No comments about Wild Card: An Autobiography, 1923-1958.

3 comments about Patrick White Letters.

1. I read 2 negative reader reviews of this book on the day I bought it and thought I had thrown my money down the drain. Luckily we all come at books from a different perspective and I am very pleased I stumbled on this 677 page volume of letters written from 1919 to 1990. Reading this is like sitting in someones living room unseen and hearing all from the everyday to the important being discussed. It gives us a strong human connection to this hugely talented, crotchety, driven, private, argumentative man of strong opinions and unpredictably diverse views of the world. Rather than writing him off as a typical Australian as previous reviewers have, I found his letters fascinating, surprising, and a damn good read and his life and thought are very un-typical of Australians of his era in my view. The fact that my house is in walking distance of Dogwoods made their Castle Hill life doubly pertinent to me but in any event I would have enjoyed the book immensely. White's comment about wishing to spend his time on his acreage at Dogwoods rather than 'watching a landscape slowly destroyed by a race whose most pronounced gift is that of creating ugliness' was prescient, a McDonalds now stands nearby opposite a shopping centre carpark. Certainly worth a read.



2. What an awful life! As an Australian this dreadful, wizened old cockroach of a man makes me ashamed. Nothing but boring twisted hatred and ingratitude. Why publish such a book at all?



3. patrick white is one of the 20th century's finest novelists - his thick tome of letters compiled by david marr was given to me by someone who knew of patrick white only as a writer from my country- I was living in TX at the time feeling acute homesickness of which, upon reading the book, was immediately cured by page 2 when the reasons why I left australia in the first place came vividly galloping towards me with a loud yawn. The scratchy nib of discontentment mark 400 pages of this old sod's rather boring snippy life with his companion manoly. His mandarin mouthed mug scowling at u courtesy of the brush strokes of Brett on the cover really tell u the whole sad story .. dinner parties, gossip, gardening, writing, gossip, travelling, bitching, writing etc go on and on -- most telling aspect is that patrick wanted all his correspondence destroyed after being read - obviously not enough of his friends took him seriously - so why should we ...

No comments about Neither-Nor: A Young Australian's Experience with Deafness (Deaf Lives Series, Vol. 5).

No comments about The Right Man for the Right Job: Lieutenant General Sir Stanley Savige As a Military Commander (Australian Army History).

No comments about Behind Enemy Lines: An Australian Sas Soldier in Vietnam.

No comments about The Biographical Dictionary of the Australian Senate: Volume 2 (Biographical Dictionary of the Australian Senate series).

2 comments about Nicky Barr, An Australian Air Ace: A Story of Courage and Adventure.

1. Like the previous reviewer, I could hardly put this book down. It is an amazing story told in cinamgraphic detail. It would have been a good book written as fiction, but to know the stories are all true (I confirmed the outline with an RAAF offical obit) brings a part of WWII to life. Well done Peter Dornan, in taking in so much oral history and weaving it into a compelling story.



2. Nicky Barr's life and the courage he showed, were almost too unblieveable to be true. His biography by Peter Dornan is wonderfully written and impossible to put down. Nicky Barr was a quiet, unassuming man, but a fierce, aggressive fighter to his enemy in battle, and a great friend to those who knew him. The reader will come away feeling like the latter.
   His wife and true love, Dot, passed away in May 2006 and Nicky joined her in June.
   Thanks to Peter Dornan, for allowing me to know them both!

No comments about Waltzing the Magpies: A Year in Australia.

4 comments about A View from the Ridge.

1. I started reading this slim volume quite a few months ago and I put it down, never intending to finish it. Some of the early parts of the book rubbed me the wrong way, to the point where I wondered just how much of a true Christian Mr. West really was. Recently, I picked it up and basically started where I left off, and my previous judgementalism gave way to a certain admiration. Morris West has not only the wisdom of a man of advanced years but the worldly experience that gives him a valuable perspective to share on such issues as evil, violence, dissent, and death. He has seen things most of us with never see, and this book is all the more enlightening because of that fact. Although not a Catholic like Mr. West is, I share his experience of a life that is centered around the institution of the church, and can appreciate the love/hate relationship one can have with the Body of Christ. Like many, he cries out for a church that values the person above laws and regulations. I look forward in the future to reading some of his fiction (although much of it is out of print and rather hard to get at this time).



2. I've long admired West's ability to move me with words. His papal trilogy in particular ranks as one of my favorite in literary fiction. To read this delightfully honest and heartfelt memoir is to gain even greater insight to the wisdom and insights of his fictional work.

   West, long a respectful rebel of sorts, has managed to approach subjects and questions many wish to avoid. In doing so, rather than turning these into platforms for personal grievances, he elevates their importance in community discussion.

   Despite his literary prowess, West manages to come across as an everyday man, a man you'd like to converse with over coffee. No, don't remind me that the most likely place for conversation would be at his deathbed. He may be getting older, nearer to unknown that he says he welcomes willingly, but his words will remain as a part of our culture. His thoughts and ideas will remain to challenge future generations.

   Mr Morris West, thank you for that gift.




3. With sales of his books having exceeded sixty million copies, Morris West is not only Australia's best-selling writer, but also one of our best-known storytellers. With his so-called `Vatican Trilogy' - `The Shoes of the Fisherman', `The Clowns of God' and `Lazarus' - he virtually invented a genre, the papal novel.

   In the past, West has resisted calls for an autobiography, holding that the `chronicles of my works and days have already been presented under the decent draperies of fiction'. However, having turned eighty, West has put aside fiction to give an account of his twentieth-century pilgrimage.

   The book is not an autobiography as such, but rather part memoir, part philosophical meditation, part spiritual testament. We learn of his early family life before becoming a trainee with the Christian Brothers, of the trials of religious life, and of life as a writer on the international stage. West reflects on the nature of evil, on violence, and on the roles of dissent and prophecy in the Church. He also writes movingly of his encounters with Brother Death.

   West has, over the years, defiantly retained his rightful place as a son of the Church, and in doing so has encouraged countless others troubled by rigid orthodoxies. Changes in the Church in recent decades, and in West's own life and attitudes, are well captured by two pieces of his journalism that are reproduced in full in the book, both about recent popes. The first is a glowing obituary of John XXIII, `The Good Pastor', written in 1963. The second is a very critical reflection on the current pontiff, written on the occasion of the papal visit to Australia for the nation's first beatification (of Mary MacKillop).

   Late in his life, West has given us an uplifting account of his experience of being a Christian in these troubled times. It is written with grace, intelligence and wisdom. [A Selection of the John Garratt Catholic Book Club.]




4. Morris West has written a truly challenging testimony as he nears the end of a fine career and eventful life. For me, he summed up how I feel as a Catholic facing the challenges of the Church at the end of the millenium. His candidness and honesty are refreshing. His ideas worth consideration. And his words often inspiring. I am grateful he took the time to tell me so intimately about his own faith journey

5 comments about A Portrait of the Artist As Australian: L'Oeuvre Bizarre De Barry Humphries.

1. The inside back dustjacket flap of this book notes that Paul Matthew St. Pierre is a Dada artist. I suspect (duh!) that he has written his Barry Humphries study precisely in his capacity as a Dadaist, as a tribute to Humphries (himself a Dada artist) but also as, what he calls in the book, a "dadact", an act of subversion in the spirit of Dada. What is he subverting? Well, I think he's deconstructing the whole idea of academic criticism, the very thing that Humphries himself deplores, being taken seriously. If you accept this premise, A Portrait of the Artist as Australian: L'Oeuvre bizarre de Barry Humphries becomes a very complicated book, at once subverting the whole idea of the academic study and undertaking a daunting research project into just about everything Humphries has ever done as a writer and a performer. Did I like the book? Yes, I think it's amazing. It's certainly unlike any other book I have read about Humphries, by John Lahr, Peter Coleman, Ian Britain, and Stephen Alomes. A singular performer, Humphries certainly deserved this kind of singular treatment. Kudos to St. Pierre for having the pluck (Humphries would say the spunk) to write it!



2. In his well researched and provocatively written book, Paul Matthew St. Pierre has made a sound case for Barry Humphries as a writer of literature. Certainly, I had not known that Humphries has been writing books throughout his career on the stage. St. Pierre addresses all of Humphries' writing and much of his stage and television work, and comes up with some original interpretations. As an academic, St. Pierre draws on some pretty infamous critics like Derrida and Barthes, but he also mentions some really interesting writers such as Es'kia Mphahlele and my late countrywoman Janet Frame, and somehow makes the mix work. In addition, he seems to be trying something nonacademic by writing a new kind of criticism. I am not sure what kind it is, but Dada criticism comes to mind, the subversion of conventional criticism. This aspect of the book offered a real challenge to me as a reader, because I realized the author was trying to change the rules of the critical game precisely as I was reading his book, which put some of the responsibility on me to play along. I see this as St. Pierre's intellectual challenge to the most avid readers.



3. I have just finished reading A Portrait of the Artist as Australian: L'Oeuvre bizarre de Barry Humphries, which I found an engaging and informative book. Having been familiar with Barry Humphries mainly as Dame Edna Everage, from television and The Royal Tour, I evidently had a lot to learn about him. I hadn't known he was a writer, for example, the author of 29 books. Nor had I known that he draws on music hall and dada in his stage performances as Edna and Sir Les Patterson. One of the most fascinating parts of the book is a chart in which St. Pierre compares some of Dame Edna's and Les Patterson's lines with the conventional spiel of the music hall chairman, who presided over stage shows a century ago: that Humphries might be invigorating some of these old formulas I found quite fascinating. St. Pierre claims that "Sandy Agonistes", which is a Sandy Stone monoloque, is the greatest Australian poem of the 20th-century. I wouldn't know. I haven't had a chance to find a copy of the poem yet, and, I must confess, I am not always sure whether I can take all of St. Pierre's claims seriously, but he has made me very very curious. I know I have to read this poem. So now I have started looking to purchase Humphries' books, records, and CDs (St. Pierre lists hundreds of them in his bibliography), because St. Pierre has intrigued me about the man beneath the make-up, who, I am convinced, must be a great artist. I realize that I knew NOTHING about Barry Humphries before reading this book. Now I think I know quite a bit. But, more important, St. Pierre has made me want to learn EVERYTHING about Humphries. He has created an interest in me.



4. I think the joke is on the reader only if one doesn't recognize this satire of a satirist. And Les Patterson, well, I think with his rave review he hopes we won't be aware of his close relationship to Barry Humphries. We all know that rave reviews are often the product of a reciprocal arrangement where you rave about my book and I rave about yours. Come to think of it, though, Mr. Patterson HAS written a book. But I doubt that Mr. Humphries had anything nice to say about it.
   
   Every page satirizes what the author must feel is Mr. Humphries' pompous writing style (or should I say sesquipedalian?) A writing style like this is so distinctive, so exaggerated and bizarre, how can anyone doubt the real author? Barry's memoirs and other books are wonderfully written and hard to put down, whereas I can't imagine anyone plowing through this balderdash. Excuse I for asking, but how did the author ever have the time or inclination to write book like this? More Sir Les and Dame Edna, please!
   
   Reading Barry Humphries' books requires a dictionary close at hand. But here the author has helped us out. All the big stumblers are footnoted, and we are spared having to haul a big heavy dictionary into our beds, or onto the train. But do we really care?
   
   Barry Humphries is a genius. I'm positively in love with Dame Edna and have a real soft spot for the Australian Attaché to the Court of St. James, but--and I mean this with respect--I learned a lot more about Barry Humphries from Women in the Background (not autobiographical!!) This book is Barry on speed or something, and I'd rather have another volume of his autobiography, something that will keep me up until 2 a.m. All I can say in favor of this book is the cover is great.



5. Paul St. Pierre's A Portrait of the Artist as Australian (2004)
   
   Paul St. Pierre's thoroughly researched text is a scholarly portrait of Barry Humphries' (the flamboyant character of Dame Edna Everage) entire career as a comic artiste extraordinaire. Humphries is a master of "grotesqueries and bizarreries," whose reputation as an actor, performer, writer, music hall artiste and Dada prankster situate him as the darling of Australian, British, and international artistic communities. The reader is invited to travel through satirical, comedic, entertaining and witty literary work with St. Pierre leading the way as a true pathfinder. Humphries' oeuvre includes dramatic monologues, comic books, (auto)biographies, film scripts, poetry, novels, and sketches. St. Pierre acknowledges Humphries' unique talents:
   
   By playing up and sending up cultural stereotypes, Humphries has encouraged Australians, and others, to laugh not only at him and his characters but also at themselves, at the negation of themselves on stage, and to come up on stage and join in the subversion of their images in the mirror. ... Thus, Humphries
   invites audiences to find pleasure in subversive things such as Dada, music hall, parody, theatre, kitsch, class, race, gender, and Australiana, as they play in the one-man show, and also to find the act of subverting pleasurable, even laughable. (133)
   
   We owe our gratitude to St. Pierre for introducing to us the world of Humphries' laughter and for his delight in researching and writing this text "not out of opportunism but out of community service, as a note of thanks to Barry Humphries and as an offering to his squillions of fans" (224). If you wish to partake in lively amusement and introspection, then sample Humphries' genius for "putting out bush fires of ignorance, pomposity, seriousness, complacency, provincialism, and political correctness around the world" and pick up a copy of St. Pierre's A Portrait of the Artist as Australian (251). In these troubled times we all need to feel the miraculous properties of laughter to heal our spirits.