WISDOM MAN To the future of my people The River Knows (Kuuyang – Eel Song) Shane Howard, Neil Murray and Banjo Clarke Who’s going to save this country now? Who’ll protect its sacred power? Listen to the south-west wind Listen can you hear the spirits sing? See the wild birds fill the sky Hear the plover’s warning cry Feel the wind and feel the rain Falling on the river once again The river knows The river flows That old river knows Watch us come and go The south-west wind brings Autumn rain To fill the rivers once again The eels will make their journey now Longing for that salty water Down the Tuuram stones they slither In their thousands down the river Headed for the river mouth Fat and sleek and slowly moving south All the tribes will gather here Travel in from everywhere Food to share and things to trade Song and dance until it fades Hear the stories being told Handed down to young from old See the fires burning there Hear the voices echo through the air Listen can you hear their song? Singin’ as they move along? Movin’ through that country there All the stories gathered here The kuuyang* move into the ocean Restless motion Even though they go away The spirits all return to here again * Eels ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Camilla Chance and Banjo Clarke’s family would like to thank the following people for their help and support in making this book possible: above all, Elizabeth (Libby) Clarke, the historian among Banjo’s children and a greatly honoured keeper of traditional ways; Camilla is much indebted to her for her input into her father’s book. Also our freelance editor Saskia Adams, Andy Alberts, Sonia Borg, Geraldine Briggs, Laura Clare, Yvonne Clarke, Judith Durham, Martin Flanagan (who helped us find a publisher), David Fligelman, Ruth Fligelman, the Right Honourable Malcolm Fraser, AC, CH; Tim Goodall, Belinda Guest (for her help in the search for Louisa Briggs’s letters), Reverend Colin Holden, Doctor David Horton, Shane Howard, Helene Jedwab, Paul Kelly, Betty Kenna, Father Michael of the Benedictine Monastery in Camperdown, Neil Murray, David Owen, Susan Pickles, Betty Reynolds, Archie Roach, Reverend David Robarts, Tricia Smith, Marjorie Tipping, Tom Wicking and Rodney Wicks. Lastly, we would like to thank our friends at Penguin Australia: publisher Clare Forster for recognising the value of Banjo’s life story; Meredith Rose for her enthusiasm, patience and sensitive editing; and David Altheim for his most powerful cover design. FOREWORD Wisdom Man describes the life and times of Banjo Clarke. In reading, it is impossible not to understand Aboriginal people’s love and respect for their own place, of their own land. The land’s importance to Banjo Clarke and his family can not be over-emphasised. This book is also the story of an Aboriginal person watching and being affected by changes that were dramatically altering the land and the world as he knew it. If readers can understand this book and its motivation, they will understand the need for reconciliation and, above all, for an understanding of the principles of Aboriginal life and culture and the standards by which Aboriginal people sought to live. Banjo Clarke was extraordinary. In many ways his life was one of forgiving; a life of kindness and a life of love. He knew what had happened to his ancestors in western Victoria and in other parts of Australia, yet he carried no residual anger. There is a touching story about a little girl who observed Banjo walking along one of the main streets of Warrnambool, greeting young and old. She turned to her mother and asked, ‘Mummy, who is that man who loves everyone?’ In many ways, that child’s words describe Banjo Clarke most accurately. I first came to know Banjo and other members of his family during the 1970s when there were problems involving their relationship with the state and the control and ownership of the Framlingham Forest. It took some time for these issues to be resolved, but in the end they were, in ways that respected Aboriginal life and enhanced Aboriginal dignity. Non-Indigenous Australians who read this book will come away with a better understanding of how many Aboriginal people lived on the edge of what had become mainstream society, but at the same time being touched by it and participating in it. When the world went to war, in 1914 and again in 1939, Banjo Clarke’s people were as much involved as other Australians. The recollections at the conclusion of Wisdom Man are examples of the many ways in which Banjo Clarke’s life affected everyone who came in contact with him. He was loved and respected by all those who knew him. The Right Honourable Malcolm Fraser, AC, CH PREFACE Our father Banjo Clarke met Camilla Chance in July 1975. It was a meeting that would forever change both their lives. Convinced that knowing about traditional Aboriginal values would help the world counter hatred, greed and lack of caring, Dad asked Camilla to record his life story. He insisted no one be told about the project, fearing that if people knew they might start influencing what he wanted to say. He wanted to speak from an uncluttered spirit. The manuscript’s existence was only made public by Camilla at his funeral in March 2000. As his children, we then resolved to ensure that their many years of work together was seen through to publication. Dad’s home on the Framlingham Aboriginal Settlement was always open to those in need – black or white, able or disabled, young or old. Everyone was welcome. For decades he provided an informal, unfunded social-welfare net for the Warrnambool region. People drifted in homeless, broke, wounded, messed up and down and out. They stayed as long as they needed to, and moved on when they were ready. No one could keep count of the number who found shelter and support with him. You could roll up to Dad’s to find that a minibus of Aboriginal youth had arrived at the same time that another full of Dutch/English/German backpackers was departing. All would mill around amid the resident army of kids, dogs and recuperating young people. A Japanese film crew might be hovering overhead in a helicopter. ‘Where’s the old man?’ someone would ask. ‘He’s answering a call from his old mate Malcolm Fraser,’ someone else would reply. It was divine bedlam. Dad was born into the Kirrae Whurrong tribe of the Gunditjmara nation on the Framlingham Mission in the early 1920s. He saw a great many changes in his lifetime, both cultural and technological. One of these was an increasing number of Aboriginal people, including his own children, being educated and employed in positions of responsibility, in both Aboriginal and mainstream organisations. Dad was always very proud of the achievements of his people, but he always told us that the bush had been his school. He attended the local Purnim Primary School for just two days, leaving after seeing a teacher hit a child, and went back home to learn from the Old People instead. He lived and breathed his Aboriginal culture, never agreeing with the view that it was a thing of the past and irrelevant to the modern age: it was as relevant to him on the day he died as when he was a boy. Yet he never rejected modern culture, either, or its more positive advances. He believed that the old ways and the best of the new could co-exist in harmony, but that, for the sake of the earth and all the life it supports, the old must never be lost. Above all, Dad embodied the spirit of reconciliation in its most generous and forgiving form. He espoused it long before it was even given a name, long before it became fashionable. He was fond of saying, ‘There are good and bad people out there, no matter what colour they are.’ Incredibly, despite all the hardships and racism he experienced in his life, he didn’t feel comfortable with the notion of Sorry Day. ‘You can’t be sorry all your life,’ he once said. ‘Why don’t they have a Happy Day for a change?’ When Dad laughed, the mountains trembled. People were healed by his laughter and his genuine, passionate universal love. He had the magic of a master storyteller, and there was never any bitterness apparent in him, though his life would have well justified it. As an Elder of the Kirrae Whurrong he had a moral authority which, like his reputation, spread well beyond the clan into the broader community – he had mates all over the planet. He owned virtually nothing, but was content with what he had. He was not a politician, or a movie star, or a rich man, or any of those things so many of us strive so emptily towards, yet by the time of his passing he had managed to reach thousands of people through what he regarded as the greatest employment of all – that of love, compassion and wisdom. Camilla Chance recorded her interviews with Dad over more than two decades, many taking place beside a waterfall at Framlingham. It is appropriate that this book stems from an oral account rather than a written one, in accordance with Aboriginal custom. Aboriginal stories, legends and lessons have always been passed down from one generation to the next via the spoken word, and Dad wanted his story to be no different.