So...Lawrence Doesn't Matter?
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Rananim The Journal of the D.H. Lawrence Society of Australia ISSN No: 1039-9658 www.cybersydney.com.au/dhl Vol. 12, No. 1. February 2004 THIS ISSUE PAGE 3 So...Lawrence Twilight cruise on the Lady Doesn’t Matter? Hopetoun PAGE 19 or some years now there has Program Manager, Literature Balls Head F been a concerted effort to and History, was dismissive, not picnic expel DH Lawrence from the to say insulting. She said: “While canon of Australian literature. the New South Wales Ministry PAGES Recent compilations of the for the Arts does have a 7-27 major works of Australian literature Literature and History program Spirit of have bypassed Kangaroo which makes grants to literary Lawrence altogether, presumably because it and history organisations…I How DHL is no longer regarded as an regret to inform you that the inspired Australian book - for it can hardly Literature and History Australia’s be excluded for other reasons. Committee is not likely to best & Perhaps the nadir of this trend consider recommending brightest came recently in a reply to our DH assistance for a society dedicated PAGE 24 Lawrence Society of Australia to the memory and work of DH The from the NSW Ministry for the Lawrence.” architectual Arts. To add injury to insult, she importance We had asked if the NSW suggested we contact the British Government would help support Council “to see if they could help of Wyewurk our website by giving us a small the DH Lawrence Society in any CONTENTS grant sufficient to have the site way”. Editorial 2 hosted on a fast server – a matter The sheer, breath-taking Lady Hopetoun Cruise 3 of a few thousand dollars. As the gormlessness of the response About this Issue 5 Spirit of Lawrence Issue (Shead, site is complex and comprehensive, puts one in mind of the reply Whiteley, Bass, Sculthorpe, White, and contains such megabyte- George Orwell received when he Dutton, Pringle, Delprat, Barbalet, consuming content as colour sent the manuscript of Animal Ruffels, Stapleton, Organ) 7-27 Saving Young Brett 10 illustrations, it is slow to download Farm to his American publisher, A Toast to Jane Austen 15 (be accessed) from our current who wrote back declining to The Boy from Gundagai 18 server, which already costs the publish it, saying “they did not Balls Head Snapshots 20 New Tricks Old Dog 23 society a considerable sum - an print children’s books”. Sandon Point Developed 26 outlay that we find difficult to For it is clear that Ms Victorian Jottings 28 support (on top of what we need Stevens hasn’t the foggiest idea Culture Shock 29 The Light Bridage 30 to keep Rananim alive) and so of the role Lawrence and Row in Parliament 32 allow people from all round around Kangaroo have played – and still Snakes & Adders 35 the world to visit it, and thus play - in Australian literature, President’s Report 36 promote Australian literature, AGM 37 history, architecture, painting, Lawrence Swansong 38 history and the arts generally. music and (as we shall see in this Bits & Letters 39 Editorial Team 40 The reply from Irene Stevens, cont’d over page Rananim 1 Visit our website at www.cybersydney.com.au/dhl to see the art works and photographs in this issue in full colour. cont’d from previous page the single major work in Australian issue) sculpture, not to mention literature, not to mention the much else besides. judgement of people like John She probably does not know Douglas Pringle, who in 1958 the significance of Wyewurk (or described Kangaroo as “the only the fact that her political supremo, profound book written about Premier Bob Carr, is an Honorary Australia”. Member of our society, apologises British Council indeed! for not attending our functions, and Hurrrmmph! was responsible for slapping a But our anger and annoyance conservation order on Australia’s should now be put to a positive and oldest Californian bungalow, where productive use. Lawrence wrote Kangaroo). For we are, in some way, The D.H. Lawrence The fact that Kangaroo is our partly to blame for her ignorance Society of Australia best report and description of and lack of appreciation of the secret army activity in Australia in importance and significance of President: John Lacey the early 1920s has also probably Lawrence, Wyewurk and Vice-President: Robert Darroch escaped her notice. Ditto no doubt Kangaroo (and The Boy in the Secretary: Margaret Jones the influence of Lawrence and Bush). For it is a reflection on Treasurer: Doug Knowland Wyewurk on Peter Sculthorpe, our failure as a Society to get the Membership Secretary: Patrick White, Garry Shead, Brett word out (difficult though that is Sandra Jobson Whiteley, PR (Inky) Stephensen – in our world of the new Australian Editor, Rananim: John Lacey not to mention Katherine Sussanah nationalism…to paraphrase Publisher, Rananim: Sandra Prichard and Mollie Skinner, among Kipling: “What do they of Jobson many illustrious others. (The Boy Australian culture know, who only Editorial Committee: John in the Bush has also escaped her Australian culture know?”). Lacey, Robert Darroch, Sandra eye, for it is partly Australian, and So we thought we could start Jobson, Margaret Jones, Eve Harrison, Robin Archer, Angela thus might have had a chance of by devoting an issue of Rananim Barker, Marylyn Valentine, Rob attracting at least half a grant.) to that subject – the importance Douglass How far have we come from and significance of Lawrence to Archivist: Marylyn Valentine the days of Professor IM Stewart, Australian culture and history. Artists: Paul Delprat, Garry whose inaugural Commonwealth Hence this issue, which we Shead Literary Fund lecture on Australian will try to use as a platform to PO Box 100, Millers Point, Literature was devoted to further promulgate our interest NSW 2000, Australia Kangaroo, which he described as and our cause. Fax: (02) 9130 6023 e-mail: [email protected] EDITORIAL www.cybersydney.com.au/dhl If this “Spirit of Lawrence” edi- OK, Lawrence was an English- tion of Rananim demonstrates one man, but he did visit and write about thing it is that Lawrence has prob- Australia, and it is his Australian ex- ably inspired and nurtured as many - perience which has inspired so many APOLOGY or more - great Australian writers, art- of our creative minds. We Austral- We owe an apology to Society ists and musicians than Australian ians have built on what Lawrence member and Archivist Marylyn taxpayer-funded support has in its did, taking our culture forward. Valentine whose article on Law- entire history. It’s time the Australian govern- rence and Nietzsche appeared in The works created by the leading ment bodies shrugged their anti-Brit the previous issue of Rananim Australians featured in this issue of chip off their shoulders. without its footnote numbers in our journal bears testimony not only So could we suggest that the the text. This was an editorial error to Lawrence and his vision, but also NSW Ministry for the Arts recon- to the fact that art, like most other siders its insular position and helps caused in transposing the text forms of human endeavour, builds our Society maintain its website from the word-processing program upon what has gone before. which advertises and promotes to the page lay-out program. A Just as we cannot look at Euro- Australian creativity internationally. corrected version, with footnote pean art, for example, and restrict it to - Sandra Jobson, Publisher and numbers included, can be seen geographical areas, we cannot cut off Acting Editor on our DHLA website: Australian art, literature and music from the outside world. (See details of this issue page 5) www.cybersydney.com.au/dhl 2 Rananim SEND NOT TO KNOW FOR WHOM THE BOAT TOOTED by Robert Darroch Darling Harbour in the evening from the Lady Hopetoun (we recommend you view John Lacey’s evocative photo in colour on our website) t is odd how often great occasions emerge out of choofed off past the moored gin-palaces on I unexpected circumstances and unpromising Millionaires' Row along Blackwattle Bay, for what beginnings. was to prove the experience of a lifetime, all the more When our President John Lacey proposed that so because of our utter unpreparedness for it. we switch our annual DHLA cruise on the Lady I have long held the view that the enjoyment of Hopetoun ± the climax of our social year ± from a occasions, and particularly occasions such as dining, daytime event to a twilight one, no one could have are due not so much to the quality or nature of the anticipated what would happen. food and drink, but the circumstances in which they Day, night, what does it matter? If anything, occur. we'd see less of the Harbour. But it was worth a try, Ambience, to my mind, is all. by way of variation, if nothing else. And let me tell you now that there are few The prospect certainly didn't galvanise the ambiences superior to that produced in cruising slowly membership. The time ± a Friday evening in mid- round Sydney Harbour on a balmy late-summer March ± was not propitious, apparently. Many evening, seeing the city lights beginning to come on, members had other entanglements, or thought that sipping ice-cold champagne, with the soft chug and committing to three or four hours on the water at the evocative coal-whiff of an old steam engine, and the end of a workday week was something they could swish of passing water, playing a subtle minuet on not contemplate with any real expectation of pleasure your senses. or enjoyment.