel Sedjati [Algeria] in 1.45.44;

2^nd:  Gabriel Tual [France] in 1.45.53

Heat 3:

Won by: Slimale Moula [Algeria] in 1.44.89

2^nd:  Marco Arop [Canada] in 1.45.12

Next two qualifiers were:

  Emmanuel Wanyonyi [Kenya] in 1.45.42; and

  Peter Bol [Australia] in 1.45.58

Women’s 200 Metre FINAL

Gold:  Shericka Jackson [Jamaica]  in 21.45;

Silver: Shelley-Ann Fraser-Pryce [Jamaica] in 21.81;

Bronze: Dina Asher-Smith [GBR]  in 22.02;  [she was the defending champion];

4^th: Aminatou Seyni [Nigeria] in 22.12;

5^th:Abby Steiner [USA} in 22.26;

6^th: Tamara Clark [USA] in 22.32;

7^th: Elaine Thompson=Herah [Jamaica] in 22.39; and

8^th: Mujinga Kambundji [Switzerland] in 22.55

Shericka Jackson, became the fastest living woman, jumping ahead of Thompson-Herah,and behind the late Florence Griffith Joyner

Men’s 200 Metre FINAL
Gold:  Noah Lyles [USA] in 19.31;

Silver: Kenneth Bednarek [USA] in 19.77;

Bronze: Erriyon Knighton [USA] in 19.80;

4^th: /Joseph Fahnbulleh [Liberia] in 19.84;

5^th: Alexander Ogando [Dominican Republic] in 19.93;

6^th: Jereem Richards [Trinidad & Tobago] in 20.08;

7^th: Aaron Brown [Canada] in 20.18; and

8^th:  Luxalo Adams [South Africa] in 20.47

Lyles was the defending champion. From this race, he became the third fastest man over the distance behind Usain Boly and Yohan Blake.

Finals tomorrow [22 July Oregon time] will be the Women’s Javelin Throw, the Men’s and Women’s 400 metres, and the Women’s 400 metre Hurdles.

Day 8, World Athletic Championships, 22^nd July, from Heywood Field,  Oregon, USA.

The day began at 6.15 am in Oregon with the Women’s 35km Walk, Amazingly, the result and order of medals was the same as a week ago in the 20km Walk,+

While for Australia, it was another successful day in the field by our Aussie girls, with a Javelin Gold Medal. Heart warming outcome.

Women’s 35 km Walk

One Aussie –  41 year old Kelly Ruddick, who apparently went into the race with a slight injury.

GOLD to:  Kimberly Garcia Leon [Peru]  in 2.39.10;

SILVER to: Katerzyna Zozieblo [Poland]  in 2.40.03; and

BRONZE to:  Shijie Qieyang [China] in 2.40.37.

Of the 41 starters, 35 completed the course [4 did not finish, 2 were disqualified.

Australia’s Kelly Ruddick finished in 34^th position in a time of 3.11.55.[her previous PB was 3.00.04].

Men’s Pole Vault Qualifying

Group A:

Best vault: by Christopher Nilsen [USA] with 5.75.

Australia’s Kurtis Marschall [PB of 5.87, ranked 16 in the world, and the reigning Commonwealth Games champion]  finished in 14^th position [of 17] with a best vault of 5.50. DNQ.

Group B.

Best vault:  by Oleg Zernikel [Germany] with 5.75

Women’s 4 x 100 Metre Relay Heats

1^st 3 of each heat plus two next fastest

Heat 1

1. Great Britain & Northern Ireland in 41.99;
2. Jamaica in 42.37; and
3. Germany in 42.44.

Heat 2

1. USA in 41.56;
2. Spain in 42.61; and
3. Nigeria in 42.68

Next 2 qualifiers were:

               Italy in 42.71; and

               Switzerland in 42.73

Men’s 4 x 100 Metre Relay Heats

1^st 3 of each heat plus two next fastest

Heat 1

1. USA in 37.87;
2. Great Britain & Northern Island in 38.49; and
3. Ghana in 38.58

Heat 2

1. France in 38.09;
2. Canada in 38.10; and
3. South Africa in 38.31

Next 2 qualifiers were:

              Jamaica in 38.33 [the defending champions & WR holder]; and

              Brazil, in 38.41

Women’s Javelin FINAL

Australia represented by 2 women – Mckenzie Little and Kelsey-Lee Barber, an event which saw Australia win it’s 2^nd Gold Medal of the championships

GOLD to:  Kelsey-Lee Barber [Australia] [the defending champion], winning throw of 66.91 [her throws being 62.67, 62.92, 66.91, 61.20]

SILVER to:  Kara Winger [USA] with 64.05; and

BRONZE to: Haruka Kitaguchi [Japan] with 63.27.

Australia’s Mckenzie Little [PB of 63.18]  finished in 5^th position [after initially in the Gold Medal spot] with a throw of 63.22 [her throws being 63.22 – 49.78 – 59.10  – 58.50 – 54.99 – x]

Women’s 800 Metre Semi Finals

1^st 2 in each SF plus next 2 fastest

SF 1:

1. Mary Moraa [Kenya] in 1.59.65;
2. Ajee Wilson [USA} in 1.59.98

SF 2:

1. Keely Hodginson [GBR] in 1.58.51;
2. Natoya Goule [Jamaica] in 1.58.7

Australia’s Catriona Bisset [PB of 1.58.09]  finished in 9^th position [of 9]. Our girl went into the race heavily bandaged with 11 stitches in her leg after her track race fall yesterday. She set a roaring pace leading into the second lap, but perhaps went tpoo fast early, and in the last 300 metres was overtaken, and faded to the rear of the field.

SF 3:

1. Athing Mu [USA] in 1.58.12
2. Diribe Welteji [Ethiopia] 1.58.16

Next 2 nest qualifiers

               Anita Horvat [Slovenia] in 1.59.60; and

               Raevyn Rogers [USA} in 1.58.77

Today’s program finished with three brilliant 400 Metre finals, with the final event producing an absolute smashing of the World Record [over the hurdles].  Eye-watering scenes.

Women’s 400 Metre FINAL

[No Aussies]

Gold to:  Shaunar Miller-Uibo [Bahamas] in 49.11;

Silver to;  Mariliedy Paulino [Dominican Republic] in 49.60;

Bronze to: Sada Williams [Barbados] in 49.75;

4^th to: Lieke Klaver [Netherlands] in 50.33;

5^th to: Stephanie Ann McPherson [Jamaica] in 50.36;

6^th to: Fiordaliza Cofil [Dominican Republic] in 50.57;

7^th to: Candice McLeod [Jamaica]  in 50.78, and

8^th to: Anne Kielbasinka [Poland] in 50.81.

The winner completed the full set of international Gold Medals, now having the World Youth, World Junior, World Indoor, and now, World Championship.

Men’s 400 Metre FINAL

[No Aussies]

Gold to:  Michael Norman [USA] in 44.29;

Silver to; Kirani James [Grenada] in 44.48;

Bronze to: Matthew Hudson-Smith [GBR] in 44.66;

4^th to” Champion Allison [USA} in 44.77;

5^th to: Wayde Van Niekerk [South Africa] in 44.97;

6^th: Bayapo Ndori [Bahamas] in 45.29;

7^th to: Christopher Taylor [Jamaica] in 45.30; and

8^th to: Jonathon Jones [Barbados] in 46.13.

Women’s 400 Metre Hurdles FINAL

[No Aussies]: The race of the meeting  –  described as ‘poetry in motion’, close to perfection, as the winner, and favourite, absolutely smashed the previous World Record, a brilliant run, irrespective of which country she was representing, brought tears to the eyes.

Gold to:  Sydney McLaughlin [USA} in  50.68 [WR];

Silver to; Femke Bol [Netherlands] in 52.27;

Bronze to:  Dalilah Muhammad [USA] in 53.13;

4^th to: Shamier Little [USA] in 53.76;

5^th to: Britton Wilson [USA] in 54.02;

6^th to: Rushell Clayton [Jamaica] in 54.36;

7^th to: Gianna Woodreuff [Panama] in 54.75; and

8^th to Anna Ryzhkova [Ukraine] in 54.93.

Two more days to go!!

Day 9, World Athletic Championships, 23rd July, from Heywood Field,  Oregon, USA.

Morning session

Men’s Decathlon  –  first 3 events [of ten disciplines]

Decathlon 100 Metres

Heat 1: won bhy Sander Skothem [Norway]  in 10.88 [888 pts];

Australia’s Daniel Gulubovic finished 2^nd in 10.99 [863 pts]

Heat 2, won by Ken Mullings [Bahamas] in 10.83 [899 pts];

Australia’s Cedric Dubler finished 2^nd in 10.93 [876 pts];

Heat 3:  won by Damian Warner [Canada] in 10.27 [1,030 pts];

Australia’s Ashley Moloney was 3^rd in 10.49 [977 pts]

Decathlon  Long Jump

Group A: won by Damian Warner [Canada][ with leap of 7.87 [985 pts];

Ashley Moloney was 8^th, with 7.46 [925 pts];

Group B:  won by Cedric Dubler with 7.56 [950 pts]

Daniel Gulubovic finished 8^th with 6.96 [804 pts]

Decathlon Shotput

Group A:  wo by Lindon Victor [Grenada] with Put of 16.29 [869 pts];

Daniel Gulubovic was 5^th with 15.00 [790 pts];

Group B: won by Maicel Uibo [Estonia], with 15.17 [800 pts];

Ashley Moloney was 7^th with 14.28 [745 pts]; and

Cedric Dubler was 11^th with 12.87 [659 pts].

Decathlon Table after 3 events

1^st: Damian Warner [Canada]  with 2,846 pts;

8^th: Ashley Maloney with 2,647 pts;

15^th: Cedric Dubler with 2,485 pts; and

18^th: Daniel Gulubovic with 2,457 pts.

Women’s 100 Metre Hurdles Heats

1^st 3 in each heat plus 6 next best to the semi-finals. Three Australian girls competing.

There were a number of hurdles crashes in these heats, including sadly, one of the Aussie girls.

Heat 1: won bgy Brittany Anderson [Jamaica] in 12.59;

Heat 2: won by Jasmine Camancho-Quinn [Pur] in 12.52

Heat 3: won by Tobi Amusan [Nigeria] in 12.40;

Australia’s Celeste Mucci [PB: 12.86] finished 4^th in 13.01 [qualified for semi final]

Heat 4: won by Pia Skrzyszowska [Poland] in 12.70;

Australia’s Liz Clay [PB: 12.91] , unfortunately fell early at the hurdles and DNF

Heat 5: won by Alia Armstrong [USA] in 12.48

Heat 6: won by Kendra Harriso [USA] in 12.60

Australia’s Michelle Jenneke [PB: 12.82] finished 3^rd in 12.84 , and qualified for semi final.

Women’s Long Jump Qualifying

Group A: 

won by Quanesha Burks [USA] with leap of 6.86

Australia’s Brooke Buschkuchi [PB:7.13] finished 4^th with 6.76 [Qualified for the Final]

Group B:

Won by Malaika Mihambo [Germany] with 6.84;

Australia’s Samantha Dale [PB: 6.70] finished in 12^th position with 6.04.[DNQ}

Evening Session

Men’s Decathlon Disciplines 4 and 5

Decathlon High Jump

Group A: won by Sander Skotheim [Norway]  with 2.17 [963 pts].

Cedric Dubler [PB: 2.15]  was 5^th with 2.08 [878 pts]

Group A: won by  Niklas Kaul [Germny] with 2.05 [850 pts].

Daniel Gulubovic [PB: 2.00]  was 7^th with 1.96 [767 pts]

Ashley Moloney [PB: 2.11]  was 8^th with 1.96 [767 pts]

Decathlon 400 Metres

Heat 1: won by Janek Oiglane [Estonia] in 49.16 [854 pts]

Heat 2: won by  Niklas Kaul [Germany] in 48.39 [890 pts]

Daniel Golubovic: [PB: 48.58] was 6^th in 49.44 [841 pts]

Heat 3: won by Ayaim Owens-Deferme [Pueto Rico] in 45.09 [1056 pts]

Ashley Moloney [PB: 45.82]  was 3^rd in 47.71 [923 pts]; and

Cedric Dubler [PB: 47.14] was 5^th in 47.71 [923 pts]

The Olympic Champion and event leader, Damian  Warner [Canada], collapsed on the track after 100 metres with hamstring injury or cramp, and did not finish the race, hence his championship attempt finished.

Women’s 4 x 400 Metre Heats

No Aussies. 1^st 3 in each heat plus 2 fastest

Heat 1;

1^st.  USA in  3.28.38

2^nd: Great Britain & Northern Ireland in 3.23.92

3^rd: France in 3.28.89

Heat 2:

1^st: Jamaica in 3.24.23

2^nd: Belgium in 3.28.02

3rd Canada in 3.28.49

Next two best

   Italy in 3.28.72;

   Switzerland in 3.29.11

Men’s 400 Metre Heats

No Aussies. 1^st 3 in each heat plus 2 fastest

Heat 1; 

1^st.  USA in 2.58.96

2^nd: Japan in 3.01.53; and

3^rd: Jamaica in 3.01.59

[Commentators remark after watching the USA win  – ‘as cool as the other side of the pillow’]

Heat 2:

1^st:  Belgium

2^nd: Czech Republic

3^rd: Poland

Next two best

   Trinidad & Tobago in 3.02.75;

   France in 3.03.13

Men’s Triple Jump FINAL

12 starters,  No Aussies.

Gold to: Pedro Pichardo [Portugal]  with jump of 17.95;

Silver to  Huques Fabrice Zengo [Burubdi], 17.55; and

Bronze to:  Yaming Zhu [China], 17.31

Men’s 800 Metre FINAL
Australia represented by Peter Bol [PB: 1.44.00]

Gold to: Emmanuel Kipkurui Korir [Kenya] in 1.43.71

Silver to: Djamel Sedjati [Algeria] in 1.44.14;

Bronze to: Marco Arop [Canada] in 1.44.28

4^th to: Emmanuel Wanyonyi [Kenya] in 1.44.54;  5^th to: Simane Moula [Algeria] in 1.44.85;  6^th to: Gabriel Tual [France] in 1.45.49;;  7^th to:  Peter Bol [Australia] in 1.45.75, and  8^th to: Wyclife Kinyamal Kisasy [Kenya] in 1.47.07;

Women’s 5,000 Metres FINAL

15 starters, No Aussies

The East African nations, particularly Kenya and Ethiopia, continue to dominate international longdistance running., today no exception.

Gold to: Gudf Tsegay [Ethiopia] in 14.46.29

Silver to: Beatrice Chebet [Kenya] in 14.46.75; and

Bronze to: Davit Seyaum [Ethiopia] in 14.47.6

Men’s Javelin FINAL

12 starters, No Aussies
Gold to:  Anderson Peters [Grenada] with throw of 90.54;

Silver to: Aceraj Chopra [Indonesia], 88.13; and

Bronze to: Jakub Vadlejch [Czech Republic], 88.09

Women’s 4 x 100 Metres Relay Final

Gold to: USA in 41.14;

Silver to: Jamaica in 41.18; and

Bronze to: Germany in 42.03

4^th: Nigeria [42.22]; 5^th: Spain [42.58]; Great Britain & Northern Ireland [42.75]; 7^th: Switzerland [42.81], and 8^th: Italy [42.92].

Men’s 4 x 100 Metres Relay Final

Gold to:  Canada, in 37.48;

Silver to: USA, in 37.55;

Bronze to: Great Britain & Northern Ireland, 37.83.

4^th: Jamaica [38.06]; 5^th: Ghana [38.07]; 6^th: South Africa [38.10]; 7Brazil [38.25]; and France were disqualified.^th:

Final day tomorrow, sees the second half of the Decathlon event [110 m Hurdles; Discus Throw; Pole Vault; Javelin Throw, and the 1500 metres], and Finals in all other events.

Day10, World Athletic Championships, 24th July, from Heywood Field,  Oregon, USA [Final Day of events]

Morning session

Men’s 35 KM Race Walk

50 starters including Ryan Cowley and Carl Gibbons for Australia,

Gold to: Massimo Stano [Italy]  in 2.23.14

Silver to: Masatora Kawano [Japan] in 2.23.15; and

Bronze to: Perseus Karlstrom [Sweden] in 2.23.44

Australia’s Ryan Cowley [PB: 2.37.57] finished in 18^th position, in 2.30.34, while unfortunately,  Australia’s Carl Gibbons [PB: 2.43.04] did not finish.

Of the 50 starters, 40 completed the course [5 did not finish, and 5 were disqualified during the race]

Decathlon 110 Metre Hurdle Heats

Heat 1: won by: Johannes Erm [Estonia] in 14.38 [926 pts]

Heat 2: won by: Ken Mullings [Bahamas] in 14.02 [972 pts]./

Australia’s  Ashley Moloney [PB: 14.08] finished  in 5^th position in 14.46 [916 pts]

Heat 3: won by: Pierce LePage [Canada] in 13.78 [1003 pts]

Australia’s Daniel Golubovic [PB: 14.02] finished 3^rd in 13.92 [985 pts], and  Australia’s Cedric Dubler [PB: 13.86] finished 6^th in 14.28 [939 pts]

Decathlon Discus Throw

Group A: won by: Jiri Sykora [Czech Republic] with 54.39 [962 pts];

Australia’s Cedric Dubler [PB: 46.01] finished 5^th with 42.88 [723 pts], and  Australia’s  Ashley Moloney [PB: 45.11] was 6^th with 42.45 [715 pts]

Group B: won by Lindon Victor [Canada] with 53.92 [952 pts].

Australia’s Daniel Golubovic [PB:51.26] finished 4^th with 46.37 [795 pts]

Decathlon Pole Vault

Group A: won by: Kevin Mayer [Canada] with vault of 5.40 [1035 pts].

Australia’s Cedric Dubler [PB: 5.20] was 4^th with 5.10 [941 pts], while  Australia’s  Ashley Moloney [PB: 5.10] did not register a height.

Group B: won by  Pierce Le Page [Canada] with 5.00 [910 pts].

Australia’s Daniel Golubovic [PB:5.05] was 8^th with 4.60 [790 pts]

Evening Session

Decathlon Javelin Throw

Group A: won by:  Kevin Mayer [Canada] [894 pts] with throw of 70.31

Australia’s Cedric Dubler finished 8^th with 5476 [659 pts]

Group B: won by Niklas Kaul [Germany] with 69.74 [885 pts]

Australia’s  Daniel Golubovic was 5^th with 56.75 [689 pts]

Women’s 100 Metres Hurdles Semi Finals

1^st 2 of each heat plus 2 next fastest

The first heat – a brilliant race with all 8 runners achieving records of some sort – including the WORLD RECORD by the winner – in a ‘semi final’!!

Heat 1:

1^st:  Tobi Amusan [Nigeria] in WR time of 12.12 seconds

2^nd:  Kendra Harrison [USA} in 12.27

Australia’s Michelle Jenneke [PB: 12.82] finished 5^th in a new Personal Best time of 12.66

Heat 2:

1^st:  won by Alia Armstrong  [USA} i 12.43

2^nd:  Devynne Charlton [Bahamas] in 12.46

Australia’s Celeste Mucci [PB: 12.96] was unfortunately Disqualified, not sure why, perhaps out of her lane?

Heat 1:

1^st:  Brittany Anderson [Jamaic] in 12.3

2^nd: Jasmine Camancho-Quinn [Puetto Rico] in 12.32

Next best two:

Danielle Williams [Jamaica] in 12.41; and  Cindy Sember [GBR] in 12.50.

Men’s Pole Vault FINAL

No Aussies. .

Gold to: Armand DuPlantis [Sweden] with a World Record vault of 6.21;

Silver to:  Christopher Nilsen [USA], with 5.94; and

Bronze to: Ernest John Obiena [Philippines], 5.94

Women’s Long Jump FINAL

12 starters, best 8 go into a final round.

Australia represented by Brooke Buschkuehl [formerly Stratton]

Gold to:  Malaika Mhambo [Germany] with jump of 7.12 metres;

Silver to: Ese Brume [Nigeria] with 7.02; and

Bronze to:  Letitia Oro Melo [Brazil] with 6.89

Australia’s Brooke Buschkuehl [PB: 7.13], just missed a medal, as she  finished in 5^th position with a best jump of 6.87 metres.

Men’s 5,000 Metres FINAL

No Aussies. 15 starters. Yet another magnificent distance race, with the crowd volume and noise at a constant level throughout the race, for the whole 5,000 metres.  A brilliant run by the Norwegian who out-ran the powerful African contingent.

Gold to: Jakob Ingebrigtsen [Norway] in 13.09.24

Silver to:  Jacob Krop [Kenya] in 13.09.98

Bronze to:  Oscar Chelimo [Uganda] in 13.10.20

Women’s 800 Metres FINAL

No Aussies. 8 starters

Gold to:  Athing Mu [USA] in 1.56.30

Silver to: Keely Hodginson [GBR] in 1.56.38

Bronze to: Mary Moraa [Kenya] in 1.56.71

4^th:  Diribe Welteji [Ethiopia] in 1.57.02;

5^th: Natoya Goule [Jamaica] in 1.57.90

6^th: Raevyn Rogers [USA] in 1.58.26;

7^th: Anita Horvat [Slovenia] in 1.59.83; and

8^th: Ajee Wilson  [USA] in 2.00.19

Women’s 100 Metres Hurdles FINAL

After we saw a new World Record in the semi-final, that record was broken again, in this Final, although because of an adverse wind reading, was not officially recognised as such, yet the time was retained!!

Gold to:  Tobi Amusan [Nigeria], another World Record of 12.06;

Silver to: Brittanty Anderson [Jamaica] in 12.23; and

Bronze to: Jasmine Camancho-Quinn [Puerto Rico] in 12.23;

4^th:  Alia Armstrong [USA] in 12.31; 5^th: Cindy Sember [GBR] in 12.38; 6^th: Danielle Williams [Jamaica] in 12.44; and 7^th: Devynne Charlton [Bahamas] in 12.53. Kendra Harrison [USA] was disqualified.

Men’s Decathlon 1,500 Metres

[Leader of the event  before this race was Kevin Mayer [France]

Won by  Ayden Owens-Delerme [Pueto Rico]  in 4.13.02;

Australia’s Daniel Gulobovic finished 5^th in 4037.26; and  Cedric Dubler was 6^th, in 4.37.26

Men’s Decathlon – final result FINAL [after 10 events]

Gold to: Keven Mayer [France] with total score of 8,816 poinhts;

Silver to: Pierce Le Page [Canada] with score of 8,701 points; and

Bronze to: Zachery Ziemek [USA], with 8,676 points.

Australia’s Cedric Dubler, finished in 8^th position, with 8,246 points;

Australia’s Daniel Golubovic, finished 14^th, with 8,071 points.

Australia’s Ashley Moloney did not complete the Pole Vault, and was subsequently eliminated from the overall Decathlon event, as were 4 others of the 23 starters, including the favourite Damian Warner, who failed to complete the 400 metres run.

Men’s 4 x 400 metres Relay FINAL

9 teams, after Botswana, disqualified in the semi final, were reinstated into the final.

Gold to: USA in 2.56.17;

Silver to: Jamaica in 2.58.58;

Bronze to: Belgium in 2.58.72

4^th: Japan in 2.59.51; 5^th: Trinidad & Tobago in 3.00.03; 6^th: Botswanna in 3.00.14; 7^th: France in 3.01.35; 

Women’s 4 x 400 Metres Relay FINAL

8 teams in the final.

Gold to:  USA in 3.17.79;

Silver to: Jamaica in 3.20.74; and

Bronze to:  GBR in 3.22.64

4^th: Canada [3.25.18]; 5^th: France [3.25.81]; 6^th: Belgium [3.26.29]; 7^th: Italy [3.26.45]; and, 8^th: Switzerland [3.27.81]

FINAL MEDAL TALLY FOR  2022 WORLD ATHLETICS CHAMPIONSHIPS

A total of 45 nations won medals of one or other colour during the meeting

Final top ten results were  –  Nation –  Gold Medals  –  Silver Medals  –  Bronze Medals [Total]

1. USA                          12   –   9   –  11    [33];
2. Ethiopia:                     4   –   4   –   2     [10]
3. Jamaica                       2   –    7   –   9     [18]
4. Kenya                         2   –    5   –   3    [10]
5. PR of China                2   –    1  –    3    [6]
6. AUSTRALIA             2    –    0   –   1   [3]
7. Peru                            2   –     0   –   0    [2]
8. Poland                        1   –     3   –   0   [4]
9. Canada & Japan         1    –    2   –   1   [4]

There were 17 other individual nations won at least one Gold Medal  during the championships

Australia’s three medals were won by or girls in the field competition  –  Gold to Eleanor Patterson [High Jump], Kelsey Lee-Barber [Javelin], and Bronze to Nina Kennedy [Pole Vault]

Bring on the Commonwealth Games

I recently noted that the winner of Eurovision this year was as expected –  a vote from the heart, a sympathy vote, a vote of support for that beleaguered nation.  The Ukrainian act was a deserving performance, as recognised by the fact that the official judging panel placed them in the top six acts of 25 finalists, but the public vote of sympathy took the performance well out of the reach of any of the other acts, including the clear initial leader [the United Kingdom].

There’s another art form where similarly, I sometimes feel, that public sentiment or the need to satisfy it and the political correctness of the day rides over some of more deserving contributions from a purely artistic point of view. I don’t claim any expertise, and obviously different opinions exist  to all manner of awards. In this instance, I’m speaking about the highly recognised Archibald Prize, Australia’s premier portrait painting award. which celebrated 100 years recently. This may not interest anyone out there, but I’ll continue anyway.

Writing in the Weekend Australian on the 14^th May, that paper’s national art critic, Christopher Allen, expressed some very strong views [some might suggest, harsh views] about this year’s Archibald Prize, awarded last week.

The winner was artist Blak Douglas with his portrait of his friend, Lismore-based artist Karla Dickens, standing in muddy flood water and holding two leaking buckets.

I imagine other critics may have a completely different view, to what follows, but I found it interesting and something worth sharing. The article is headed ‘Political gesture’ the art of cruelty’.

So, in reflecting on  this year’s Award, Allen wrote:

“What can one say to the trustees of the Art Gallery of NSW? Stop it or you’ll go blind?

The intensity of the ideological self-indulgence would be amusing if it weren’t also so sad.

But alas, they couldn’t bring themselves to award the Archibald Prize to the best picture when there was the irresistible temptation of a work by a black artist whose subject was a black woman. As a bonus, they got a reference to the Lismore floods.

Progressive signalling and compassion all at once!

In the process, they have gratuitously insulted Robert Hannaford yet again. His self-portrait is clearly the outstanding work in this year’s exhibition, far better than the winner on any set of criteria: it demonstrates much greater mastery of the technical art of painting, but also and more importantly it is superior in character, sense of inner life and humanity.

I have been in touch with many professional artists over the past week and the quality of Hannaford’s painting was obvious to all of them.

To overlook Hannaford again feels pointed, like a deliberate act of cruelty as well as stupidity. But it seems the trustees couldn’t bear to select an artist who happened to be male and white.  It is as though, in some perverse logic, Hannaford had to be made to pay for all the imagined wickedness of humans who fall into those two categories.

He becomes a scapegoat immolated by rich and privileged people to make a show of dubious contrition for their own privilege.

But beyond the personal insult to a distinguished  artist who has too often been overlooked in favour  of third-rate pictures, the trustees have made it clear they have no interest in supporting good art; they are only concerned to make vacuous political gestures, in the process once more rewarding the most over-rewarded categories of artists in Australia today.

The result is a travesty, and it is further evidence to support my suggestion that the Archibald be transferred to more competent judges. It should be selected and judged by a panel – however constituted – of professional portrait painters, the kind that people actually commission when they want a good portrait.

These painters could be counted on to choose both the finalists and the eventual winner on more solid criteria than rich would-be progressives whitewashing their wealth with smug ideological choices”.

Strong words indeed, and no doubt, someone will take offence and want to accuse Allen of racial vilification or something similar, in this modern world, where a word out of place, or a slightly different opinion,  or hint of criticism, is so often attacked as coming from some racially based  or other motive. Sometimes, a political gesture’ needs to be called out too!!  We’ve had plenty of those over recent months!

Following – the winner, and the Robert Hannaford self portrait

Readers can form their own opinion as to which of these portraits is the more deserving!

In this contribution, I make reference to a number of books and publications read over recent weeks

• ‘7 ½’ by Christos Tsiolkas;
• ‘Philanthropy in Ballarat by Doug Bradby;
• ‘The New Kingdom’ by Wilbur Smith;
• The Accidental Prime Minister [by Annika Smethurst;
•  The Game [by Sean Kelly].;
• ‘A Narrative of Denial: Australia and the Indonesian Violation of East Timor’  by Peter Job;
• ‘The Wimmera: A journey through Western Victoria’;
•  “Corporal Hitler’s Pistol’ by Tom Keneally,
• Australian Foreign Affairs, Issue 14: The Taiwan Choice.

7 ½  by Christos Tsiolkas

Published in 2021, 344 pages:  early on in this book, I felt as though I didn’t wish to keep reading  – there seemed to be so much emphasise on the subjects of body odours, under-arm smells, and vivid depictions of sex between men in particular, and constant references to the male anatomy  –  I just felt the whole tone of the author’s writings to be distasteful and over-done.

And yet the praise for the book from people like Helen Garner and Charlotte Wood, established writers in their own way, were full of flowing praise –  ‘so personal, so delicate, so true’ –  ‘a scorching, mythic work with a heart of the sweetest intimacy’.   I came to realise there was much more to the book than that which  I personally found distasteful  –  as also noted on the back cover  ‘ “A breathtaking audacious novel….about finding joy and beauty in a raging and punitive world, about the refractions of memory and time and, most subversive of all, about the mystery of art and its creation’ – on that aspect, so much outstanding references to art and music, nature and birds, the ocean.

So yes, those latter aspects did come to dominate and depict the storyline, and while the subject matter which had initially annoyed this reader, continued to ‘intrude’ from time to time, I had to admit in the end, I enjoyed the book, and found so many of the writer’s reflections on art, music, and nature quite exhilarating

As ‘Google Books’ notes – “An audacious and transformative novel about the past, the present and the power of writing and imagination from the award-winning author of Damascus and The Slap. Art is not only about rage and justice and politics. It is also about pleasure and joy; it is also about beauty”

[Occasionally, as noted previously, the writer’s idea of ‘beauty’ didn’t always quite align with mine!].

Meanwhile, a Goodreads summary tells us that “A man arrives at a house on the coast to write a book. Separated from his lover and family and friends, he finds the solitude he craves in the pyrotechnic beauty of nature, just as the world he has shut out is experiencing a cataclysmic shift. The preoccupations that have galvanised him and his work fall away, and he becomes lost in memory and beauty …  He also begins to tell us a story … A retired porn star is made an offer he can’t refuse for the sake of his family and future. So he returns to the world he fled years before, all too aware of the danger of opening the door to past temptations and long-buried desires. Can he resist the oblivion and bliss they promise?”

One reviewer, Maks Sipowicz writes as follows:

In his latest novel, 7½, Christos Tsiolkas declares that he is tired of the lofty ambitions many novelists hold of writing about things such as politics, sexuality, race, history, gender, morality, or the future. ‘All of them now bore me,’ he writes. Instead, his goal is to write about beauty. 

7½ blends three stories. The first is about Tsiolkas himself, reflecting on the process of writing, the things that drive and motivate his interests, and his exhaustion with the political thinking permeating every aspect of art (as he sees it). The second is about younger versions of himself, in a series of vignettes about his youth, his coming to discover his sexuality and realising the beauty and sensitivity to be found in the pursuit and satisfaction of desire. The third, and most important, about a retired bisexual porn actor, who returns to Los Angeles from his home in regional Australia at the behest of an ageing fan wishing to experience in person the desire the actor inflamed in him from the screen.

These three intertwining stories amount to a reflection on desire and on finding beauty in oneself and other people. I found the passages about young Tsiolkas to be particularly engrossing, as the author recounted with love for his past self the key moments that made him. Altogether, the three stories are evocative of the strength of nascent feeling, the kind that comes with the passage from youth into adulthood when every emotion is felt much more keenly than later in adulthood. The blend of autofiction with pure imagination is very effective in this. His experience is informed by both the experience he brings back from memory, of his early youth and the discovery of his desires and the pleasures that come from their satisfaction, and by the story he invents of the porn actor. In turn, the story he invents is informed by the author’s memory, as he consciously places people and sensations from himself into his fiction. 

In trying to write about beauty, Tsiolkas’ strategy of cycling through the three storylines is an effective device for avoiding bland platitude. Instead of merely pointing to beautiful things, such as a young boy’s early desires, a middle-aged man’s love of his wife, or his own experience of beauty in nature, Tsiolkas builds a contrast between the beautiful and the ugly and shocks us into accepting that the two are not mutually exclusive. He reminds us that beauty is to be found in unexpected places. In this, I found 7½ to be a novel encouraging of quiet reflection which can spur the reader into reflecting on their own memories and finding beauty therein.”

A novel well worth a read, particularly if you are more tolerant of some the areas [which in the end, formed a minor part of the book] which  I found a little distasteful.    

‘Philanthropy in Ballarat: Irrespective of Creed, Country or Colour’ by Doug Bradby.

Something very different to Tsiolkas, and a brief read  –  part of a series of historical booklets about the City of Ballarat by this author.

As noted in the booklet, there has always been poverty in Ballarat and there has always been those who strive to relieve the suffering of those in need’  Reading this booklet, I was particularly interested in the reference to  the ‘opposition’ expressed and enacted against the  Salvation Army bands marching in the streets of Ballarat in it’s earlier years, and some female members being actually jailed for doing so. Not so philanthropic, certainly on the part of the Mayor of the day who seem to be the main instigator because a ‘licence ‘ to ‘march’ hadn’t been obtained!!  [p.30/31].;

‘The New Kingdom’  by Wilbur Smith [published in 2021]., 407 pages.

 Another enthralling novel by Smith, full of the usual mix of historical fiction, war, love, betrayal, bloodthirsty descriptions, and so on. Historical fiction has always being one of  the Coachbuilder’s favoured genres of writing, the opportunity to learn new aspects of history, whilst recognising of course that this has been interpreted through fictional families and storylines.

Born in 1933, we sadly lost Wilbur Smith, aged 88 years in November 2021, and this was one of his final books, published in the year of his death. Born in Zambia, he was a British-South African novelist specialising in historical fiction about international involvement in Southern Africa across four centuries, seen from the viewpoints of both black and white families. By the time of his death in 2021 he had published 49 books [most of which I have purchased and read since 1973] and had sold more than 140 million copies.

Let’s just incorporate one summary/review of the book, this time from QBD Books  –  “A brand-new Egyptian novel from the master of adventure fiction, Wilbur Smith.  In the heart of Egypt under the watchful eye of the gods a new power is rising  In the city of Lahun, Hui lives an enchanted life. The favoured son of a doting father, and ruler-in-waiting of the great city, his fate is set. But behind the beautiful facades a sinister evil is plotting. Craving power and embittered by jealousy, Hui’s stepmother, the great sorceress Isetnofret, and Hui’s own brother Qen, orchestrate the downfall of Hui’s father, condemning Hui and seizing power in the city.
Cast out and alone, Hui finds himself a captive of a skilled and powerful army of outlaws, the Hyksos. Determined to seek vengeance for the death of his father and rescue his sister, Ipwet, Hui swears his allegiance to these enemies of Egypt. Through them he learns the art of war, learning how to fight and becoming an envied charioteer.  But soon Hui finds himself in an even greater battle – one for the very heart of Egypt itself. As the pieces fall into place and the Gods themselves join the fray, Hui finds himself fighting alongside the Egyptian General Tanus and renowned Mage, Taita. Now Hui must choose his path – will he be a hero in the old world, or a master in a new kingdom?”.

Another great read from Smith –  though he, as always, never ‘draws back’ from his vivid descriptions of violence, bloodshed, sex, and love, all combined with brilliant interpretations of history, whether imagined or real.

Recently, I completed reading the two recent Scott Morrison biographies [both published in 2021], the second one, finished reading within 36 hours of it’s purchase.! 

• The Accidental Prime Minister [by Annika Smethurst], and,
• The Game [by Sean Kelly].

Two very differently formatted books – the former, going through Morrison’s life in typical   chronological order with strong emphasise on recent years, while the second, described as a Portrait, consisting of various chapters under a range of titles, with no specific chronological approach attempted.

Two interesting brief descriptions by prominent female journalists are highlighted on the cover jackets of each book:  Smethurst’s book is described by Laura Tingle as “A penetrating study of relentless ambition and making ‘ordinary’ the new political norm, none of it edifying, all of it essential reading’”  while Kelly’s book is described by Niki Savva as “Engrossing, illuminating and often disquieting”.

Two very apt descriptions, because yes, I did find much of the material not particularly admirable!  In both cases, I found these books an ‘easy read’, in comparison, for eg, to the average lengthy and detailed political biography, and not because of paucity of material, but simply the style of authorship, which kept you interested and keen to continue reading.

‘The Accidental Prime Minister’ certainly doesn’t lack detail, and in typical bio fashion traces Morrison’s life through that of his parents and earlier generations to himself.  It relates, through the various ‘life stage’ chapters the growth and development of his particular personality traits, his search for power,  and how this growth related to his involvement with work colleagues in his early years, and with the various prime ministers, and other politicians that preceded him leading up to his involvement in politics before actually entering the field as a member of parliament. There’s a full reflection of his times, in particular, as Immigration Minister, before moving into the social welfare area [perhaps a welcome attempt to soften the impression of  ‘hardness’ created in his previous role], and then onto the Treasurer, and finally, the rise to the position of Prime Minister.  Throughout these stages, the use and development of the various ‘traits’ with which he is so often identified today, are revealed and demonstrated.

‘The Game’ especially provides some interesting perspectives on the man, and in many ways, reflect much of the ‘tone’ of Kelly’s writing. Three examples of many throughout the book, I copy below, and quite obviously, it needs be understood that these should really be read within the overall context of the chapter or section of the book from which they are taken.

• From pps 248-249, we read  “By this point in Morrison’s prime ministership, a set of recurring traits is clearly visible. There is the dependence on tactics, a sense that politics is a game to be won.  There is an overreliance on cheery platitudes in the place of serious thought.  There is the inability to see out from his own narrow view of the world, his tendency to focus on those that remind him of himself, and the defensiveness that arises when he is asked to do otherwise. Most importantly, there is a stubborn, reality-denying belief that everything will turn out well”.
• Earlier, on page 91 – “If you throw yourself into a performance, then you can, at least temporarily, come to believe that the performance is real. This does not require delusion. You know that you have said something, but, at the same time, you believe that you never said such a thing. There are two frames, and you are capable of existing in both at once: the frame in which the world is as you say it is, because you are the prime minister, and the frame in which facts dominate. Morrison’s particular skill is to toggle back and forth between these frames as necessary, to believe whichever needs to be believed.”
• Finally, on page 102: “He never feels, in himself, insincere or untruthful, because he always means exactly what he says; it is just that he means it only in the moment he is saying it. Past and future disappear”.

I guess we can say that those sort of quotations give some kind of authenticity to the way that much of Australia over the past couple of years in particular, view the Prime Minister, either fairly, or not!   I’ve selected one particular review, from many, in each case, to perhaps provide an indication of what the ‘professional’ critics feel about the writings in these two books, and whether those comments reflect in broad terms the feelings of the general populace.

Michael Rowland, writing for the ABC [on the Smethurst book]:

Much has been made of how Scott Morrison unexpectedly became Prime Minister at the end of that week of Liberal Party turmoil in August 2018.

How he was, just like Australian Olympic skater Steven Bradbury, the last man standing in a contest that had seen the other competitors fall over before the finish line.

But, as political journalist Annika Smethurst notes in her absorbing biography of Morrison, The Accidental Prime Minister, that would be to overlook a few things.

Just like the surprise gold medallist in the 2002 Winter Olympics, the man from The Shire had spent many years preparing to be in a position to succeed when his competitors tumbled.

Smethurst’s book is an uncompromising account of Morrison’s life, and how he amassed steadfast allies and bitter enemies in equal measure along his path to the top job.

here are friends who talk about the loveable suburban dad; a man lacking in pretense who has an innate understanding of how “ordinary” Australians think.

Then there are the political colleagues who take aim at the ruthlessness and scheming they insist marked his rise in Canberra.

In the words of one unnamed minister quoted in the book, Scott Morrison is “volatile, sly and untrustworthy”.

The book takes a look at what was a faltering start to Morrison’s professional life.

Armed with a science degree from the University of New South Wales, the young graduate and devout Christian dreamt of a life studying theology, but ended up in a string of corporate jobs in both Australia and New Zealand.

A successful stint as state director of the NSW Liberal Party was followed by a not-so-glorious period as managing director of Tourism Australia, a body funded by the federal government.

methurst charts the tumultuous events that led to Morrison’s sacking by the Tourism Australia board halfway through his three-year contract.

“He really didn’t see it, and he was gutted,” says one of his friends.

An assertive Morrison had a tense relationship with then tourism minister Fran Bailey and it is clear the bad blood continues to flow nearly 20 years later.

Bitterness also marked Morrison’s entry into Parliament in 2007.

We are taken back to the extremely unpleasant Liberal preselection contest for the safe seat of Cook, based around Cronulla in Sydney’s south.

Amid a flurry of damaging allegations thrown around by all sides, Morrison was defeated in the first round of voting.

The successful candidate, Michael Towke, was subsequently dumped by the party’s state executive, with Morrison triumphant in the second ballot.

Smethurst then proceeds to chart what she describes as a “relentless pursuit of power” that took Morrison all the way from the backbench to The Lodge.

Not formally aligned with any particular Liberal Party faction, Morrison always favoured pragmatism over ideology as he climbed through the ranks.

But underlying it all was a ruthless streak that sometimes got him into trouble.

Like the time when, as the opposition’s immigration spokesman in 2010, he attacked the then Labor government for flying detainees from Christmas Island to Sydney for the funerals of family members who had died in the sinking of a boat packed with asylum seekers.

Smethurst says the “heartless misstep” nearly cost him his job.

There were also questions over how Morrison reconciled this hard-line stance in opposition, and later as immigration minister, with his Christian faith.

We learn, through confidants, how Morrison first raised the idea of getting rid of Tony Abbott within 12 months of the Coalition’s 2013 election win, and how he clashed with Treasurer Joe Hockey.

One long-serving Liberal minister describes Morrison as a “predator intent on dominance”.

Morrison threw his support behind Malcolm Turnbull because it would give him the best chance of taking over from Hockey and move him “one step closer to the prime ministership”.

The 2015 leadership change duly installed Morrison as treasurer.

e was viewed by colleagues as a hard worker and a strong communicator, but before long frustrations were building within Turnbull’s office about Morrison frontrunning economic policy through the media, primarily the News Corp tabloids.

In that frantic final week of Turnbull’s prime ministership, Morrison publicly supported his leader, while keeping a close eye on the shifting numbers in the party room.

This relentless ambition had finally secured Morrison the ultimate political prize.

As have many of his internal Liberal opponents, the Bill Shorten-led Labor party fatally underestimated Morrison in the 2019 election, handing the Coalition another term in office.

Smethurst rounds out the book with a critical look at the past two years.

She identifies a tendency by Morrison to blame-shift when he’s under pressure, from his initial mishandling of the Black Summer bushfire crisis to the trouble-plagued COVID vaccine rollout.

Smethurst – who has worked with News Corp and now the Nine newspapers — also gives us some revealing insights into Morrison’s working relationships with women.

She says a “common sentiment expressed by female colleagues was that they felt excluded, overlooked and even ignored while Morrison was in the room”.

One female Coalition frontbencher goes as far as describing the Prime Minister as a “deeply ingrained chauvinist”.

At the same time, Morrison is credited with having a Herculean work ethic, and possessing a deep understanding of what gets through to mainstream Australians.

At critical points in his political career, he has made his own luck.

Reading Smethurst’s exhaustive biography gives you a much better insight into a man whose ascendancy appears to be anything but accidental.

From ‘The Conversation’ on ‘The Game’; [by William West]

“How can you tell if a politician is lying?” It is a favourite joke of my grandfather’s, and the punchline is all too obvious: “His mouth will be moving.”

The joke gives succinct expression to a cynicism that has shaped Australian politics since the introduction of self-government in the 1850s. The implication, of both the joke and the culture informing it, is that the politician’s lies reflect solely on their kind and reveal nothing about the rest of us.

In his newly published profile of Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Sean Kelly flips this way of thinking on its head. The Game offers many powerful and revealing insights into Morrison’s career and the tricky political tactics that have characterised it. But the most important revelations in this book are about the society that created our prime minister, and the structures and cultures that facilitated his path to the Lodge.

Kelly explains, for example, that Morrison worked hard to be a “blank canvas” in the public eye until perhaps 2015, at which point he became the more recognisable suburban “good bloke down the road”.

This persona, replete with the “ScoMo” nickname, has characterised his public performances ever since. But the performance only matters because it finds in the Australian community “a willing audience” who, recently at least, like to have what novelist E.M. Forster called “flat characters” (or instantly recognisable “types”) in their newspapers and their parliaments.

Formerly a self-described “spin doctor” for both Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard, Kelly studies Morrison’s public persona not just with the eye of a Canberra insider, but also with the lens of a cultural critic. In this “land of extremes”, he says, Australians are

always splitting ourselves in two, then ignoring the half that discomfits us.

For Kelly, this mentality explains why the so-called “quiet Australians” have indulged “the game” that Morrison plays, while the others have rejected him entirely (“I am completely different”).

Given Kelly’s Labor connections, cynics might expect a partisan hit-job on the prime minister. This portrait is no hit-job, but it is, unsurprisingly, unflattering.

Kelly gives Morrison the benefit of the doubt with respect to the early stages of the pandemic, “a situation unlike anything those involved had dealt with before”. There is recognition, too, of the burdens that Jenny Morrison and her daughters have borne in service of public life. But the portrait of Morrison himself is a study of duplicity and hollowness.

There are criticisms of Morrison’s more tone-deaf and morally dubious performances, none more so than the forced handshakes with reluctant bushfire survivors and firefighters during that black summer of 2019-20.

But the most important conclusion about Morrison in this book relates to the way he thinks. Kelly suggests Morrison’s mind does not think in narratives, but only in images or snapshots (think of the punchline of the tourism ad he commissioned, “Where the bloody hell are ya?”). This, Kelly reasons, is why he can say one thing with such apparent conviction today, and the opposite with equal fervour tomorrow.

For a public figure, this inconsistency would be impossible “if it were not a central aspect of their experience of the world”. The psychological analysis here is sweeping, its inferences devastating.

There are many praiseworthy qualities in Kelly’s study. Serious issues, from asylum-seeker policy to the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccine roll-out, are given ample coverage. But this is no traditional biography, and these debates are not its central concern.

The main subject of this book is the performance of politics itself, and the narratives that mediate the public’s relationship with its representatives. The idea of “performance” seems resurgent in political theory and history, and its capacity for revelation is rich.

In some ways, Kelly’s book builds on an older tradition of political profiles that took performance as their main subject. Graham Little’s Strong Leadership (1988) and Judith Brett’s Robert Menzies’ Forgotten People (1992) stand tall in that tradition, using psychosocial theory to unpack the hearts and minds of Australian liberals from Menzies to Malcolm Fraser. Don Watson’s Recollections of a Bleeding Heart (2002) is equally important, part-memoir, part-meditation and part-psychological study of Paul Keating as prime minister, written from the intimate perspective of a prime ministerial speechwriter.

In each case, the biographer’s goal was to explain not just who the prime minister was, but how their way of thinking engaged with the world around them.

Kelly does not try to discover the “real” Scott Morrison, a task rendered almost impossible by the vacuousness of the prime minister’s performances and the role of the media in presenting him to us.

Instead, he evokes the divided community to whom Morrison performs, and the social and cultural processes that allow those performances to take place and, at least sometimes, hit their mark. Kelly’s method is to home in on public speech, its sounds and cadences, as well as the often elusive messages and impressions that Morrison seeks to convey with his words.

The chief limitation of The Game is that, relying largely on public material, it cannot take us into the institutions that empower Morrison, other than the media.

We don’t learn much about the Prime Minister’s Office, other than that it failed to respond to Brittany Higgins’s alleged rape in Parliament House in an appropriate fashion.

Parliament itself is a stage here, but scarcely recognisable as an institution that makes laws. The public service is invisible. National Cabinet is, according to Kelly, little more than an “aesthetic change” from the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) that preceded it.

It says something about the condition of contemporary politics that it is hard to say whether these absences are a flaw in the author’s approach, or inevitable given the style of leadership it so astutely anatomises.

In the end, The Game invites us to look toward the next election. That poll will, Kelly implies, reveal something more of ourselves, or at least those “quiet” Australians who are supposed to have voted for Morrison in 2019. Like most of us, Kelly is unsure who will have the last laugh.

 ‘A Narrative of Denial: Australia and the Indonesian Violation of East Timor’  by Peter Job [published in 2021 by Melbourne University Press, 356 pages, including pps 278-356 consisting of Notes, Index, etc]

I had  been trying to get through this book for some weeks  –  it made for very disturbing reading about the attitudes and approaches towards East Timor by both the Whitlam and Fraser governments , and while the subject was not new to me, I have to admit to being quite shocked at the described ‘denial’ tactics of both governments.   Long-time friend Ruth really brought this to our attention at the local Uniting Church  in the late 1990’s  with a series of  passionate and usually emotional calls for the people of East Timor to be assisted, and this was almost  two decades after the events depicted in this book. From that passion, arose a ‘Social Justice Group’ at that particular church which operated through the early 2000’s, placing particular emphasise on Indigenous and refugee issues and needs.  As is revealed in this book, the Indonesian invasion of East Timor in 1975 led to a prolonged conflict, severe human rights abuses and a large loss of life. 

The book was extremely detailed, almost [probably was] with seemingly every speech by politicians, the media, and others on the subject, throughout the period in question  included throughout the various chapters  – especially 1975-1983, and because of that detail, I found it difficult to read a great deal at one time – the word extensive study below is a very apt description  –  . the trend and theme of Australia’s approach was repeated time and again with little change in ‘official’ policy during that period. The book demonstrates how the Australian government used the guise of national interest to forge a false account of the Indonesian invasion of East Timor. In today’s world, the Chinese for eg, would counter Australian criticism of China’s human rights record, with the claim that Canberra tends to ignore human rights abuses in countries Australia wants to get on with. Its approach towards Indonesia’s treatment of West Papuans and East Timorese is an example.  And during the period of this book’s time line, one of the threats used by the Indonesian authorities, was that  if Australia didn’t bring those protesting and publishing adverse criticisms of Indonesia’s actions into line,  it would be to point at the international level, to Australia’s long-term treatment of it’s own Indigenous populations. The same kind of accusation could be used in respect to modern Australia’s  government treatment of refugees!

From the book ‘jacket’ we read:

“What role did Australia play in the Indonesian occupation of East Timor?  From 1975 to 1983 the Indonesian military’s campaign of ‘encirclement and annihilation’ destroyed rural food resources, creating the famine  that took most of the lives during the occupation. The Australian governments of Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser presented themselves as advocates for human rights and the international rule of law, while viewing relations with Indonesia as key to their foreign policy objectives. These positions came into conflict due to the Indonesian invasion of  East Timor.  Based upon an extensive study of Australian foreign affairs archives, as well as interviews, ‘a Narrative of Denial’ demonstrates how the Australian Government responded to the conflict by propagating  versions of events that denied the reality of the catastrophe occurring in East Timor. It worked to protect the Suharto regime internationally, allowing it to continue  its repression relatively unhindered. This remarkable story will unsettle existing perceptions of how Australia operates in world affairs.”

I thought I might quote a few comments from parts of the book, in particular the concluding chapter, which sums up the  separate conclusions inserted at the end of each chapter throughout the book. By necessity, these are just isolated selections which however are supported within the body of the book and through extensive research and voluminous ‘notes’. The author himself [Peter Job] was involved in the East Timor support movement during the Indonesian occupation, including working on the radio link to Fretilin in 1978 [radio links of this sort were regularly closed by the government for fear, that the ‘wrong’  messages and impressions were given to the Australian people through such ‘propaganda broadcasts – in the same way that the various support groups – including some of the government’s own members –  were attacked as preaching ‘subversion’ against the government policy and were creating adversity with respect to Australia’s desire to maintain a  good relationship with Indonesia.

As mentioned somewhere in the book, the crisis in East Timor generated with the Australian public, a far less degree of support or protest  [much less so in fact] than for example, the Vietnam War, or the Indigenous marches for Reconciliation, etc, because the broader public were constantly assured through government policy and pronouncements that there ‘was nothing to see here’, and the problems of a small backward nation were being humanely treated through the intervention of Indonesia!  But as indicated, the word ‘humane’ was a long way from the truth.  One of the constant arguments put up by the Fraser Government was that East Timor was a poor, backward country, which needed the ‘humane’ assistance of Indonesia to help its people, and that Indonesia should be praised for the humanity of its resettlement policies following the displacement of thousands of the Timorese due to ‘supposed’ civil war, a level of unrest that had forced Indonesia to ‘reluctantly’ move into East Timor to restore order!!!

Some quotations from ‘A Narrative of Denial’

In the meantime, a few selected quotations from Job’s writings.

• “Key to this narrative was the claim that the invasion was an irreversible matter of the past that Australia had objected to but was powerless to change. This produced the contention that the interests of the Timorese people were best suited by the Australian Government working with a fundamentally well-intentioned Indonesian regime that had reluctantly intervened in a destabilising situation  allegedly brought about by circumstances beyond it’s control”. [p.140];
• East Timor was never an issue of the first order  for much of the Parliamentary Labor Party [during the Fraser years] or for a great deal of the activist left. The lack of interest by most sections of Australian society, allowed the government to proceed with it’s agenda with some success” [p.141];
• [At the United Nations] the interests of the Suharto regime were central.  Australia lobbied for the interests of the Indonesian  Government  from the invasion onwards, with the long-term aim of removing the issue from the UN agenda and achieving international acceptance of incorporation. As in the domestic arena, this required the propagation of a ‘narrative of denial’ concerning the events that had led to the Indonesian invasion and the ongoing situation’:[p.173];
•   “The attacks on James Dunn, ACFOA and other Timor activists by pro-Suharto journalists and academics  furthered the government’s efforts to depict them as marginalised  radicals, using hearsay, anonymous sources and unverified claims in support of an irresponsible ideologically based campaign against the Indonesian  Government.  Gough Whitlam, a former prime minister of a Labor government and a respected figure to many on the left of politics the world over, abetted this further.  His energetic, unrestrained and aggressive lobbying  on behalf of the Suharto regime and his denigration of individuals and organisations  attempting to bring the real situation to the  world’s attention bolstered the Fraser  Government’s ability to position its narrative  as the responsible one. It also created mistrust concerning the veracity of information deriving from Timorese Catholic sources, whence a great deal of the evidence about the situation in the territory was coming.” [p.264];
• “As the testimony of DFA officials at the Senate inquiry demonstrated, the propagation of the government narrative did not require a sophisticated understanding  of the situation,  particularly concerning the humanitarian plight  of the Timorese people.  On the contrary, it required purposely ignoring available evidence.” [p.264];
• “ The Whitlam Government’s denial of what it knew  regarding the deaths of the Balibo Five and its consequent failure to protest would have sent a strong message to the hardliners  within the Suharto regime that Australia would not prove a substantial impediment to any course of action it might choose”. [p.268-69];
• “Good relations with the pro-Western  and anti-communist Suharto regime were therefore important to the Fraser government’s  concept of the Australian national interest. The welfare of the Timorese people, in contrast,  was never a substantial consideration.  It was during the Fraser years that the majority of those who died in East Timor due to the occupation lost their lives. Despite the extent of the crisis, however, East Timor never became an issue of major importance to the majority of Australians, nor did it spawn a movement comparable to the Vietnam War protests or even the anti-apartheid campaign. Nevertheless, with evidence of the humanitarian crisis emanating from East Timor on a regular basis, the work of the smallish but energetic solidarity movement, the Timor parliamentary lobby, ACGOA, James Dunn and others was successful  in keeping the issue in the public eye to a reasonable extent for most of the Fraser years.” [p.269-270];
•  “Australian policy was impaled on the hook of the relationship with Suharto’s New Order, unwilling to move beyond its vision of the Australian national interest or the primacy the relationship with the regime played in it. So fearful was it of offending the Suharto regime that, regardless of the evidence, the Fraser Government proved incapable of attempting tosteer Indonesia away from its course of action  or itself from its support for it.”;
• As Foreign Minister, Andrew Peacock was a forceful supporter of the government’s policy.. in October 1976, he told parliament that “the political reality was that it did not serve Australia’s interests to place itself on a massive collision course with Indonesia.” [p.124] and “Peacock assured Mochtar in December 1979 that his government shared the Indonesian Government’s concerns regarding ‘sensational and distorted’ media reports about East Timor and wanted to work with it to improve its image in Australia”. [p.239]; and,
• “However, Australian policy during the years 1974 to 1983 ultimately proved neither pragmatic or realist. Even judged by their own policy goals the contention espoused by both Whitlam and Fraser that they were acting in the Australian national interest proved incorrect…..The efforts by successive Australian governments  to protect the Suharto regime on the Timor issue culminated ultimately  in the INTERFET intervention and the strained relations with Indonesia that accompanied it………….Australian policy failure, however, went far deeper than this. It was a failure due to the immense suffering it caused to the people of East Timor. More than a failure of policy goals, it weas a failure of conception, morality and ethics, and of fundamental human rights. Policy failed as these matters did not even figure in Australian calculations of the national interest or foreign policy goals. An Australian foreign policy built upon an elite, hard-nosed and supposedly realistic approach to the national interest ultimately proved neither realistic nor viable, and for the people of East Timor it resulted in catastrophe……The people of East Timor were regarded as dispensable. It was this that had the direst consequences, and it was this that was the real policy failure.” [p.274-75].

 ‘The Wimmera: A journey through Western Victoria’ published in 2021, 232 pages [a Coffee Table boo

Some fascinating descriptions of the old towns and their origins in the Wimmera district of western Victoria, so sad that in many cases, these towns have all but disappeared with maybe a few residents remaining, and very few of the original buildings.  Interesting that many of the towns came to life and really developed when the railway lines connected them up with other areas, but similarly, they gradually ‘died’ as the railways were discontinued.  Some of my family ancestors lived in many of these areas, and I’d like to do another  road trip to explore them before it’s too late.

This book was a ‘companion to  ‘The Mallee’  basically the area in western Victoria, more or less to the north of the Wimmera region.

 “Corporal Hitler’s Pistol’ by Tom Keneally, published in 2021, 335 pages.

 This story was a bit slow to get into initially, and I didn’t feel as though I was going to get much from this book.   But, as I read on, the storyline developed and the various family scenarios began to create some interest.  I guess we can call it ‘historical fiction’ although perhaps more on the fiction side, as compared for eg, with the books of Peter Fitzsimons.  I did get through the story in speedier fashion than some of the Keneally books I’ve laboured through in the past.  I found the references to the ongoing Irish problems of the time of special interest, as I did the reflection, of rural Australia’s continuing negative attitude [in the 1930s] to the Aboriginal inhabitants on the outskirts of country towns, etc.

Susan Wyndham, writing in the Guardian Australian in September 2021 provides a succinct review of Keneally’s book which I’ve taken the liberty of copying below.

‘When Tom Keneally chose the loaded title Corporal Hitler’s Pistol, he would have been well aware of Chekhov’s advice to writers that if a gun appears in the first act it must be fired in the second. Indeed, he fires his fictional pistol several times to dramatic effect in his 35th novel, a compelling blend of historical crime thriller and intricate portrait of an Australian rural community. The gun has been lurking in Keneally’s imagination since the first act of his own life. His father, serving in the Middle East during the second world war, sent home souvenirs including a German Luger holster (not the pistol itself), which Keneally can still show visitors.

Nazi Germany and the world wars have inspired many of his rich narratives, most famously the Booker prize winner Schindler’s Ark. Corporal Hitler’s Pistol sits in the unstable peace between wars, when post-traumatic pain collided with the Great Depression and escalating tensions. The Japanese occupation of Manchuria leads a young man to speculate: “I hope I am wrong. But could we be seeing the opening to a second Great War?”

The action is focused in 1933, two years before Keneally’s birth, in the north-coast New South Wales town of Kempsey, where he spent his early childhood. He draws on experience and folklore, such as an old German-Australian said to possess a pistol that had belonged to Hitler.

His familiarity with the town makes Kempsey crackle with commerce, gossip and class divisions from the opening pages. Well-to-do Flo Honeywood walks through the streets, glimpsing other characters, and steeling herself to confront her husband, the respected master builder, about an Aboriginal boy from the camp outside town who looks just like him.

Always a first-rate storyteller of a traditional kind, Keneally displays his mastery of narrative technique in a series of cinematic set pieces that propel the story forward while intimately developing the characters. Some take place in the Victoria Theatre, the centre of social life, where Hollywood movies add glamour and dreams to ordinary existences.

Young Gertie Webber speaks with actorly exaggeration, and her brother Christian imagines dressing his mother “in the manner of Marlene Dietrich in Shanghai Express”. The Victoria simmers with the novel’s repressed eroticism. At a screening of Tabu, “Harper Quinlan, the projectionist, said you could hear the boys’ fly buttons popping all over the cinema”.

Chicken Dalton, the “effeminate and stylish” pianist who accompanies the Saturday night pictures, is the most theatrical of a lively ensemble. He sounds like a Dickensian dandy but is based on a real resident of the time and represents Keneally’s homage to the gay men of his youth.

“Kempsey’s pansy” finds sexual company with closeted homosexuals whose secrets are bound to blow up. Keneally inhabits gay, female and Indigenous characters with confidence and complexity, all of them observed in convincing detail from their fashion to their fears and desires.

A glimmer of social change begins with Flo Honeywood’s rebellion against her husband, which brings her into unexpected connections with Chicken and with the Aboriginal boy, Eddie Kelly. Her meeting with a group of Thunguddi women in Tsiros’s Refreshment Rooms is a finely drawn microcosm of multiracial Australia. But the might of power and prejudice lie waiting for vulnerable transgressors.

In the other main storyline, Bert Webber, a Lutheran dairy farmer, breaks down on seeing a newsreel about the new German Chancellor, “the man with the stupidly economical moustache”. Despite his German forebears, Bert fought with an Australian battalion in France and watched his friend shot dead by a “skinny, droop-moustached” German. The encounter will haunt him and the course of history.

While Bert relives his horror under electroconvulsive therapy and mesmerism, his unhappy wife, Anna, fills the void with one of the novel’s steamy sexual affairs. Further intrigue emerges with the mysterious past of Johnny Costigan, the Irishman who manages the Webber farm.

Keneally’s prose is robust (and sometimes humorous) with the language of Catholicism learned as a young man: “That sainted and cursed gun … equivalent of the nails that tore Christ’s hands.” “The hallway [of the convent] smelt of polish and virginity, and Flo thought it not a bad smell.” And in a sexual communion, “there was gravidness and erections to be attended to”.

Flashbacks to trench warfare in 1916 and to the Irish Civil War in 1922 dramatise the ambiguities of conflict. At times Keneally the historian is so keen to share his knowledge that he nudges aside Keneally the novelist and the pace slows. Yet these dark events are essential to understanding later motives.

Keneally deftly plaits together his disparate strands, far too canny to create predictable outcomes. Nothing goes as planned, even for those with noble intentions, keeping the plot taut right to the end. Corporal Hitler’s Pistol manages to be a rollicking, optimistic entertainment while mourning the human tragedies that shaped the 20th century and beyond’.

Meanwhile, a general reviewer, simply by the name of Des, provided an interesting summary of the story which generally allied with my feelings when he wrote:

‘Corporal Hitler’s Pistol is an engaging novel that tantalisingly plays with the notion that a pistol supposedly used by Adolf Hitler, is the cause of intrigue and drama in the regional town of Kempsey in the 1930s. Thomas Keneally creates characters with separate yet connected stories that are linked by an unknown historical event: the use of Hitler’s pistol from WWI. He relates these stories quite independently, yet engaging the reader with the circumstances as to how the themes ultimately bind together.  Little is presented about Hitler except for detail to give historical authenticity of his being.  The setting of Kempsey is indicative of Australia of the 1930s and illustrates parochialism, sectarianism, misogyny, social stratification, racism and homophobia. I did enjoy Tom Keneally’s use of Australian idioms and slang so typical of the time.  Woven into the story are unresolved issues around Irish nationalism, Irish Civil War and WWI trauma which played out among the protagonists.
I enjoyed the richness, suspense and anticipation in the novel even though I needed some time to digest all that was read.  Thomas Keneally brought the novel alive with the outstanding character development and unfolding stories. At times the storyline became very difficult to follow, however the interest level was maintained and the ending was compelling which gave me an enriching reading experience’.

Australian Foreign Affairs Bulletin, Issue 14:  The Taiwan Choice: Showdown in Asia.

The fourteenth issue of Australian Foreign Affairs examines the rising tensions over the future of Taiwan as China’s pursuit of “unification” pits it against the United States and US allies such as Australia. The Taiwan Choice looks at the growing risk of a catastrophic war and the outlook for Australia as it faces a strategic choice that could reshape its future in Asia.  “Whether or not America chooses to fight, a crisis over Taiwan would most likely see its position destroyed. This is the real flaw in America’s position, and Australia’s.” writes  Hugh White. His and other contributing essays examined the following aspects, and most of them did not provide very comforting reading, particularly if we give much credence to the kind of scenarios depicted in the Taylor quote, below.

• Hugh White reveals why war over Taiwan is the gravest danger Australia has faced. 
• Linda Jakobson probes how Xi Jinping views Taiwan in an age of Chinese assertiveness.
• Brendan Taylor examines what a conflict over Taiwan might look like. 

Quote:  “A full-blown conflict over Taiwan could make living through the COVID-19 pandemic seem like a cakewalk. It would very likely be the most devastating war in history, drawing the world’s major powers into their first nuclear exchange. Hundreds of millions could perish, both from the fighting itself and from the sickening after-effects of radiation. Even a limited nuclear conflict would be an environmental nightmare, with soot from incinerated cities shutting out the sun’s rays, depleting food supplies and plunging the planet into a prolonged famine. Life for Australians would be forever changed. Such a catastrophe looms closer than we think. If it eventuates, those left behind after Asia’s atomic mushroom clouds have settled will wish that we had fought with every fibre of our being to prevent it.

• Yu-Jie Chen explores the Taiwanese view of autonomy, independence and China. 
• Stephen Dziedzic considers whether a generational divide is fuelling Australia’s intensifying China debate. 
• William Stoltz examines how Canberra can combat malware and cyberaggression. 
• Cait Storr writes on the geopolitical space race and the likelihood of nuclear war. 

Our nation celebrates Australia Day on the 26^th January each year, being the date in 1788 that European settlement first commenced with the arrival of the First Fleet [of convicts] in Sydney, NSW. Over recent years in particular, there has been much debate over whether that date is now the appropriate date for such a recognition., principally in view of the fact, that upon their arrival, the new ‘settlers’ found an Indigenous population which had been in Australia for up to 60,000 years.  To many, the day has been referred to as ‘Invasion Day’, and the celebration of 26^th January is not inclusive of all peoples in this country.  Many will argue to the contrary, however, be that as it may,  just like the eventual creation of a Republic, I think there will eventually  be a change of date, which will hopefully be considered a more inclusive date selection by all.

Meanwhile, thirty-two inspirational Australians were named as the national finalists for the Australian of the Year Awards, with the winners announced in Canberra on the evening of 25^th January.  Looking at past results, and current nominations, it would be difficult to argue that inclusiveness is not a consideration.

The National Australia Day Council describes the Australian of the Year as a program by the Council each year to celebrate the achievements and contributions of eminent Australians by profiling leading citizens who are role models for us all. They inspire us through their achievements and challenge us to make our own contribution to creating an inclusive, harmonious and more resilient Australia. The Awards honour an exceptional and diverse group of highly respected Australians who ignite discussion and change on issues of national importance.

Each of the national finalists have been nominated for an Australian of the Year Award by the National Australia Day Council, through each of the States and Territories, due to their impact and achievement in a range of sectors.  These sectors include science and medicine, social and community projects, human rights advocacy, social entrepreneurship, sustainability and contributions to the pandemic response.

Each State and Territory award recipient was announced at local ceremonies. These Australians are now in consideration for the 2022 overall Australian of the Year Awards.

Currently, the selection committees refer to three main criteria when considering nominees:

• Demonstrated excellence in their field; 
• Significant contribution to the Australian community and nation; and.
• An inspirational role model for the Australian community.

In addition, a fourth award, the Local Hero award acknowledges a significant contribution at local community level.

These were the thirty-two nominations from the respective States and Territories.

2022 AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR

ACT Australian of the Year: Patrick (Patty) Mills. Basketball player and Indigenous rights advocate.

NSW Australian of the Year: Professor Veena Sahajwalla. Founding Director of the Centre for Sustainable Materials Research and Technology at the University of New South Wales.

NT Australian of the Year: Leanne Liddle. Director of the Aboriginal Justice Unit.

Queensland Australian of the Year: Sue and Lloyd Clarke. Founders of Small Steps 4 Hannah.

SA Australian of the Year: Professor Helen Marshall. Vaccination researcher.

Tasmania Australian of the Year: Craig Leeson. Documentary filmmaker and journalist.

Victoria Australian of the Year: Dylan Alcott OAM. Athlete, paralympian, philanthropist, media commentator and advocate.

WA Australian of the Year: Paul Litherland. Cyber safety educator and campaigner.

2022 SENIOR AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR

ACT Senior Australian of the Year: Valmai Dempsey. Volunteer at St John Ambulance.

NSW Senior Australian of the Year: Abla Kadous. President of the Islamic Women’s Welfare Association.

NT Senior Australian of the Year: Robyne Burridge OAM. Disability services advocate and Founder of Focus-A-Bility.

Queensland Senior Australian of the Year: Dr Colin Dillon AM APM. Australia’s first Indigenous police officer.

SA Senior Australian of the Year:  Mark Le Messurier. Educator, counsellor and author.

Tasmania Senior Australian of the Year: Bruce French AO. Agricultural scientist and Founder of Food Plants International.

Victoria Senior Australian of the Year: Gaye Hamilton. Deputy Chancellor of Victoria University.

WA Senior Australian of the Year: Janice Standen. President of Grandparents Rearing Grandchildren WA.

2022 YOUNG AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR

ACT Young Australian of the Year: Sean Dondas. Former Board Director at CanTeen.

NSW Young Australian of the Year: Dr Daniel Nour. Founder of Street Side Medics.

NT Young Australian of the Year: Sizolwenkosi Fuyana. Businesswoman, podcaster and youth advocate.

Queensland Young Australians of the Year: Dr Tahnee Bridson. Founder of Hand-n-Hand Peer Support.

SA Young Australian of the Year: Dr Trudy Lin. Special Needs Dentistry consultant at Adelaide Dental Hospital.

Tasmania Young Australian of the Year: Kaytlyn Johnson. Youth leader and singer-songwriter.

Victoria Young Australian of the Year: Ahmed Hassan. Co-founder and executive director of Youth Activating Youth.

WA Young Australian of the Year: Kendall Whyte. Founder and CEO of the Blue Tree project.

2022 AUSTRALIA’S LOCAL HERO

ACT Local Hero: Luke Ferguson. Youth support worker at The Woden School.

NSW Local Hero: Shanna Whan. Founder and CEO of Sober in the Country.

NT Local Hero: Rebecca Forrest. Event organiser and fundraiser.

Queensland Local Hero: Saba Abraham. Community leader, founder and Manager of social enterprise Mu’ooz Restaurant & Catering.

SA Local Hero: Monique Bareham. President of Lymphoedema Association SA Inc.

Tasmania Local Hero: Kimberley (Kim) Smith APM.Community volunteer with the Rotary Club of Sullivans Cove.

Victoria Local Hero: Leo op den Brouw. Volunteer with the Mallacoota State Emergency Service.

WA Local Hero: Craig Hollywood. Founder and CEO of Short Back & Sidewalks.

Listening to the stories of each of the above-named, at the Award ceremony, one can imagine a very difficult choice from a broad range of inspirational and dedicated human beings. However, as with everything, there has to be a winner, and on this occasion, the respective Winners this year from the foregoing lists were:

2022 Australian of the Year

Dylan Alcott OAM

Athlete, paralympian, philanthropist, media commentator and advocate

VICSTATE RECIPIENTAUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR2022

As a teenager, Dylan Alcott hated being in a wheelchair because he didn’t see anyone like him in mainstream media. Then sport changed everything.

A gold medal at the Paralympic Games in wheelchair basketball preceded three more in Paralympic competition after a cross-code switch to tennis. Now, with 23 quad wheelchair Grand Slam titles and a Newcombe Medal, Dylan Alcott recently became the first male in history, in any form of tennis, to win the Golden Slam.

Amid his training and competition load as a world-class athlete, Dylan notes that his most profound impact has come from beyond the field of play. He founded the Dylan Alcott Foundation to provide scholarships and grant funding to marginalised Australians with a disability.

He also authored his best-selling autobiography, Able, and co-founded Get Skilled Access. Further, Dylan’s AbilityFest is Australia’s first and only inclusive, fully accessible music festival. In realising his childhood dream, Dylan holds several high-profile media roles spanning TV, radio and podcasting.

A passionate ‘off the cuff’ speech by Dylan, who earlier in the afternoon, at completing a successful semi final match at the Australian Open, modestly stated that ‘I’m just making up the numbers in Canberra tonight’.

2022 Senior Australian of the Year

Valmai Dempsey

Volunteer at St John Ambulance

SENIOR AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR2022

Starting as a cadet volunteer while still in primary school, for more than 50 years Valmai (Val) Dempsey has dedicated her life to St John Ambulance. She’s one of the Australian Capital Territory’s longest-serving volunteers and, year after year, she still dedicates more hours than any other volunteer.

In 2020, Val faced her biggest challenge yet as a St John Ambulance volunteer – first with the ‘Black Summer’ bushfires, followed by the COVID-19 pandemic. In response, she led 40 fellow volunteers as they supported fire-affected communities during the emergency that stretched over many weeks.

Then when the pandemic hit, Val displayed unwavering commitment to the St John team, despite heavy impacts on team morale. Without hesitation, she personally contacted every volunteer to check they were ‘doing OK’ in terms of welfare, mental health and morale.

It is these tireless commitments to St John that has led many in the community to know her lovingly as ‘Aunty Val’.

This lady is a passionate advocate for all learner drivers to be required to undertake a first aid course prior to being granted a licence..  At accident scenes, that attribute for a first on the scene bystander, can make the difference between life and death.  Powerful inspiration.

2022 Young Australian of the Year

Dr Daniel Nour

Founder of Street Side Medics

YOUNG AUSTRALIAN OF THE YEAR2022

Identifying a gap in the healthcare of vulnerable people in New South Wales, Dr Daniel Nour founded Street Side Medics in August 2020. It’s a not-for-profit, GP-led mobile medical service for people experiencing homelessness.

With 145 volunteers, and four clinics across New South Wales, Street Side Medics has changed the lives of more than 300 patients. It has treated many communicable and non-communicable illnesses, dealt with neglected medical needs, and detected conditions that would otherwise have gone unnoticed. This includes diabetes, thyroid disorders, hepatitis C, HIV, heart disease and cancer.

Despite working full time at Royal North Shore Hospital, Daniel has rarely missed a clinic across the four sites since Street Side Medics launched. He volunteers his afternoons to ensure the clinics are run smoothly and patients are receiving the care they deserve.

With his leadership and social consciousness, Daniel is committed to making a real difference to the lives of many Australians. He’s also making significant improvements to society.

A truly dedicated volunteer in this service basically directed at the homeless

2022 Australia’s Local Hero

Shanna Whan

Founder and CEO of Sober in the Country

LOCAL HERO2022

Shanna Whan is single-handedly creating radical social impact and change around how we discuss and use alcohol in rural Australia.

When Shanna almost lost her life to alcohol addiction in 2015, giving up drinking was just the start. What began as volunteer work to help others locally, evolved into a grassroots charity called Sober in the Country (SITC) which now has a national reach and offers peer support, powerful broadscale advocacy and education.

Shanna donated about 20,000 hours to the cause and now travels on invitation as the spokesperson for SITC. She has appeared on multiple major national media platforms, in person, in paddocks and at conferences.

She courageously shared her harrowing journey to sobriety on Australian Story in 2019. Now, through the national charity, she is amplifying the essential, life-saving message and charity campaign that it is always “OK to say no” to booze.

A passionate and emotional  acceptance speech.

Over the past 22 months, we have watched the daily count of COVID deaths and infections world-wide, while here in Australia in recent weeks, there has been a sudden surge of infections nationwide to levels of infection we’ve not seen before.. In all that time, pushed to the background of our thinking [though not for those personally affected] is the daily scourge of road deaths and associated trauma. This area is the brief subject of my final ‘Coachbuilder’s Column’ for 2021.

A major factor in trying to combat the national road toll, and to determine precise action needed,  appears to be a lack of action in co-ordinating data collected, and this is illustrated below in reports by various road accident authorities around Australia – in particular, the lack of data reported as compared with the last two years of reporting on COVID statistics.

Writing in the Victorian tabloid newspaper [Herald Sun] just prior to Christmas, the Editorial  was headed ‘Road trauma warning’ ………….”Victoria has an enviable reputation for road safety reforms over the decades, and generally has among the lowest per capita road deaths in the world. So the news that Victoria was the deadliest state for road trauma in November – with the number of fatal crashes  rising by 80% – is a real concern. Federal Transport data show that 27 people died on our roads compared with 15 at the same time last year. By contrast, Queensland and NSW both dropped from 24 deaths in November 2020, to 21 this year. ….The alarming figures come as Victoria’s top traffic cop warns of a ‘perfect storm’ of increased crash risk amid young drivers getting behind the wheel after all the lockdowns  In today’s Herald Sun, Road Policing Command assistant commissioner Glenn Weir says the problem is compounded  due to the inexperience of newly licensed drivers, and a surge of young people rushing to get their licenses.  The state government move to deploy a series of ‘pause stops’ on key regional arterial roads over Christmas to counter the expected spike in road trauma is welcome. Drivers must take extra special care during the holiday season”.

Two days after Christmas, we learnt that six lives had been lost on Victorian roads since Christmas Eve, and those six lives convert into tragic trauma for so many associated family and friends, and all the other financial costs associated with such losses.

As Glenn Weir stated after that news – “For most of us, this is an exciting time of the year with holidays and festive cheer in full swing…While we’re asking everyone to slow down, not drink or take drugs and drive, and avoid distractions like mobile phones, rest assured police will also be doing our bit and ramping up enforcement on Victorian roads”.  The general warning was to be well rested before driving – with many holiday makers taking summer trips for the first time in two years.  Traffic data reveals that 16-20 per cent of fatalities on the state’s roads were attributed to drowsy driving  –  so current advice is “If you find yourself day-dreaming, missing exits or drifting from your lane, take a break and consider a 15-minute powernap. There are plenty of places to stop all throughout the state, take your time so you can get to your destination safely”.

Always good advice, and yet so often, it is ignored in so many little ways, with one simple second of inattention meaning a lifetime of misery for many, the end of a life for others.

In 1969, the year my father died after an avoidable car accident, there were 3,502 Victorians killed on our roads, which represented .286% of a population of 100,000.  In 2018, that figure had dropped to 1,135 [or .046% of a population of 100,000].  It was from those 1969 figures that essentially saw the beginning of major road safety campaigns here in Victoria,  aimed particularly at drink driving, and the wearing of seat belts [perhaps the latter may have made a difference in my father’s case?].

‘

Sadly, those statistics seem to be on the increase again On the national front, despite COVID lockdowns, road fatalities rose this year.  As reported by political reporter, Jake Evans on the 20 December, experts fear a new road toll plan isn’t going to work.  He noted that COVID lockdowns have brought scenes of empty motorways and desolate streets but road deaths actually rose this year. There were 1,126 people who died on Australia’s roads in the past 12 months, a 1.4 per cent increase on the year before.  The country’s top motoring and health bodies say a new federal plan to lower the road toll needs a total rework if there is any chance of the government meeting its goal to reduce road deaths to zero by 2050.   National motoring bodies, road trauma organisations and expert health practitioners have written to Infrastructure and Transport Minister Barnaby Joyce asking the government to go back to the drawing board with its 10-year road safety strategy, which is due to be released before the end of the year.

One of the biggest issues, according to the country’s peak motoring body the Australian Automobile Association (AAA), is a “shambolic” approach to collecting information on road deaths, which remains patchy and often missing details.  AAA managing director Michael Bradley said COVID had proven states had the ability to collect detailed information on road safety — but that isn’t being done.  “It’s almost non-existent: you can go to any news website today and you will see how many people in your state have COVID, you can learn about their gender, you know about whether or not they’re in hospital, whether or not they’re on ventilators, you know the proportion of people by local government area who are vaccinated,” he said.  “This is done daily — and yet we can’t tell you how many people are seriously injured in car crashes. There is no national dataset.”

Dr John Crozier, a trauma surgeon who was hand-picked by former minister Darren Chester to lead the government’s review into the past decade’s road safety strategy, has backed the call for the upcoming plan to be overhauled.  Dr Crozier said some safety data, including data on serious injuries, lags by as much as four years.  “Four years in the past data does not helpfully inform modern contemporary road safety practice,” he said.  “We’ve got to do a lot better than that in this upcoming decade.”  The government’s road safety strategy lists improving data as a priority, as it did in 2011, but does not detail how that will be done.  Mr Bradley said the upcoming plan is set to repeat the same mistakes of the last decade unless new rules are introduced to force states to improve their data collection.  “We’re concerned that you’ve got another strategy that says governments are going to do the same thing they signed up to last time,” he said.  “There’s no consequence associated with people signing up to say they’re going to do these things, but they never follow through.   “What we’re looking for is some mechanism that compels states and territories to come to the table and change what they do.”

The AAA said based on recent trends, only NSW and the Northern Territory were on track to meet the government’s target of halving the road toll by the end of the decade.  In fact, while the total road toll has fallen since 2010, motorcyclist deaths have seen almost no improvement in the past decade and cyclist deaths have risen over that time.  Meanwhile, state data that does exist on injuries suggest the number of people hospitalised from road accidents has been rising by about 3 per cent each year since 2013, according to the Department of Infrastructure.  Dr Crozier, who is also the chair of the Royal Australian College of Surgeons’ road trauma committee, said about 100 people were hospitalised each day by road crashes, costing the country $30 billion each year.  “We’ve had a silent epidemic on our roads, that’s seen more people killed [than COVID], seen many, many more seriously injured and hospitalised by road crash, but we’re not anywhere near as aware of that silent epidemic which is the day-to-day reality on our roads,” he said.  “We have many of the solutions, we have many of the ‘vaccines’ on our roads that would deliver fewer crashes … but we’re prevented from the effective implementation of a number of these proven ‘vaccines’ for road safety.”

A year-end plea to family, friends and general readers: please stay safe on our roads in 2022, and avoid the unnecessary personal trauma and tragedy which arises from accidents that in the main just should not happen. Don’t become a statistic, as my father did in 1969.

This entry refers to two very important recent books of direct relevance to Australia’s history, both past, and present. In each case, I have briefly referred to my basically ‘non-professional’ reflection of these books, and then submitted a selected overall summary and review in each case by a professional journalist, which I believe provides a concise description of what you are getting !!

At the end of November, 2021, I finished reading Farmers or Hunter-Gatherers: The Dark Emu Debate  by Peter Sutton & Keryn Walshe: pub. 2021; 288 pages.  

Now prior to reading this book, I had previously read [and reviewed] two of the principal books referred to by Sutton and Walshe, which through their research and studies have been much discredited, in particular Dark Emu..

In the case of Bill Ramage’s  [The Biggest Estate on Earth: How Aborigines Made Australia], I would write in 2013 that   ‘Very interesting,  but difficult at times to read with a lot of seemingly repetitive material, however a perspective of the Aboriginal treatment of  this country that should be learnt and respected’…….and from the book jacket –  ‘Across Australia, early Europeans commented again and again that the land looked like a park. With extensive grassy patches and pathways, open woodlands and abundant wildlife, it evoked a country estate in England. Bill Gamage has discovered this was because Aboriginal people managed the land in a far more systematic and scientific fashion  than we have ever realised…..Once Aboriginal people were no longer able to tend their country [with the arrival of the white man] it became overgrown and vulnerable to the largely damaging bushfires we now experience’.

Bruce Pascoe’s ‘Dark Emu’ went much further, in fact too far, as far as Sutton and Walshe are concerned, yet I mistakenly, in retrospect, gave Pascoe a little too much leeway. In that case I wrote :in 2020  ‘An inspiring read, leaving much to reflect upon…In Dark Emu [first published in 2014, revised edition in 2018], Pascoe examines the journals and diaries of early explorers such as Charles Sturt and Thomas Mitchell and early settlers in Australia, ‘finding evidence’ in their accounts of existing agriculture, ,engineering and building, including stone houses, weirs, sluices and fish traps, and also game management..   This evidence of occupation challenges the traditional views about pre-colonial Australia^, and “Terra Nullius”, and were the type of findings that  were likely to quickly ‘upset’  people like Andrew Bolt, amongst others!!  I believe ‘Dark Emu’ should be essential reading for all with a genuine interest in the true stories of our nation’s history.  Bill Gammage’s earlier publication ‘The Biggest Estate on Earth’ should also be read in conjunction with Pascoe’s book.  Pascoe also attributes a major influence on his book to the historian, and independent scholar Rupert Gerritsen, who in 2008 published   ‘Australia and the Origins of Agriculture’, which argued that Aboriginal people were agriculturalists as much as hunter-gatherers. Gerritsen died in 2013, and Pascoe cites him as a scholar who languished in obscurity because his theories contradicted the mainstream view.  Possibly, Pascoe’s book is likely to have a similar affect on those of the Australian populace who simply don’t want to be told that what they have  always been taught to believe may not be ‘accurate’, and that, as Pascoe writes in his introductory comments ‘not only that the frontier war had been misrepresented in what we had been taught in school,  but also that the economy and culture of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people had been grossly undervalued……so very distinct from ‘the primitive hunter-gatherer lifestyle we had been told was the simple lot of Australia’s First People’.

Well. In this 2021 publication [by Sutton and Walshe], I finished the book feeling that I had been truly ‘hoodwinked’ by Pascoe’s many exaggerated claims and theories based on flinty evidence and ‘selected’ sources emphasised  to suit his purpose. In many ways, while constantly attacking Pascoe for his incorrect assessment of the real facts – as these two highly respected scientists and authors write ‘We contend that Pascoe is broadly wrong, both about what Australians have been told of pre-conquest Aboriginal society, and about the nature of that society itself’.  They devote 288 pages, including an extensive Notes and References section of 66 pages, in support of their material [Pascoe 29 pages] That material was extremely detailed, constantly referring back to Pascoe’s surmising with proven scientific, archaeological and spoken and written records of the Indigenous people themselves. I actually found the extent of the detail of evidence provided as almost painful, so precise and far-ranging it went.

Whilst it fair enough that different versions of a story need to be looked at, I felt disappointed that some sectors of the country’s Education system, have since promoted Pascoe’s book as the ‘Bible’  of Aboriginal ‘history’ in Australia, in the absence of the kind of scientific and anthropological analysis that Sutton and Walshe provide us with, with their central question in writing the book being to ask why Australians  have been so receptive  to the notion that farming represents an advance from hunting and gathering – there is a middle ground which they explore and examine thoroughly

The following review provides a much more substantial assessment of the book than I can manage, and I include it, to encourage readers.

From ‘The Conversation’ by Christine Judith Nicholls 14/6/2021

Eminent Australian anthropologist Peter Sutton and respected field archaeologist Keryn Walshe have co-authored a meticulously researched new book, Farmers or Hunter-gatherers? The Dark Emu Debate. It’s set to become the definitive critique of Bruce Pascoe’s Dark Emu: Black Seeds — Agriculture or Accident?

First published in 2014, Pascoe’s Dark Emu has spawned numerous derivatives. Pascoe contends that in pre-contact times, Australian Aboriginal people weren’t “mere” hunter-gatherers, but agriculturalists. Descriptors like “simple” or “mere” are anathema to people like me who’ve lived long-term with hunter-gatherers.

For many Australians, Pascoe’s book is a “must-read”, speaking truth to power. For such readers, Dark Emu seems a breakthrough text. Not so, in Sutton and Walshe’s estimation. Nor mine.

Underpinning Dark Emu is the author’s rhetorical purpose. This proselytising is partly achieved by painstaking “massaging” of his sources, a practice forensically examined by Walshe and Sutton. It has led to converts to Pascoe’s dubious proposition. But this willingness to accept Pascoe’s argument reveals a systemic area of failure in the Australian education system.

On the basis of long-term research and observation, Sutton and Walshe portray classical Australian Aboriginal people as highly successful hunter-gatherers and fishers. They strongly repudiate racist notions of Aboriginal hunter-gatherers as living in a primitive state.

In their book, they assert there was and is nothing “simple” or “primitive” about hunter-gatherer-fishers’ labour practices. This complexity was, and in many cases, still is, underpinned by high levels of spiritual/cultural belief.

Not agriculturalists

As Sutton attests, seeds were and are occasionally deliberately scattered. But in classical Aboriginal societies they were never planted nor watered for agricultural purposes. Such aforementioned rituals are collectively called “increase ceremonies”. Sutton’s alternative term, “maintenance ceremonies”, invokes spiritual propagation as opposed to oversupply.

Their objective was continuing subsistence. Australia’s hunter-gatherer-fishers left an extremely light carbon footprint — the diametric opposite of many contemporary agricultural/industrial practices. A  photo [depicted in the book]  taken in 1932 or earlier, shows Pilbara people throwing yelka (nutgrass) — not threshing or scattering seeds.

Pascoe’s sources and approach

Pascoe draws on records of explorers and early colonists, also citing recent works, including Bill Gammage’s The Biggest Estate on Earth: How Aborigines made Australia. Dark Emu leans most heavily on the work of the late historian/ethnographer Rupert Gerritsen.

Counter-intuitively, Pascoe mainly cites non-Aboriginal sources. There is no real “voice” given to the few remaining people who lived traditional lives as youngsters, or are cited in books or articles.

While some have described Dark Emu as fabrication, Sutton and Walshe are more measured. They methodically show that in Dark Emu, Pascoe has removed significant passages from publications that contradict his major objectives. This boosts his contention that all along Aboriginal people were farmers and/or aquaculturalists.

One example concerns Pascoe’s quoting of the journal entries of the explorer Charles Sturt. Sutton writes:

Sturt is quoted [by Pascoe] on his party’s discovery of a large well and ‘village’ of 19 huts somewhere north of Lake Torrens in South Australia.

This “village” concept arose from colonial records, and is still sometimes used in recent articles.

Pascoe’s edit of Sturt’s original 1849 text breathes oxygen into Dark Emu’s polemical edge. It’s misleading at best. For Sturt’s diary reveals Aboriginal people didn’t live in “houses” in any single site all year round.

Such accounts destabilise Pascoe’s argument, reinforced by ethnographic, colonial, and archaeological records.

Hunter-gatherers did alter the country in significant ways — most Australians know about the ancient practice of firing the country, recently discussed in depth owing to our increasingly devastating bush-fires. This involved ecological agency and prowess. But expert fire-burning isn’t an agricultural practice, as Pascoe avers.

Misidentification of implements

In a key chapter, Walshe homes in on Pascoe’s mis-interpretations of hunter-gatherer implements, which he labels “agricultural” tools. For instance, Pascoe misconstrues grooved “Bogan Picks” as heavy stones used for agricultural activity.

Walshe disputes Pascoe’s claim, stating that, “with their adze-shaped end and grooved midline for hafting, they were likely used in a similar way to stone axes.”

Wooden digging sticks were also used for breaking up the earth to extract yams when in season, among various other purposes — not for “tilling” or “ploughing” the soil in preparation for planting seeds.

Language used by early colonists and explorers — words like “village” and “picks” — befuddles readers. British colonists’ monolingualism meant they used English words, often imposed arbitrarily, to name never-before-seen hunter-gatherer implements. For example, “Bogan Pick” references the nearby Bogan River.

Hunter-gatherer mobility and stasis

Sutton expertly summarises the experience of escaped convict, William Buckley, who spent 32 years travelling around country with the Wathawurrung people in Central Victoria.

Over time, Buckley became fluent in the language of his Wathawurrung hosts. Later, his oral account of the hunter-gatherer group’s approximate lengths of mobility and stasis at numerous sites was transcribed. It’s a unique document covering a significant timespan.

This account reinforces earlier chapters in Dark Emu Debate. Sutton and Walshe make it crystal clear that Aboriginal people weren’t “simple nomads” wandering around randomly, opportunistically searching for food and water. They knew their country intimately.

Rather, hunter-gatherers engaged in purposeful travel to sites with which they familiar and able to source seasonally available food, water and shelter at variable times of year.

Another conspicuous weakness in Dark Emu’s approach, pinpointed by Sutton and Walshe, is Pascoe’s penchant for choosing exceptions to the general rule, implying that these atypical practices were widespread or universal. It’s another strategy to consolidate his argument but involves eliding vital information.

Pre-contact aquaculture

Pascoe offers two examples of “aquacultural” practice, one in Brewarrina (NSW) in the bed streams of the Barwon River, and the other in Lake Condah, in south-western Victoria.

He seizes on rock use in the Brewarrina fishery and Lake Condah’s fish and seasonal eel trapping as “proof” of Aboriginal people’s aqua/agricultural prowess — giving the impression they created these complex hydrological systems from scratch.

But Sutton writes, “The fish traps of Brewarrina … were not claimed as the ingenious works of human beings, but … regarded as having been put there in the Dreaming, by Dreamings.” Both he and Walshe readily acknowledge the fact that Aboriginal people use/d their human agency to create modifications. It’s not an either/or matter.

However, a chapter written by Walshe throws light on the seismic activity that forged Lake Condah’s unique terrain and waterways. This area, she writes, is part of

a volcanic system … last active … 9,000 years ago, with a major eruption much earlier, about 37,000 thousand years ago, causing a massive lava flow across the pre-existing drainage system.

The natural tilt southwards, she explains, facilitated “naturally formed ancient river channels … to reach the Southern Ocean”.

This enabled migratory fish to spawn. Fish, and at certain times of year, eels, swam through both fresh and salty water — making for ease of catching. Local Aboriginal people moved the heavy stones into semi-circular formations to enable netting, spearing or grabbing by hand, possibly creating further semi-captivity of these food staples.

In this way, hunter-gatherers consistently and constantly “value-added” to, or enhanced, nature’s creation.

Not a bunfight

Pascoe’s skilful editing of his sources involves conscious, deliberate intervention. Does he hope Dark Emu will convince people to change their belief in the noxious evolutionary ladder, once uniformly, but still sometimes, applied to different groups of homo sapiens?

Or was his book written to prove Aboriginal people were/are more like Europeans, which could perhaps lead to much needed progress on reconciliation? Perhaps that accounts for its rapturous reception by many Australians, especially the young.

Why not simply celebrate the long-term achievements of hunter-gatherers?

Hunter-gatherers worked in concert with the natural world, not against it as most humans do today, resulting in insoluble difficulties such as overcrowding, pandemics and toxic agricultural and aquacultural practices. Survival depends on this. For eons, it ensured the continuity and the continuing existence of Australia’s hunter-gatherer people and their culture.

Farmers or Hunter Gatherers? The Dark Emu Debate needs to be read carefully, keeping an open mind. The book’s focus is on both material and spiritual economies and their misrepresentation. Despite racist commentary from some, this isn’t an exclusively right or left-wing issue or a bunfight.

Bruce Pascoe’s Dark Emu will continue to be granted recognition, if not immortality. But Sutton and Walshe’s Dark Emu Debate will undoubtedly be acclaimed. As a critique of Pascoe’s book, it’s just about perfect — a volume with the twin virtues of rigour and readability.

Late in December, 2021, I also finished reading ‘Escape From Manus: The untold true story” by Jaivet Ealom; published in 2021; 347 pages.  A very disturbing read, which despite denials from some quarters, needs to be read and believed, as it confirms so many of the reports and feedback that have been denied by successive governments for almost two decades. It is a story that reflects very poorly on Australia’s so-called humanitarian policies towards refugees. If it wasn’t already shattered, this book certainly added to my personal disillusionment of government [Liberal in particular] policies and attitudes to the whole question of refugees and asylum seekers in our modern Australian society where all forms of empathy have been diluted by the forceful impressions ‘conned’ onto the population by pronouncements of government, and especially a succession of Immigration Ministers, with Scott Morrison and Peter Dutton being prime suspects in the enforcement of such harsh policies..

This book is a powerful account of how one man escaped the prison of Manus Island. A true story of bravery and resilience.  It’s the awe-inspiring story of the only person to successfully escape from Australia’s notorious offshore detention centre on Manus Island.
In 2013 Jaivet Ealom fled Myanmar’s brutal regime and anti-Muslim persecution,  and boarded a boat of asylum seekers bound for Australia. Instead of receiving refuge, he was transported  from Christmas Island, to Australia’s infamous Manus Regional Processing Centre.
Blistering hot days on the island turned into weeks, then years until, finally, facing either jail in Papua New Guinea or being returned to almost certain death in Myanmar, he took matters into his own hands. Drawing inspiration from the hit show Prison Break, Jaivet meticulously planned his escape. He made it out alive but was stateless, with no ID or passport. While the nightmare of Manus was behind him, his true escape to freedom had only just begun.
How Jaivet made it to sanctuary in Canada in a six-month-long odyssey by foot, boat, car and plane is miraculous. His story will astonish, anger and inspire you. It will make you reassess what it means to give refuge and redefine what can be achieved by one man determined to beat the odds.

From ABC Radio National, we learn that we’ve all heard stories of great escapes — soldiers cutting the wire or tunnelling under the fence of POW camps, and spies assuming new identities to evade the security services on their trail.  Here, we meet someone who’s done almost all of that.’  While Manus closed in late 2017, it was not before Jaivet’s audacious, and at times, distressing flight.  These days, Jaivet resides in Canada, where he has become a prominent spokesman for the Rohingya community. He is studying at Toronto University and works for a company that providers software to non-profit organisations.

Again, I include one specific review of the book which explains the content and the story.

From The Guardian [Australia], as reviewed by Clarissa Sebag-Montefiore, on 2 July, 2021

In 2013, when Jaivet Ealom sat squeezed in a boat with other asylum seekers, he prayed, not for the first time, for an easy death. They were far from shore off the coast of Indonesia, the vessel was sinking, and Ealom could not swim. Fishermen from a nearby island came to the rescue, hauling each passenger from the half-submerged vessel. Ealom was saved. But during the chaos, a small baby fell into the ocean. “It never resurfaced,” remembers Ealom. “[The mother] just screamed from the bottom of her lungs. It was traumatising.”

The event was just one of the horrors that Ealom faced in his long route to freedom: from persecution as a Rohingya Muslim in his homeland Myanmar, to three and a half years internment in Manus Island,  to his time living in a homeless shelter in Toronto, where he eventually settled.

Now Ealom’s book, Escape from Manus, tells the story of his journey. In particular, his six-month odyssey to flee the offshore detention centre using tricks he had learned from the TV series Prison Break, which involved, among other things, studying his guards’ movements and faking his identity.

Escape from Manus begins, though, in Myanmar, where Ealom was born a decade after the ruling military junta spearheaded increasingly barbaric controls over the country’s stateless Muslim minority.

“They were burning down whole entire villages, whole entire neighbourhoods,” recalls the 28-year-old University of Toronto student when we speak on the phone. “That was when we collectively decided in the family that those who could leave, should.”

Ealom fled to Jakarta before deciding he would try to make it to Australia. But, as he was at sea, the then prime minister Kevin Rudd declared that any asylum seekers arriving by boat without a visa would never be settled in the country. Ealom was detained first on Christmas Island, then on Manus.

The conditions on Manus were as bad as Myanmar. Ealom lived in a cramped modified shipping container, which roasted in the oppressive heat. His rancid food was filled with debris, including stones and human teeth. Locals attacked the compound, thinking that the asylum seekers were terrorists; they shot at his accommodation, leaving bullet holes in the walls, and forcing inmates to shelter behind their mattresses.

As he writes: “The prison looked and felt like the scene of a horror movie about a perverse site for human experimentation; a floodlit laboratory in the middle of nowhere.”

Worse than the physical discomfort, Ealom says, was the emotional strain: “In Burma the torture was physical: you only feel it when you are being tortured, you only suffer when you are being chased. But in Manus it was psychological, the torture is with you 24/7.”

The stress of indefinite detention, with no end in sight, led to a rash of asylum seekers trying to take their own lives, including Ealom. “There wasn’t even a private place to commit suicide,” he says, bitterly.

In 2017, Ealom decided, once again, he must flee. He had been served paperwork stating that he would either be returned to Myanmar – and, he feared, death or incarceration – or sent to prison in Papua New Guinea. The news was a wake-up call. He escaped Manus in May, in part by using tricks from Prison Break, including tracking his guards’ schedules. Then, slipping away at an opportune moment, he boarded a plane to Port Moresby.

Helping him were people working within the system. “There were good people among the guards,” he says. “Some didn’t realise it was this torture camp that they were signing up for.”

The Manus Island detention centre was found to be illegal by the PNG Supreme Court   in 2016 and forcibly shut in violent confrontation a year later. The detained men were moved to other centres in Manus province or to Port Moresby. In 2021, about 130 men remain held   in the PNG capital.

From Port Moresby, Ealom made his way to the Solomon Islands. There, in order to get a Solomon Islands passport, he spent months perfecting how to pass as a local, from learning Pijin, the local language, to chewing betel nuts, which stained his teeth a deep crimson.

Travel document in hand, using the last of his money, he bought a ticket to Toronto.

Ealom arrived on Christmas Eve 2018, with only a light jacket for warmth. He sought asylum and, after a stint sleeping on a homeless shelter floor, was finally granted refugee status.

“I didn’t know a single person here,” he says. “I didn’t have any idea two days prior where Canada was. It was the only place I could buy with the money and the only place with relatively easy visa requirements. I just took a leap of faith.”

It worked.

Proficient in English, Ealom is now finishing his degree and works at NeedsList, which matches the needs of victims of humanitarian crises with help using special software.

The aid sector “is always top to bottom”, he says. “It needs to be bottom up: we [should] identify what is needed on the ground so there is less waste.”

As for returning home to Myanmar, “given the Rohingya situation … is not going to get any better soon, I don’t see any opportunity,” he says. Plus, after all the years of waiting and frustration, of pain and plotting his escape, “I am satisfied with the life I am building in Canada.”

A small selection on this occasion, as follows:

• The Astonishing History of Ballarat: Vol. 1: 1851-1855 [Doug Bradby];
• ‘Sturt Street’ Ballarat’s Grand Boulevard, a credit to the city” [Doug Bradby];
• Australian Foreign Affairs, Issue 13; and,
•  ‘Falling Man’ [Don Delillo]

‘The Astonishing History of Ballarat: Volume 1: 1851-1855; by Doug  Bradby, published in 2018; 180 pages;  This was a fascinating little read in which the author draws on various newspaper reports, correspondence, etc, to bring a more intimate depiction of the early years of Ballarat, and the conditions under which the early gold diggers [later, miners] endured in those first few years after the gold discoveries.

From  Collins Booksellers, we read:  – “In 1851, Ballarat was a tranquil and beautiful valley. By 1855, it had become the thriving centre of the world’s largest alluvial goldfield. But how did such a feat occur when at the beginning, diggers had little or no knowledge of where to look for gold or how to extract it from the gravel and quartz? From finding specimens of gold at Poverty Point and Golden Point, to sinking 60-metre shafts through wet and dangerous earth, this book reveals the journey undertaken by the diggers as they mastered the complex Ballarat East goldfield in the exciting years of 1851-55. It was an astonishing intellectual and physical achievement. The diggers of Ballarat extracted an astonishing two million ounces of gold, and Ballarat would never be the same again.”

The author introduces each chapter with

• [1] a list  of intriguing questions examined in the chapter, and
• [2] the cast of characters referred to in the chapter.

 Many of the chapters end with a ‘Report Card’ on the progressive state of Ballarat at that time. Briefly, each chapter covers in broad terms the following topics, generally expressed in ac somewhat amusing fashion:

Chapter 1. 1848-50. The Discovery of Gold in the Port Phillip District.  How a shepherd found Victoria’s first gold but failed to produce a goldrush.
Chapter 2. The Discovery of Gold in Victoria. How a publican, a squatter, some more shepherds, a doctor, and an ex mailman, found the gold that produced the Victorian goldrush.
Chapter 3. The Discovery of Gold at Ballarat.  How the Ballarat gold field was discovered by Thomas Hiscock at Buninyong, and by old John Dunlop and young James Regan at Poverty Point, and by Old Tom Brown of Connor’s Party at Golden Point.
Chapter 4. The Genesis of Ballarat. How the diggers arrived, mined, lived, and governed themselves at Ballarat.
Chapter 5. The Exodus from Ballarat. Why the diggers left Ballarat when they had found less than 1% of Ballarat’s gold.
Chapter 6. The Monster Nuggets. Why Sarah Sands from Ballarat was introduced to Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle.
Chapter 7. Settling Down on Ballarat. How and why some diggers settled permanently at Ballarat as miners.
Chapter 8: Mining in the year of Eureka.  How the miners tackled the problems of shepherding and the mining consequences of the Eureka Stockade.
Chapter 9. The Gravel Pits. How the miners of Ballarat Flat learnt to work ‘in the water.’
Chapter10. Towards the Tableland. What the miners did when they hit a ‘wall of rock.’

‘Sturt Street’ Ballarat’s Grand Boulevard, a credit to the city”  by Doug Bradby, published in 2021, 32 pages.  Another fascinating look at a part of my ‘home town’ and one aspect of it’s history – some more interesting stories about the origins of Sturt Street, how it and the grid of streets around it were planned as they were [a sharp contrast to the eastern goldfield areas of the town], and the interesting stories of gold leads and sunken rivers under many parts of the central CBD area, and around the Sturt/Lydiard Streets intersection in particular.

The October 2021 edition of the  Australian Foreign Affairs [Issue 13] titled ‘India Rising’ Asia’s huge question, presented a number of essays dealing with subjects such as

• our next great and powerful friend?, based on an assumption that Australia can no longer depend on traditional allies such as the UK or the USA, but has become  part of a new polar arrangement;
• past reflections on reactions to Indians in Australia, as both  migrants and studentshere; and
• the views of Australia and India toward each other.

In essence, these and other examine the future of India, described as a rising giant whose unsteady growth and unpredictable political turns raise questions about its role and power in Asia. It  explores the challenge for Australia as it seeks to improve its faltering ties with the world’s largest democracy, a nation whose ascent – if achieved – could reshape the regional order.

This Issue also included a rather interesting historical perspective of former Prime Minister, Paul Keating [and his government’s ] interactions with Indonesia during the 1990’s, and the effect of those relationships, in particular on the tragedy, and future of ‘East Timor’

Finally, a comment on  ‘Falling Man’ by Don DeLillo, published in 2007, 246 pages  –  I had previously read  ‘Mao II’  by this author, and I should have taken heed of my brief comments about that earlier book before deciding to [purchase this one!!

About Mao II I wrote [back in March 1993] that “A lot different  to what I expected with the terrorist issue almost on the periphery of the story. At times difficult to follow the wanderings of the mind as portrayed through the writer, at other times,  very real and down-to-earth description of everyday events. A brilliant description of the funeral of Ayatollah Khamenei and of other events of that era  – described as the ‘cutting edge of modern fiction’!!”

In Falling Man –   which deals with the aftermath of 9/11 and it’s affect on a group of individuals, with again, the event itself – the falling of the towers, and the lives and feelings of the terrorists involved leading up to the event –  very much on the periphery of the book contents. To be honest, I found those aspects of the book the most interesting, while the lives and activities of the selected individuals, post 9/11 somewhat mundane. True, I guess the writer was using those characters as examples of the thousands of lives affected in many ways by the attack on the twin towers –  but personally,  as I read through it, I could feel myself thinking thoughts to the affect of ‘get on with it’ and ‘why do we have to be plagued with this rubbish’  –  the constant references to the poker games a prime example  that  ‘got up my goat’!!

Yet I imagine that the term ‘the cutting edge of literature’ would perhaps rightly be applied again in this case by true modern literary critics  – I bow to their professional qualities and viewpoints –  but the nature of that ‘literature’ just simply didn’t appeal to this reader. With the exception perhaps of the final few pages –  which actually got to the moment of impact and the ‘imaginary’ [though no doubt  real] scenarios that followed, as those in the Towers attempted their escape downwards, whether that was via the stairwells, or jumping to their inevitable deaths from the windows – the basis of the title ‘Falling Man’!!

At the time of this book’s publication [2007], DeLillo had published some 13 novels and 3 plays, so obviously his style of writing appeals to many.

However, to give readers the opportunity to determine the book’s value for themselves, the following is the basic description of the book as used in the promotion of it by various book sellers, and on the book’s jacket  –

“There is September 11 and then there are the days after, and finally the years. Falling Man is a magnificent, essential novel about the event that defines turn-of-the-century America. It begins in the smoke and ash of the burning towers and tracks the aftermath of this global tremor in the intimate lives of a few people.
First there is Keith, walking out of the rubble into a life that he’d always imagined belonged to everyone but him. Then Lianne, his estranged wife, memory-haunted, trying to reconcile two versions of the same shadowy man. And their small son Justin, standing at the window, scanning the sky for more planes.  These are lives choreographed by loss, grief and the enormous force of history”

And from  at least one professional reviewer, we read [appropriately enough] from the New York Times [27/5/2007] by Frank Rich

No matter where you stood in the city, the air was thick after the towers fell: literally thick with the soot and stench of incinerated flesh that turned terror into a condition as inescapable as the weather. All bets were off. New Yorkers who always know where they’re going didn’t know where to go. Cab drivers named Muhammad were now feared as the enemy within; strangers on the street were improbably embraced like family under a canopy of fliers for the missing. Such, for a while anyway, was the “new normal,” though the old normal began to reassert itself almost as soon as that facile catchphrase was coined. Today 9/11 carries so many burdens — of interpretation, of sentimentality, of politics, of war — that sometimes it’s hard to find the rubble of the actual event beneath the layers of edifice we’ve built on top of it. (Or built on top of all of it except ground zero.)

In his new novel, Don DeLillo shoves us back into the day itself in his first sentence: “It was not a street anymore but a world, a time and space of falling ash and near night.” He resurrects that world as it was, bottling the mortal dread, high anxiety and mass confusion that seem so distant now. Though the sensibility and prose are echt DeLillo, “Falling Man” is not necessarily the 9/11 novel you’d expect from the author of panoramic novels that probe the atomic age (“Underworld”) and the Kennedy assassination (“Libra”) on the broadest imaginable canvas, intermingling historical characters with fictional creations. With the exception of Mohamed Atta, who slips into the crevices of “Falling Man” as an almost spectral presence, DeLillo mentions none of the other boldface names of 9/11, not even the mayor. Instead of unfurling an epic, DeLillo usually keeps the focus on an extended family of middle-class Manhattanites. If “Underworld” took its cues from the kinetic cinema of Eisenstein, “Falling Man,” up until its remarkable final sequence, is all oblique silences and enigmatic close-ups reminiscent of the domestic anomie of the New Wave. In DeLillo’s hands, this is not at all limiting or prosaic. There’s a method to the Resnais-like fogginess. The cumulative effect is devastating, as DeLillo in exquisite increments lowers the reader into an inexorable rendezvous with raw terror.  Humor is not this novel’s calling card………………. The narrative ends in the rubble and it is left to us to create the counternarrative,” DeLillo wrote. “People running for their lives are part of the story that is left to us” because “they take us beyond the hard numbers of dead and missing and give us a glimpse of elevated being.” An event like 9/11 cannot be bent to “the mercies of analogy or simile.” Primal terror — “the cellphones, the lost shoes, the handkerchiefs mashed in the faces of running men and women” — has to take precedence over politics, history and religion. “There is something empty in the sky,” he wrote. “The writer tries to give memory, tenderness and meaning to all that howling space.”