Vol. 4 No. 8 October 1994 $5.00

THE BIG DRY Margaret Simons on the state of the country

New Australian poetry: Kevin Hart, Jack Hibberd, Les Murray, Dorothy Porter, Peter Porter, Peter Rose and Peter Steele

Serious travel: Chris McGillion watches the fading of Cuba's revolution, Peter Pierce follows Robert Louis Stevenson into New Caledonia and Shane Maloney finds evidence of miracles in the Wild West From the Publisher Dear Readers,

For several years I have been approached by different organisations-church groups, aid agencies, publishers and the like-wanting to let you know about their products or appeals through direct mail advertising. Until recently, I have resisted these requests. However, I can now see a value in them. Publishing is expensive and your subscriptions and advertising are our only sources of income. The ever­ increasing costs of production end up being passed on to subscribers, unless the cost is offset either by increased advertising in the magazine or through renting our mailing list. I can assure you that anyone seeking to rent the list of subscribers to Eureka Street will be assessed by Jesuit Publications for their suitability. You will not be deluged with mail, nor approached by unsuitable advertisers. A large part of the material you receive will be from groups who already advertise with us. Ultimately, it will be your decision whether you participate in this or not. If you wish to have your name and address withheld from this activity, you are free to do so, and we will respect your decision. Please write and let me know if this is what you want.

Thank you for your subscription to Eureka Street. I hope it continues to stimulate and inform you about our changing world and church.

Yours sincerely Fr Michael Kelly SJ Publisher

The Publishing Event of the Year! UNIVERSITY OF NSW PRESS THE OXFORD COMPANION TO Waterloo Creek AUSTRALIAN LITERATURE The Australia Day Massacre of 1838, George SECOND EDITION Gipps and the British Conquest of NSW Written by William H . Wilde, Joy H ooton and BaiT)' Andrews Roger Mil/iss + Includes entries on the key Meticulously researched, yet as gripping plays, no vels, poems, journa ls, newspape rs, antho logi es a nJ and intense as any novel, Roger Milliss' organisations influentia l in Banjo-Award-winning book tells the shaping our literary culture + Presents the major movements shocking true story of a massacre of and milestones in Australian hundreds of Aborigines and the fi cti on, poetry, drama, biography, and autobi ography extraordinary + Updates the careers of events which innumerable contemporary writen; such as Helen G arner, Pete r followed . Care y, and Eliza be th Jolley + Reflects the con siderable increase in wo men's and "An awesome multicultural writing and + O ffers major ne w essay­ RRP $69 .95 length articles fr om Aboriginal courageous Available fr om all good writing, ro crime fi ction , a nc..l [he work" Sydney boo kstores immigrant experience Morning Herald. In cax- of dLffLcul!y omr:~o + Fully revised and ex panded OxfurJ Un1vcrs1ty Press Phone: 646 4100 Frt'c Fax: 008 81J 602 containing over 500 new entries Now in OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS paperback! AUSTRALIA 992pp $49.95pb & AR I IN007/5101 1 1~ Volume 4 Number 8 EURI:-KA srm:-a October 1994 A magazine of public affairs, the arts and theology

CoNTENTS 4 30 COMMENT TRAVEL Chris McGillion watches the fading of the 8 revolution in Cuba; Shane Maloney rides LETTERS into the Wild West with the Laredo nuns (p.36); Peter Pierce pursues Robert Louis 11 Stevenson into New Caledonia (p.38). CAPITAL LETTER 34 12 QUIXOTE REPORTS Nguyen Viet Huy SJ on Asian youth in 41 Cabran'latta; Catriona Jackson on the UN BOOKS Population Conference in Cairo (pl3); Jon Michael McGirr explores Brian Castro's Greenaway on Australia's immigration Drift and Rodney Hall's The Yandilli policies (p22). Trilogy; Max Teichmann reviews Robert Manne's The Shadow of 1917 (p.42). 14 THE BIG DRY 44 Margaret Simons on Australia's farmers, FESTIVALS the drought and government policy. Graham Little anticipates an encounter with Edna O 'Brien at the M elbourne Serious travel 20 Writers' Festival. with Chris McGillion, Shane Maloney BEWARE THOSE RADICALS, and Peter Pierce, see pp30-42 KEN NETT &. CO. 46 Moira Rayner on the radical right and the THEATRE Cuba waiting: photographs, above, remaking of Victoria. Geoffrey Milne assesses the influence of by Catherine O'Leary American drama in Australia. 21 ARCHIMEDES 48 FLASH IN THE PAN 23 Reviews of the films W olf, The Lion King, Cover Photograph: Drough t country ISOLATION Clear and Present Danger, Spider and by Bi ll T homas. Craig Minogue reflects on life in isola­ Rose and Fellini Satyricon. Photographs pp14,18, 19, 44 by Bi ll Thomas. tion at Pen tridge. Graphic pp13, 17, 22, 24-25, 36 by Tim Metherall. 50 Graphics pp7, 17, 36 by Siobhan jackson. 24 ON SPEC Cartoons pp9, 20 by Peter Fraser. MY CHILDHOOD DOOR Graphics p23 by Tohm Hajncl. Cynthia Rowan retraces her Murri Photographs pp30-33 by Tania Jovanovic, 51 M33 Agency. fa mily life. SPECIFIC LEVITY

Eureka Street magazine 26-29, 35 Jes uit Publications POETRY PO Box 553 Richmond VIC 3121 Poem s by Kevin Hart, Jack Hibberd, Les Tel (03)427 731 1 Murray, Dorothy Porter, Pet er Porter, Fax (03)428 4450 Peter Rose and Peter Steele. COMMENT

EURI:-KA SJRI:-B MoRAe FRASER A magazine of public affairs, the arts and theology Publisher Michael Kelly SJ Editor Morag Fraser Work in progress Production editor Ray Cassin Consulting editor Michael McGirr SJ INST MAe ,, s CAT""'"" '" S "'"" th e

4 EUREKA STREET • O cTOJlER 1994 COMMENT: 2

RAY CASSIN

A m, AN AN~:;,~,~~ ~:e ~::~n:d ~~~~ th:~~~•ncc h'' now been out, the world is accustomed to reacting with almo t translated into a decision to seek a resolution of the as much cynicism as relief. This is especially the case conflict on an all-Ireland basis, then northern Prates- when the conflict concerned is that in the north of tants only have more to lose by excluding themselves Ireland, which, depending on one's historical perspec- from the process. They, or their organised voice in tive and political allegiance, has lasted either 25 years, the unionist parties, may continue to assert their 70 years, or two, three, four or eight centuries. Even peculiar brand of 'Iri h-Britishness', but the real in an age that has seen the Berlin Wall come down, political question is whether anyone in Westminster Nelson Mandela elected president of South Africa and still wants to collude in the fiction. Republican myths the State of Israel negotiating with the PLO, it seems have come in for a healthy close of scepticism from too difficult to accept that the two communities in revisionist Irish historians, and some of the 'loyalist' the north might make a lasting peace with each oth- myths are overdue for similar treatment. er, with Britain and with the rest of Ireland. It is not clear what sort of constitutional frame- For a start, only one of those communities seems work could give both communities an assurance of to have embraced the prospect of peace with any continued identity, though Albert Reynolds has enthusiasm . Nationalists, whether supporters of Sinn signalled a readiness to start by amending those Fein or the Social Democratic and Labor Party, greet- sections of the republic's constitution which claim ed the IRA's announcement of an indefinite ceasefire sovereignty over the north. But if northern Protestants from 1 September with dancing in the streets. But are really to be assured that they have a secure future unionists have remained sullen and suspicious, and in any new Irish order, then perhaps the biggest one docs not have to be a supporter of partition and gesture must come from the Catholic bishops. the Orange ascendancy in the north to see their point. One consequence of partition has been an in ten- How has the president of Sinn Fein, Gerry Adams, sification of the Catholic character of the south: the been able to persuade the IRA council that anything republic's constitution may no longer give the is to be gained from a unilateral ceasefire? Through- Catholic Church a special status, but Dublin's legis- out the past 25 years of what it euphemistically calls lation (or lack thereof) on matters such as divorce, 'armed struggle', the IRA failed to change Britain's contraception and abortion still fuels fears among determination that the six counties should remain Protestants about Rome's sway over a united Ireland. part of the United Kingdom until the majority of their The bishops can strengthen the steps towards population decides otherwise. Only if Sinn Fein/IRA peace that politicians, however falteringly, have has now been given reason to believe that British re- already taken, by giving a clear indication that they solve is wavering, unionists argue, is there any rca - would accept a relationship between church and state son for it to start negotiating. which is the same as that existing in other western Whether or not John Major's governm ent has pluralist democracies. In other words, that they would privately encouraged Adams, the SDLP leader, John not automatically expect the law on matters such a Hume, and the Irish Taoiseach, Albert Reynolds, in divorce to conform to Catholic teaching, and that they such a belief, in fact successive British governments understand that those who are not Catholics have have tacitly accepted that the so-called province of rights in such matters which must be respected. • Northern Ireland is not a fully integrated part of the -Ray Cassin

COMMENT: 2

CHRISTINE BURKE

T,"ceNT MONT=O~~~o~,~~~t t~~ ti tht~ ::~~bc~!~~ong with the P"""' can statements reasserting the restriction of ordina- packaging. tion to men highlights tensions about the mode of One danger of such times is that our attention authority within the church. turns inward. Church structures absorb energy, in- Many in the Catholic community fear that the stead of freeing people to take a more active role in collegial and communal vision promised by Vatican society. II has been downgraded in practice, if not in theory. Christianity is first and foremost a belief in the The ensuing disillusion leads to withdrawal for many. divine brea king into, and being discovered in, our But it can also deepen inner conviction for those who world. The Christian heritage presents us with the believe that the spiritual riches of the tradition are challenge to keep this awareness alive, to live out its

VOLUME 4 NUMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 5 implications, to cherish and nurture our world and All of us, not just our leaders, need to address its people. Our tradition values the common good as the key question of how we maintain com m unity a key elem ent in a just society. We are committed to while respecting difference. Critical for the Christian a 'tough ' notion of community, which cares for the are power and participation. The use of power must weakest and respects difference. always stand under Jesus' example of 'power going These insights and the practical engagem ent they out from ' rather than 'power over'. Unless we can entail are sorely needed now, at a time when passivi­ change styles of power which have more in keeping ty is exploited so that laws can be changed, services with past eras than with gospel concerns, we will be reduced, and people withdraw into familiar relation­ unable to participate in the present 'open moment'. ships rather than reaching out to newcomers. Our ensuing culture will be all the more fragm ented Many people understand that an ethos of compe­ and alienated because of that. tition and individualism has led to to a spiritual vac­ The fact that all this has been sparked off by uum, and they are seeking more communal values. church documents which in different ways resist the At such a time, a patriarchal style of authority ham­ feminine presence in practice and in language is not pers the ability of the Christian tradition to make a coincidental. Feminist theologians from many coun­ significant contribution. People outside the Catholic tries explore and develop the importance of both con­ Church look with confusion at the principles of so­ nectedness and respect for difference. They explore cial justice enunciated by the church, and compare in practice alternative modes of organisation which these with a practice in which real respect for differ­ empower rather than control. A church which ex­ ence is ignored. Insights that Catholics might have cludes their contribution will be unable to negotiate about community sound like window-dressing for to­ the conversion needed if we are to contribute to the talitarian control. This is in the nature of scandal, common good of our times. • because the need for a well-developed rationale for Christine Burke IBVM is doing a doctorate in politics community has never been stronge r. and religion. She works for Fair Share.

C OMMENT: 3 M ORAG FRASER

T ,"'" N OT M UCH ''"M cnou~~:~:~S ~~,P~~'~t he pm,illce"', whole. They be PNG at the moment. The volcanic activity in Rab- lieve the BRA cannot be forced to give up its arm s aul in September repeated the pattern of political and could return Bougainville to the terrorism of 1990, events in August. When Eurel

6 EUREKA STREET • O CT OBER 1994 COMM ENT: 4 CHrus McG rLLI ON

M cx 1 c~~ ~c~T~~:~~~~n :~e~.,~~:o~~~~~=~~~ •ndnew p'es- 'fr ee and fair'-to use the currently fa shionable jar- sures into the country's policy-planning debates. go n- by most observers. In what sense it was also As a result, the PRI is deeply faction-ridden . It is meaningfu l is another matter. The ruling Institutional split between young Technoturks who want to di s- Revolutionary Party's (PRI) Erne to Zedillo scraped mantle an interventionist state and party traditional- hom e with 50.03 per cent ists who fear for their of the vote . The only power and prestige. authentic opposition can- If the PRI is to can- didate, Cuau h temoc Car- tinue its historic function denas of the D emocratic of interest aggregator, Revolutionary Party (PRO), policy m aker and regime polled a mere 17 per cent. legitimator, Zedillo must Cardenas, along with the quickly forge a new con- mysterious Commandante sensus within the party. Marcos of the Z apatista But the strong, and well- gu errillas, h as claimed fo unded, suspicion that m assive fraud. PRJ hard-liners were im- But that was never plicated in Colosio's as­ likely. If the PRI had sassination suggests how thought fraud necessary to difficult-and dan ger­ cling to power, it w ould ous-that m ay be. not have agreed to overhaul Those opposed to the the electoral system or to PRI and its economic and accept an unprecedented ocial policies have their level of impartial electoral own problem s. Cardenas oversight. The efforts of has been unable to re­ foreign election m onitors group the alliance of so­ were well-intentioned but cial forces that supported misplaced: the crucial pe­ him in 1988. (This is clear riod for Mexico was not the 'What happens in Mexico in the next few months is of not only fro m his poor days leading up to the elec­ interest not only to Mexicans. The rest of Latin America showing on 2 1 Augu st tion; it will be the months will be watching to see what becomes of this experiment but also from the gener­ fo llowing the vote. in free market reforms and free trade as ociation with ally unenthusiastic re­ the industrialised economies of North America.' By 2 1 August many sponse to the protest -Chris McGillon Mexicans had been con­ rallies he called after the 'Let them eat fries!' Voters in a Veracruz cafe. vinced that their country Engraving by Siobhan Jackson election .) Cardenas ha was on the verge of a vio­ shifted fro m left -of-centre lent breakdown of order. The Zapatista uprising in to the centre in the past 12 months. The example Chiapa in January contributed to that perception. So of the Zapatistas is pulling som e of his old did the assassination of the PRI's initial presidential allies in the opposite direction. candidate, Luis Donalda Colosio, in Tijuana in March, skirmishes between rival drug traffickers, and the W AT HAPPENS IN M EXICO in the next few months kidnapping for ransom of several prominent local is of interest not only to Mexicans. The US has an businessm en . obvious economic and strategic interest in the coun­ The election outcom e refl ected anxiety at these try. But the rest of Latin Ameri ca will be watching developments but provides no relief for it. Electoral closely as well, to see what becom es of this experi­ dem ocracy is a contest for the control of government: ment in fr ee-market reform s and fr ee-trade associa­ in Mexico the real crisis lies at the level of state and tion with the industrialised economies of N orth society. America. A decade of free-market reforms has strained the Mexico experienced the fi rst social revolution of old alliance of interests between workers, peasants, the 20th century. It may yet experience the last. • the bureaucracy and the military on which the PRI's uninterrupted 65-year rule has been based. It has in­ Chris M cGillion writes for the Sydn ey Morning troduced new actors (Mexican fin ance capital, trans- Herald. H e was in Mexico for the August elections.

V oLUME 4 N uMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 7 L ETTERS

Eurelw Street welcomes letters II Bad Boy bubble from its readers. Short letters arc On the contrary more likely to be published, and ;d l letters may he ed ited. Letters Fr om Professor Pet er Singer, Centre From Pe ter Malone MSC, Pacific m u~t he signed, ;md should in ­ for Human Bioethics, Monash Univ­ Region president of OCIC (Organisa­ c ludc a contact phone number ersity. tion Catholique l ntemationale du and the writer's name and address. It is astonishing to read, in Raimond Cinema et Audiovisuels). Gaita's response to the interviews Eur­ The vehemence of Michael McGirr's rel

8 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 most every major point I made.' When the visible church continually clisem­ all about. No saving is clone by me. people make contradictory claims, powered. Baptism is the core sacrament. It they do become difficult to under­ The evidence is there for us all to is the springboard from which all life stand. sec: Holy Spirit is aba ndoning the hi­ and mission flows- for those in the Peter Singer erarchical structures of the ordained ordained ministry as well! You refer Clayton, VIC and calling the unordainccl to exercise to ordination in terms of power- how ministry according to the New Testa­ sad. Out of order I ment model, which clearly included Brian, thanks for the image of Ju­ women and married men. But can we dith- may some of her strength and From Ross Saunders imagine the ordained giving up the humour move all our hearts during The debate over the ordination of right to veto the decisions of the un­ these times! women will not go away until the orclainecl? Marlene McGrath church hierarchies realise that this is Surely, the next reform of those Vermont, VIC merely a symptom of a deep and on­ churches that maintain an imposed going malaise in those churches that hierarchical, authoritative ministry TALKING POINTS have an imposed ordained hierarchy. must involve the shari ng of power Catholicism, like Orthodoxy and with the whole church- and that will Nobody, a play about adolescent Anglicanism, divides those baptised be a sight to behold, given that power experience in the modern city, is into the Body of C hrist into two: the does corrupt and absolute power being performed during Mel­ ordained and the unordained. makes sure that no one else gets it! bourne's Fringe Festival from 4-22 The unorclained take no part what­ Ross Saunders October, in Commerce Way, off soever in the process of ordaining the Newtown, NSW Flinders Lane between Elizabeth and unorclained. They may be given some Queen Streets in the city. For book­ grudging power to select, from among ings, phone Nicola (Open Family) those already ordained, those they on (03) 696 3393. wish to have as their pastors or bish­ ops. But they have no say whatsoever Buddhist Mind Science, a seminar in who amongst them may be or­ sponsored by Deakin University's dained, nor do they participate in the School of Social Inquiry, takes place actual process of ordination. on 14-16 October. Enquiries: Cathy Clerical orders are conceived of as Tay, (052) 27 2262 a direct gift from above, m ediated through the already ordained. This is - clear from the various encyclica ls and official promulgations emanating from Looking for achallenge in 1995l popes and councils. Why not spend a year in a ... All the rhetoric about magisterium - and communion-all the models be­ ing dredged up by the ordained to pac­ Companions ify the unordained- does not hide the ~~ .... a\ sv,l\c; fact that the church of Christ has been Volunteer divided into two separate bodies that Out of order II are held together only by the domina­ Community tion and self-serving authority of the From Marlene McGrath, Pastoral ordained. Associate, St Timothy's, Forest Hill, eve is a program jointly sponsored T he N ew Testam ent model of the VIC by the Jesu its. the Si sters of Mercy church as the Body of Christ with In his letter 'Michael's Message' (Let­ and the Chri st ian Brothers Christ the sole head has, since the sec­ ters, September '94) Brian Lang has the It offers th e opportunity of serving the ond century AD, been abandoned. And audacity to display in public inaccu­ disadvantaged, livin g simply in community the various Protestant reformations rate details of Michael's and my life and sharing faith. did nothing to change that. based on a world and church view that Currently there are com munities in Melbourne Only when the ordained include went out with buttoned-up boots. and Brisbane. with th e possibility or a the u nordained in the exercise of the You see, Bri an, St Timothy's com­ commun ity in Perth in 1995 process of ordination and authority munity never needed saving by me­ If you are a single man or woman in the 20-30 will the church ever succeed in com­ or anyone else for that matter! The year old age group living in Australia. w ith ing anywhere near the model that Lord has done it, and continues to car­ good hea lth. transferable sk ills, Christian Christ envisaged and which Peter and ry out his redeeming mission in all our motivation. nexibility and a sense of humour, Paul practised. lives, and the only thing we have to and if you wish to choose the cha llenge of the So long as the unordained have to do is to recognise it is happening. companions vo lunteer community. submit to an imposed hierarchical sys­ It has been my privilege to be write to: tem of authority and ministry that earthed in St Timothy's faith commu­ Sr Madeline Duckett RSM completely e liminates them from nity, sharing their ' joys, hopes, griefs CVC Office, PO Box 5067 sharing in the gifts of ministry given and anxieties', walking with the peo­ A lphington VIC 3078 to the whole Body, then so long will ple as together we lea rn what commit­ Christ be divided asunder into two and m ent and compassion and mission is Tel: (03)499 1577

VOLUME 4 N UMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 9 ple now and in the future? N o wonder clrawal has provided the Palestinians Philip Kennedy w ent public! I am sure with a freedom- from curfews, sol­ Dark clouds that staying in the church can be as diers and prisons-that they have not painful as leaving it. experienced for 27 years (Tikkun, July/ From Laura Doh erty The best way to avoid a museum­ August 1994) Thank you, Eureka Street, for your re­ pi ece church is to m ake every effort Of course, this does not change the cent articles by Philip Kennedy, Alan t o prove, in a w ord a nd deed, the fa ct that the rest of the West Bank re­ G ill and Ra y Cassin on authority, the church's relevancy today. Thank you mains under Israeli occupation. N or right to express diverse opinion in the to Eurel

10 EUREKA STREET • O c TOBER 1994 Learning the things

T,uTEST MD ill analy•i:~~~v ~~ t:~~li ~ ~,~:&tho< te,.on doe' not alway' the Labor and Liberal parties is to compare the way carry the day, that symbols and appeals to sentiment in which Labor nurtures its young-by instilling iron are as significant as cold logic, and that, if chance must into their souls-with the clubby Liberal atmosphere, be taken into account, then the better politicians in which people who have shown talent in some non- make their own breaks. The Liberals, by contrast, still political sphere are thrust into senior politics on the want power to come easily. They spend too much time basis of declaring in an interview that they are deter- daydreaming about what they might do if they win mined to excel at politics too. The newest Labor back- government, and not enough time working to attain bencher, say the wise heads, has spent 10 or 20 years it. Even party officials tend to operate more as social in Young Labor or the union movement, learning all club committee members than as functionaries who about the game of counting heads, cutting throats and can dispense or withhold favours. These failings are stabbing others in the back. Keating's backbench, with aggravated by the party structure, which makes both a dozen former state secretaries, union organisers and the organisational wing and grass-roots members miscellaneous apparatchiks, has more experience in irrelevant on a day-to-day basis. In particular, the hard politics than the entire Liberal front bench. Many Liberals lack mechanisms for shifting direction-ex- of the essential skills are instinctive, and Labor has a cept, of course, the ultimate one of assassinating the culture that selects those who have the guts to ac- leader. quire power and wield it effectively. The Liberal ama- Things that Matter ought to have served a useful teurs, by contrast, often get near the top before it is purpose for Alexander Downer. More than a decade apparent that they lack such instincts. of wandering in the wilderness under an array of lead- There is something in this analysis, as Alexan- ers has left even the parliamentary party, let alone der Downer's continuing debacles show. The man ordinary branch members, confused about what the himself, though born and bred to politics, killed any party stands for. Almost every crisis of direction- momentum from his Things that Matter statement over sexual-privacy laws, say, or Aboriginal affairs, with a few offensive jokes. He continues to fall on his has had the capacity to tear the party apart. Most vat- face, and worse, seems unable to get up. Andrew Pea- ers were never going to read a manifesto, and the prin- cock, a party elder statesman with great political nous ciples for which the party stands should be able to be but no killer instinct, abandons the most prestigious summarised in a page or two. What was needed were Liberal seat in the country and the party actually be- clear indications of the way the party would turn comes desperate to find a replacement. A senior par- when, for example, developmental concerns clashed ty ideologue says he's too interested in making money with environmental or Aboriginal ones, or states to be interested in the job, and another possible con- rights with the rights of individuals. Instead, Downer tender, the Victorian Premier, lets it be known that produced a document that in more than 100 pages he would only accept nomination as part of a deal did not even pretend to set priorities or weigh differ- that delivered him the leadership as well. ent ideals. Even as a pragmatic document produced Meanwhile, Labor is going through one of its most by a committee, it is easily outshone by ALP confer- inept periods of government: a former deputy premier ence documentation. joins his former boss in jail; the ALP's accident-in- In part this was because Downer wants to keep waiting, Laurie Brereton, conspicuously mismanages his options open on issues such as the republic, states' the Australian National Line affair; the left is in dis- rights, economic intervention and social questions. array over strategy for the party conference; and eco- All things being equal, he wants to move into the nomic management is in need of tuning only four centre, but he also wants to avoid fights with party months after the budget. Yet no-one in the Opposi- hardliners, inside or outside Parliament. The docu- tion is able, or even trying, to score a hit. mentis thus deliberately anodyne, to give him maxi- What Labor has that the Liberals do not is not mum room to manreuvre according to circumstance experience in disembowelling, or a capacity to count and opportunity. heads, but an understanding of the fundamentals of That's marketing, however, not real politics. Even politics-that, in the first instance, it is about mak- Labor's Third XI could roll that over. The Liberals have ing choices that will leave some people disappointed; got to stop trying to get there in one go and start build- second, that it is about the building of coalitions, per- ing an organisation that will move step by step. If the manent or temporary, in support of particular poli- party is not capable of winning government, it is not cies; and third, that it is about framing arguments in fit to govern. • such a way that your opponents will find it much harder to state their case persuasively. In short, what the Labor school teaches is power, Jack Waterford is deputy editor of The Canberra how to get it and how to use it. Labor politicans learn Times.

VOLUME 4 NUMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 11 REPORT

N GUYEN VIET H LJY 1995 PROGRAMME FOR THE FORMATION OF SPIRITUAL No place to call home D URtNG THE PAST FEW YEARS, Cabram a tta offers acceptance, DIRECTORS Asian, or in particular Vietnamese, company and fun. It is obvious that youths have been blamed for the while in prison they are always on CS 04: THE MINISTRY OF CS OS: PRACTICUM IN increase of criminal activities in the the lookout for friends. You can see SPIRIT UAL DIRECTION THE MINISTRY OF Cabramatta area. When John N ew­ the joy in their faces when they meet. This course fl'ill be conducted in SPIRIT UAL DIRECTION man MP, a local crime fighter, was Traditional parental discipline Semester I and aims to develop This practice involves: the studv has been undermined. Vietnamese an undersranding of spiritual of the philomphy underpinning killed on 5 September, Asian gangs direction ministry, its hisrory, spiritual direction. guidance were widely held to be responsible. parents learnt that in Australia they traditio/Is and more rece11t through the process of spiritual T here is rarely a Vi etnamese over should not touch their children, as it developme11ts. It also looks at directio11. g iving spiritual the age of 30 being held in Parramat­ might be considered child abuse. the psychologicol dimensions of direction with supervisio11. This ta and Parklea prisons in Sydney's Whether they were misinformed or the spiritual life and spiriwal practicum will be conducted west. According to a recent federal whether they misunderstood is hard directions. through both Semester I and government report cited by AAP: to know. Semester II 'The Vietnamese youth gangs active What is true is that parental in Sydney around Cabramatta and authority cannot reach the children For further information regarding these courses contact: Fairfield are the children of the im­ now. Likewise, the law-enforcem ent The Secretary, St Francis Xavier Seminary migra nts who arrived during the agencies cannot reach them . In dea l­ exodus fro m Vietnam during the ing with Asian crimes, authorities 101 Morialta Road , Rostrevor SA 5073 1970s.' The report points out that in Australia often meet with a wall Tel: (08)337 1460, Fax: (08)365 0494 'Gang m embers range in age from of silence. Iron ical! y they have or their mid-teens to early 20's and become highly protected peopl e; they Adelaide Diocesan Retreat Team oft en live together, away from their are the 'untouchables' and their num­ GPO Box 1364, Adelaide SA 5001 families in group homes-' It is correct. bers are growing very fast. Tel: (08) 210 8210 They are young and were once However, they are products of students in Australia. They arrived our society. They were brought up in in Australia som ewhere between the Australia; they are all Australians. ages of one and nine. Their parents They are not as ugly as they are were refugees. For various reasons, a painted by the m edia. Young Asians number of them left school before are accused of supplying pure heroin. Aurora International Travel reaching senior level. In fa ct some of them are in Parklea Ajoint project of the Society of Jesus and Raptim International Travel Their language skills are poor. and Parramatta fo r crimes of vio­ They left school while their knowl­ lence. Most of those charged with Book now fo r 1995 tours departing to: edge of English was still at primary heroin-related crimes are only serv­ Rome for Easter level. Furthermore, with their edu ­ ing six, nine or 12 months, a sen­ tence indicative of a minor offence. Departs April 6th incl. th e Va ti ca n, Eas ter se rvi ces and Italy cation disrupted, they lack the abil­ ity to refl ect. They do not have vi­ A number of young Asians are Rome and the Holy Land sion and it is difficult for them to tattooed with designs purported to Departs May 30th incl. Pentecost ce leb rations express themselves. Within the walls show gang m embership. That may of Parramatta and Parklea prisons, be so, but many also wear these tat­ Rome there are only a handful of them who toos unaware of their significance. can write in Vietnamese. Any They are not necessarily from organ­ Departs Sept 7th incl. the Feast of the Holy Cross attempt to communicate seriously ised gangs. When all egations are Medjugorje and Rome with them , in English or Vietnam­ made, young Asians are given a false Departs October 3rd ese, ends painfully. macho image. This attracts the curi­ The majority of Asian inmates at osity of other Asians.The macho Rome and Israel for Christmas Parklea and Parramatta gaols were phenomenon is also shown in their Departs December 19th incl. Midnight Mass at th e unemployed at the time of their satisfaction in building up their bod­ Bas ilica of the Nati vity in Bethl ehem arrest . T h e rest were low-paid ies while in cu stody. labourers. Without basic qualifica­ But isn't it too easy to accept the tions it is not easy for them to find goodies and reject the baddies? Wh en Free time for ind epend ent work. The lengthy recession during things go wrong, shouldn't we reflect sightsee in g, shoppin g and the past decade hasn't helped either. on the situation rather than looking furt he r trave l on all tour s! Cabramatta is a place where they for the obvious scapegoats? • can come and go, and feel welcom ed. A growing number of Asian children Nguyen Viet Huy SJ is chaplain at For tour deta il s, inclu sions and co sts con tac t: Geoff Glove r leave home because they find it an Loyola College, Mt Druitt, NSW, Pilgrim Trave l Pty Ltd (03 ) 899 7333 Licence N" 314 81 unbearable place to live with con­ and a prison chaplain in Parramatta flic ting c ultures and values. diocese.

12 EUREKA STREET • O cTOBER 1994 R EPORT

CATRIONA JAC KSO N FORDHAM The view from the Cairo bus UNIVERSITY N EW YORK D ELEGATES TO SEPTE MB ER's Inter­ with, after all population control $105 million in popula­ national Conference on Population programs have been run in som e tion control programs in and Development (ICPD) had no developing countries for over forty Indonesia. Indonesia has matches your interests: trouble getting to the out-of town years. been one of the highest ADULT, FAMILY, COMMUNITY conference centre. Luxury buses left Bangladesh has had an official user of the long-acting RELIG IO US EDUCATION ? the city every ten minutes before population control program since contraceptive Norplant, Yo ur mentors: Dr Glori a Durka , 9am, and returned the delega tes to 1965. Bangladeshi spokesperson, Far­ with over 850,000 Indo- Dr John Elias their hotels when the meetings end­ ida Akhter, says the programs began nesian woman receiving - for parish, sc hool & home eel in the evening. An Australian in by using con tracepti vcs such as the the drug between 1987 Cairo explained that the buses had pill and condoms, but says now that ancll990. (Norplant con­ YOUTH MINI ST RY ? priority through Cairo's chaotic pea k 'Condoms are only balloons, they sists of six small rods that YOUNG ADULTHOOD? hour traffi c: 'On the first morning are now used forma king cycle tyres'. are implanted under the Your mento r: Dr j ohn Nelson. we ca ught the l am bus and there The programs now favour longer­ skin. The rods slowly re­ - growth in fai th , moral formation, were nine people on it. It was embar­ term methods, such as IUDs and the lease a contraceptive hor­ piritual development rassing; everyone else was in com ­ fiv e-year contraceptive Norplant. mone for fi ve yea rs, aft er RELIGION AN D SOCIETY? pletely rattletrap buses, bursting at T hese m ethods may be more eff ec­ which time it must be PEACE AND JUST ICE? the scams.' ti ve in reducing the number of ba­ removed.) Your mentor: Dr John Eli as In the wake of Cairo, the rarely­ bies born, but, says Akhtcr, they Because there are so - ana lys is of social issues heard voices of the m any people with take control of fe rtility out of wom­ m any N orplant users, social ministry and ed ucation direct experience of pop­ en's hands. the priva te US 'popula­ PARI SH/ PASTO RAL MINISTR Y? ula tion contro l pro­ Sh e adds tha t tion council' conducted CHURCH LEADE RSHIP? gram s arc asking wheth­ wom en often h ave an investiga tive study. It Yo ur mentors: Dr German er the big guns at the - no choice in the con­ found that women su f- Martinez OSB, Dr Gloria Durka ICPD are as isolated traceptive m ethod fering fro m w ha t are - for ORE 's, Parish Admins.& Assocs . fro m the on-the- ground they receive, as they termed 'partially heavy' reality of these program , are made part of tar­ side-effects were being SP IRIT UA LI TY: THEOL. & HIST.? as t hey were from the get groups for specif­ refused rem oval. Also, SPI RITUAL DIRECTION? Cairo traffic. ic types and brands the drug was not being Your mentors: Dr Janet Ruffing RSM, Like the Rio Earth of con tracepti vc removed from many Dr Frederica Hall igan, Summit before it, the m eth ods. Man y women after the five­ Margaret Burke MA Cairo Population Con­ women returning to year expiry date because - through to Supervised Practicum ference invol vee! a series clinics to have their insufficient records had PASTO RAL COUNSELING? of deli ca te negotiations IUD removed have been kept in order to HOSP ITAL CPE? be t ween s ta t es w ith been told that t he de- track users down. PASTO RAL CARE AG ING? vastly conflicting interests and be­ vices are now safe for two, three or India also has a sub­ Yo ur mentors: Dr John Shea OSA, liefs. Delegates were reminded of fo ur times the original life span. stantial population-con­ Dr Mary Ann jordan, Dr Mary Byrn e. the urgency of their mission by the Akhter is also concerned that trol program, with wom­ - through to Supervised Practicum. giant population clock in the main Ba ngladesh's high maternal mortal­ en being offered a fee if TH EO LOGICAL RENEWAL? hall, which registered more than one ity rate (six dea ths for every thou­ they opt fo r sterilisation, SABBATICAL? CRED IT FREE? birth per second. sand births) is also being seen as a which unlike vasectomy Yo ur mentor: Fr Vincent Novak SJ Aft er nine days of diplomatic population rather than a health-care fo r m en, is virtually irre­ - bibl., liturg., systematic, personal barn-dancing, more than 150 coun­ issue. "In order to save these six versible. In addi tion, In­ refres hment in community. tries, and the Vatican, supported a wom en they are giving all th e 1000 dia will next year intro­ Year-round summers on ly (4). MA, 20-ycar plan to reduce the world's contraceptives. It's like cutting off duce laws that prohibit MS(Ed), APD (post-MA). Begin 1995: population. The plan proposes in­ your head if you have a headache" poor fa milies from hav­ Jan 17, June 29, Aug 28 creased access to contraception to And poor nations have little op­ ing more than four chil­ effect that reduction, as well as bet­ tion but to accept population con­ dren. AWARDS: Fu ll/Part ial Scho larshi ps, ter health education for wom en trol progra ms. Funding from the It is clear in Indone­ Mission Dioceses (7 8), Anniversary world wide. World Bank, and International Mon­ sia, and in m any other Awards for ca ndidates from overseas. What does this m ea n fo r the peo­ etary Fund is now tied to commit­ developing countries, FOR APP LI CATIONS & ple most affected by the policies, ment to these programs. that despite the rhetori c, INFORMATI ON: that is, the women in so-called de­ Many people from the now more population control does VI CEN T M. NOVAK SJ veloping countries? This was a ques­ than 90 countries that run popula­ not always lead to better RAD. SC H. OF RE L. & REL. ED . tion raised by non-government rep­ tion programs say that they are be­ reproductive health for FO RDH AM UNIVERS ITY resentatives running an NCO forum ing run without proper health-care women. • te l (7 18) 8"17 1000 in tandem with the UN conference. programs to back them up. Catriona Jackson is a BRONX, NEW YORK, They have plenty of history to work In 1991 the World Bank invested fr eelance journalist. 10458-5 163

VOLUME 4 N UMllER 8 • EUREKA STREET 13 THE NATION

As farmers in eastern Austalia endure the worst drought in living memory, Margaret Simons reviews the state of the country.

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14 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 cleaning is an appropriate term. You can see where ity of light on the walls tells me even before I look they have been. The ground looks like a short-pile out that there is no rain. The front is here, but it has carpet: clean as a whistle. brought only a hot and thirsty wind. I can see the Just outside Forbes, near the graveyard where the struggling wheat and canola withering in front of my bushranger Ben Hall is buried, there is a farmer out eyes. A few days more of this, and that with his cattle. He stands there, by the side of the will be the end of any hope for the year's road, with his dog and stick, caught as the car flashes crops. By the end of the day, when the There are very few by with his mouth open, then left behind. farmers bring the ladies in for their Outside the gate at Twilight, I find the farmer evening drink, the sky is once again an marginal seats in who runs the property also by the side of the road. He unobstructed blue. calls the sheep he is watching his 'streetwise ladies'­ I tell one of the farmers at Twilight farming Australia, five-year-old ewes who have seen it all. Now they are that the meteorologists I have spoken to vacuuming their way up the long paddock, bums bare are predicting that the El Nino effect will and the real problem, from recent crutching to cut away the dags. The begin to break down in November or one suspects, is that weather map, the farmer says, shows an approaching December. Relief-and useful rain- will cold front. Such formations usually bring rain. come then. H e looks thoughtful. If he there aren't any We change into daggy but dag-free clothes and could rely on that, they would go into go and have a look around the 119th annual Forbes debt, buy stockfeed and hang onto the political parties who Agricultural Show. There are prizes for everything cattle and sheep that represent next here: bales of hay (judged on quality), sample jars of year's income. As it is, they will face the are actually wheat (judged on smell, appearance, weight per bush­ crunch in the next two or three weeks interested in the el, trueness to type and freedom from mouse drop­ and give up on the crop, letting the stock pings), and for damper. Boys and girls compete in in to eat it off the paddock before it dies. inland. Basically separate classes for the damper prize, and the girls' Driving against the wind, we head damper looks best. north of Forbes, to see what I am told sensible policies like There are prizes for the bulls with giant testicles will be some 'real drought'. The spring and backs the size of kitchen tables, and prizes for rain that Twilight got was very localised. those initiated by poultry. I compare the first and second-prize roosters. Fifteen kilometres away, and you can see Kerin have been slow Is it the blue ribbon that makes the first rooster look the difference. Here the wheat is not so perfect, such an archetype of roosterdom, or am I even at ankle height. It just dusts the to come, then fail in just reading that in? Everybody loves a winner. paddocks with green. Roadside trees are The shearing competition is being conducted in competing for survival. They are sur­ the execution and the the beer tent, and judges in green blazers watch for rounded by a 30 m etre circle of bare quality as well as speed. Here the streetwise ladies earth, their roots going into the crop, fine print, largely are turned on their heads, legs asplay, sometimes sucking the water out from under. The because nobody is spurting blood under the blade (for which the shear­ canola looks almost comic, like a piece ers lose points). The wool drops on the ground like of yellow knitting with big, unravelled watching and nobody banana peel. The contest over, the loser departs, sweat holes. The barley is trying to form heads stains growing like emerging continents under his although the plants are barely above in power is listening. armpits. He says nothing, not even to the little boy ground level. running by his side, but his gait-all dirty jeans, broad 'I've got to survive/ says a farmer, trying to ex­ leather belt and purposeful stride tell you how proud plain to me what it is that I am seeing. He is speaking it is possible to be in the face of defeat. from the point of view of a barley plant. 'There isn't Listen to the conversation in the beer tent. They enough water, so I've got to reproduce now, before I don't talk much, but what they do say is all about the die. Throw out a seed. Throw out a head. Now. Before weather map and previous dry years, just like this, it's too late.' when rain has come at about this time. What On, into Trundle, which is officially known as will tomorrow bring? the N ew South Wales town with the widest main street. There are old photos of bullock drays lined up S UNDAY. N OT A DAY OF REST but another day on the six across. long paddock. The sky to the west is screened with The depopulation of rural areas is not a result of sheets of high altitude cirrus that look like rice paper this drought alone. Farming is a model of increased but in fact are made up of millions of high-up ice crys­ efficiency and reformed labour markets. Mechanisa­ tals. The front is coming. A change. Hope. tion has m eant that 'agricultural labourer' is the fast­ A farmer says to me: 'If it rained now, we est declining job category in the country. Trundle was wouldn't even call it a drought. We wouldn't even probably a sad town even last year, when it had rained. whinge. We'd just have had a dry winter.' Now, they are giving out food parcels to families Monday comes. I wake to hear sheets of corru­ around here. It is not only this drought that has ga ted iron on some nearby shed flapping, but the qual- brought things so low. There were good years before,

VoLUME 4 N uMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 15 but the prices for wheat and wool were so depressed to most of us. On the drive back from Trundle, I ask: that not even the comparatively fortunate farmers 'Okay, just suppose that front had brought rain. What could build up cash reserves. One no-income year, do you dol Is it too late to sow the rest of the crop?' and things are desperate. The farmer considers. 'It depends. If you had the It takes two minutes to walk across the main right soil available and the right wheat, a late-bearing street from the sagging verandah of the big old Trun­ wheat, yo u might take the risk.' dle pub- all rooms closed now, except for the front 'What's the right soil ?' bar- to the post office, where there is a community 'Well, in this area there's a black soil and a red noticeboard advertising the Trundle Debutante Ball. soil. The red soil is lighter textured. You need less There are six debs to be presented, but it doesn't say rain to grow a crop. If you had that, and the seed in to whom . There is also a poster about courses in thera­ hand, you might take a gamble.' peutic massage, reflexology and Reiki I & II-'Learn 'Why would it be a gamble if it rained? Wouldn't to help yourself in troubled times.' that make everything all right?' Also at the post office is a schedule of rainfall in 'Well, you'd need more rain in three weeks or so, the district since 1888. The dri est year was 1902, with or the crop'd just die. Then every two weeks until it 796 points. So far this year, there have been just 508 began to ripen. Then no more or the heads begin to points. Trundle may be heading for a personal worst. sprout before you can harvest -' In the hardware shop, which is up for sale, a farm er is ' And October and November are dry m onths overheard to say he is about to put his remaining sheep normally?' into the canola crop to ea t it off. 'H opeless,' his 'Yep. Then you usually get rain at the other end, wordsdrift out. 'Bloody hopeless.' Yet everyone knows in autumn. Just when you don't want it.' that Trundle is not the worst off. 'So you probably wouldn't make it.' In Queensland, it has been li ke this for four 'Yep.' years. There is no du sting of green, no unravelling 'A big ga mble.' crops, n othing to hold the soil down at all. 'Yep. There's a lot of variables.' It just blows away and nobody talks about He goes on to point out particular paddocks­ hope at all. some where the crop is doing better than others. This, he says, is because of the quality of the fallow in the L ATER, TALKING TO the local Rural Financial Coun­ preceding year. Water was stored up in the subsoil. sellor, Mary Ewing, I hear that under the strict crite­ He points out the paddocks of a farmer who habitual­ ria of the Rural Adjustment Scheme as applied by the ly overstocks, in good times and in bad. The paddocks New South Wales government, Trundle farmers do have that vacuum-cleaned look. The farmer is look­ not qualify for assistance. To do so, they would have ing for stock agistment on other peopl e's farms. There had to have been drought-declared for the past three is none to be had. m onths, and drought-declared for at least six out of 'He just flogs his land. Just fl ogs it,' he says. 12 m onths in at least two of the preceding three fi­ Daunted by the way he reads the landscape, I ask: nancial years. Trundle fails the second condition. 'How do yo u learn all these things?' Even m ore insulting: these guidelines were not 'Experience. Reading. The Department of Agri­ published. Ms Ewing learned about them when she culture. My father.' There is a pause. 'Trouble is, 'can't rang up and asked. use it to do anything else.' In a recen t article in The Australian, form er Paranoia in the bush leads ome to believe that Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser argued for a m ore in­ Fraser is right about a campaign to rid the country of terventionist approach by government to drought. He fa nners, but the recent history of drought policy does said the skills of our farmers were a national asset, not show active hostility, so much as neglect. As in which should be protected from erosion or replace­ most things in life, the cock-up theory seems m ore ment by big multinational land-owning corporations. likely than the conspiracy. He compared the situation of the farming industry to There were big changes in the Rural Adjustment that of steel. The government, in spite of its free- mar­ Schem e (RAS ), which is the main vehicle of govern­ ket-oriented ideology, had been prepared, early in its ment aid, two years ago. The changes were announced term, to hand out almost $1 billion to help revamp by the then Minister for Primary Industries, Simon steel mills when BHP claimed the industry was in Crean, but resulted largely from the work of his pred­ jeopardy. Fraser speculated that the double standard ecessor, John Kerin. Kerin, who is one of the few pol­ might be because farm ers are conservative voters. 'Is itician s most farmers speak of with som ething the government deliberately using the drought to de­ resembling respect, set up a ta k fo rce to review stroy a strong group of independent-minded Austral­ drought policy It was this task force that for the first ians who normally would not be government time made the 'normalcy' of periods of drought offi­ supporters?' he asked. cial. It was probably the first time anyone in govern­ What are the skills that Fraser says we should be ment had looked at the issue without the ingrained acting to preserve? They are skills that are invisible Continued plB

16 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 l '' I.love sunburnt country, A land of sweeping plains. crease. year -c---- .,,·-.---- Of ragged m ountain ranges, that normally fa over eastern Aus­ is after time Of droughts and flooding rains. tralia falls over the ocean instead. spent ploughing, fertrli and s After an El Nino period the see­ ing crops. Had good fam1ers saw normally tips the other way, they were heading for an El towards La Nina ('the girl child') . year, they may have decided to p G '""AT'ON'o'c'•w.eN h>Vo During these periods, the effects are serve top soil and save m oney been taught to sing about love of this reversed, bringing Australia much leaving the land fa llow. : country in terms that, to minds higher rainfa ll than usual, and oft en Mary Voice says: 'Once we · trained in a European tradition, m ake fl oods. seen the w hites of El Nino's eyesi. so . the attachment seem foolish if not According to the head of climate to speak, we can get a fairly good idea' . improbable. analysis for the Bureau of Meteorol­ of how long it is likely to conti ~ City people reading about the ogy's national climate centre, Mary but the probl em is that is too la ~ pr ese nt drought might be forgiven Voice, there is no reason to believe some really crucial farming · p for feeling slightly impatient. It that climate conditions have changed sion s.' The bureau believes present El Nino effect will last 1 peems that every few years there is a since Eu ropean settlement, or as a '( fuss about lack of rain, or too much result of the greenhouse effect: Aus­ around N ovember, then begin to "..,.. ~, pf it. The drought that Bob Hawke tralia just is a riskier place for agri­ brea k down, bringing rains in late Seemed to claim credit for breaking culture than m ost other places in summer or autumn. This will be too An the ea rly 1980s go t international the world, and it is normal for sub­ late for this year's crop, but i£1 the 1 / coverage because of its severity. stantial parts of the continent to be bureau could convince fa rmers of t " ;There was another drought in 1988- in drought about twice a decade. the accuracy of its prediction, it c uld

,,&9, yet surely it was only a couple of Having said that, however, it re­ influence other decisions wi th1 ira~­ / Y£. ars ago that there were appeals for mains clear that the pre ent drough t plica tions fo r land conservation. / ~ rm e r s affected by fl ood? is unusual in that there has been a 'The outlook m eans there is no 1 f...... _ . ~ The song got it right. Australia is chain of El Nino episodes that have sen se in keeping stock on land in the ' lr ~): -....__v.;:ry different fro m Europe. The east- not been separated by Las Ninas. hope of rain soon, and just d egra~iin g , ' '!II 9'n half of our continent is governed The 1990-9 1 wet season was very the land further,' says Mary V6 iC'e . / b'y seesaw-like climate oscillation wet in Queensland, yet the next year 'Those with agistment options or I vthich means that peri ods of drought there was virtually no rain, and the ability to transport stock _else­ / a~d fl ood are normal. In recent years, drought set in across the north of the where would be better advised to \ ( ,tlj.is realisation has been reflected in continent. T he El Nino eff ect then look at that. Of co urse, the hard fac t ...... ,_ ~cnanges to government policy that began to wea ken, bringing the fl oods is that many far mers simply don't /II seek to encourage a view of drought of spring 1992 to south-eastern Aus­ have those options.' t a!'i a normal part of fa rm manage- tralia. Then, unusually, El Nino re­ At present research is aim ed at ! rnent, rather than as a natural. disas- vived and then weakened again in predicting the onset of El N ino be­ I /er. 1993, bringing more fl oods to the fore autumn, w hen fa rmers make ( . One side of the climatic see-saw south, and a cool summer. N ow El their most crucial decisions. T he I is :known as the El Nino eff ect. El Nino has again reimposed itself. predictions must be based on com­ Nino translates literally from Span ­ Although the floods indicated a plex computer modelling of the in­ ish as the 'boy child'. Peruvian an­ weakening in El Nino, there was no teractions between two fluids- in chovy fisherm en used the term, a intervening La Nina eff ect in the this case, the Pacific Ocean and the reference to the Christ child, to de­ Pacific. Queensland and northern atmosphere. T he bureau and the scribe the appearance of a warm N ew South Wales remained CSIRO are among the world leaders ocean current off the South Ameri­ in drought throughout. in developing the necessary compu­ can coast at Christmas time. ter m odels. N ow meteorologists understand HISTOR ICA L CLIMATE records How responsive are fa rmers to that El Nino affects the entire Pacif­ show that a sequence of unbroken El the burea u's advice? Mary Voice says ic Ba sin- almost half of the globe. Nino eff ects of this length has only farmers are an increasingly recep­ When the climatic seesaw is pitch­ occurred once before in the history tive audience. 'Some farmers still ing towards El Nino, ocean temper­ of European settlem ent, in 19 11 -15. sow every year on Anzac Day, come annes in the central and eastern Pa­ There were other long El Nino epi­ rain, hail or drought, but most real­ cific becom e warmer than average, sodes at the end of the last century, ise that in Australian conditions, all while the west cools. At the same and at the beginning of the Second your managem ent decisions have to time, air pressure in the eastern Pa­ World War. One of the main prob­ be based on complex va riables.' • cific becom es lower than normal, lems fo r fa rmers is that meteorolo­ and pressures over Australia in- gists usually cannot predict an El -Margaret Simons

VOLUME 4 N UM ilER 8 • EUREKA STREET 17 ernment ignores them altogether. At the other end of the scale, the RAS provides interest-rate subsidies of up to 50 per cent for farmers borrowing to upgrade their farms or their skills. As well, in times of exceptional dif­ ficulty, such as long- term drought, interest-rate subsidies of up to 100 per cent would be available to farm­ ers who meet the eligibility guide­ lines. Mary Ewing says that most good farmers do not argue with the un­ derlying principle behind the govern­ ment's drought policy. The problems are in the fine print and the imple­ m entation, and they are so basic that one can only conclude that they are the result of blindness on the part of government and bureau cracy. For example, the guidelines for access to RAS grants in assumptions of European agriculture. The policy that times of exceptional difficulty are phrased entirely in Stock coming off the resulted stated that drought was not a calamity, and trucl

18 EUREKA STREET • OCTOBER 1994 the fine print means the schem e is of little use. Inter­ Security for farmers in extreme difficulties who pre­ est-rate terms and withholding tax make deposits in viously had been shut out because the the lED so unattractive that out of about 130,000 farm­ assets test . The announcem ent of the ers in Australia, there are only about six thousand or changes followed Keating's tour of Paranoia in the bush so deposits in the scheme. drought-aff ected Queensland, but bureau­ There are very few marginal seats in farming crats were hinting at them for weeks be­ leads some to believe Australia, and the real problem, one suspects, is that fore. there aren't any political parties who are actually in­ The Department of Primary Indus­ that Malcolm Fra ser terested in the inland. Basically sensible policies like tries' director of rural access and commu­ those initiated by Kerin and introduced by Crean have nities, Bernie Scott, described the changes is right about a been low to com e, then fail in the execution and the as 'fine tuning'- Certainly they do not de­ campaign to rid the fine print, largely because nobody is watching and part from the basic government position nobody in power is listening. of not treating the drought as a national country of farmers, Communication with rural communities has disaster. N evertheless, for drought-affect­ been woeful. According to Joan Kennedy, of the Smith ed farmers the moves were more like an but the recent history Family charity, some of the most desperate families­ engine refit. They effectively put the so­ mainly in Queensland, where the drought has per­ cial security safety net that city dwellers of drought policy do es sisted for four years-have approached the charity for take for granted under farmers as well, not show active help without realising that they might have been eli­ guaranteeing that, just like city fo lk on gible for farm household support, or som e other as­ hard times, they would at least be able to hostility, so much as sistance from Social Security. Nobody had told them pay the h ousehold bills and put food on about it. the table. neglect. As in most Mary Ewing says that crucial guidelines govern­ How the changes to the RAS will ing RAS eligibility were not published but rather com­ work remains to be seen, but perhaps the things in life, the municated by telephone-and only then when she most significant thing is that these basic, cock-up theory seem s asked for them . As well, grants made available to help hard-to-argue changes took so long to with employing farm labour were announced in a achieve, although there has been support more likely than news conference, but no information was released. for them from all sides-Labor backbench­ Ewing's telephone calls to find out about the applica­ ers, Democrats and the National Farmers the conspiracy. tion procedures were passed from department to Federation. department, until she found out that guidelines had In the longer term, farmers may also be helped, not yet been agreed. 'Oh yes, we're having a meeting by tax incentives, to plan for drought. Silos, for ex­ about that next week,' she was told. Meanwhile, ample, which can be used to store surplus wheat for agricultural labourers joined the lists of the use as feed in bad years, m ay be able to be 100 per unemployed. It is hard to believe that any other cent written off against income in the first year. Aga in, major industry would be treated in the same this is a small but significant move which has been way. put to Canberra in submissions from a variety of groups for many years, but without effect until now. A T THE FORBES SHOW, the children paid high prices Only when there is a drought, and the impact is to take sideshow rides decorated with pictures of fe lt on the national accounts, does attention flicker Michael Jackson and Bart Simpson-international in the direction of the inland. symbols of confused and belligerent youth. But their Then we put scarecrows in our banks. • parents tended to shun the fast-food caravans and in­ stead patronised the tea tents run by the Uniting Margaret Simons is a freelance writer and regular con­ Photo: Bill Thomas Church. Here you could get a sandwich, two slices of tributor to Eureka Street. cake and limitless tea from giant aluminium pots, all for a couple of dollars. Next door there were rissole sandwiches, sausage sandwiches and steak ----- sandwiches for two dollars apiece, courtesy of the Baptist Church. The faces around the tables, when relaxed and unconscious of observation, set into stubborn lines. A handwritten poster read, 'God Provides All We Need. Have You Said Thank You Lately?' In mid-September, after some parts of the country had been in drought for nearly half a dec­ ade, the Government changed the eligibility guidelines for the RAS and increased total fund­ ing, as well as introducing a new type of Social Beware those radicals, Kennett & Co.

~TO"A'' KeNNeTT GOVeRNMeNT TURNS TWO '"umptioo of di

20 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 becom e apparent that Parliament had inadvertently breached that provision by ordinary Acts which gave exclusive jurisdiction to other courts (such as the Kennedy AAT) or excluded review entirely (such as the Retail Airport awaiting a plane to Rome when boarding calls were made Tenancies Act 1986) . These were retrospectively val­ for a Paris flight scheduled at the same time. With hundreds of idated in 1990. Since 1992 a specific provision calling others, they were still waiting when the Paris flight took off. the attention of the Parliament to the intended amend­ Finally the Italian announcer crackled into life. We are sor­ ment of the constitution has been necessary. ry for the delay, she said. No, it wasn't a mechanical fault or a It is hard to identify 'indirect' amendments be­ baggage handlers' strike. Someone had forgotten to tell the crew fore 1992, but I conducted a quick statutory search in that it was the eve of a long weekend in the US, and they were mid-September. I found that under Cain and Kirner caught in traffic somewhere between their Manhattan hotel and there were arguably four such amendments in 1990 the airport. Instead of becoming angry, the waiting passengers (three excluding claims to compensation for resumed gave a good-natured sigh of recognition. In the midst of New land, one validating the State Bank transaction) out York, they were already in Italy. And in the end, despite leaving of a total of 94 statu tes; there were 10 out of a similar 90 minutes late, the flight arrived in Rome on time. number in 1991, and lO before the change of govern­ Travel is a healthy antidote for those who think technology ment in 1992, nearly all of which limited land com­ necessarily destroys culture. For instance, computerised vend­ pensation. One was particularly controversial, and ing machines have revolutionised tourism in Italy. No longer concerned the sale of land to Collingwood Football does the hapless visitor face the impossible task of working out Club. just when Italian banks and post offices are open. Now, one just The ALP's hands are not clean, either, but they has to decipher the puzzling instructions and insert a credit card less mired than those of the Kennett Government. in such a way that the machine does not swallow it for good. I also noticed one particularly unsettling consti­ There are automatic machines to dispense almost any­ tutional change made under Kennett. In 1991 Kirner thing-the latest videos, train tickets and Italian currency. Their had explicitly established the Supreme Court's right smooth functioning ultimately depends, however, on having to review decisions made under the Casino Control humans to explain how they work, or to fill in when they break Act; in 1993, Kennett removed the Supreme Court's down. And that's when the fun begins, because there is nothing jurisdiction entirely. that Italians like better than talking. Fourth, it is a novel defence to a charge of wrong­ One gets the feeling that for 3000 years (and probably more) doing to argue that someone else has done it before. Italian culture has revolved round negotiation-and technology Is genocide less culpable because Hitler, Pol Pot and merely contributes to the game. In Rome, pedestrians are in the Rwandan Hutus have practised it? And dismiss­ constant negotiation with the drivers of cars and motor scoot­ ing criticism as politically partisan ignores the fact ers, and minor accidents tend to be resolved peacefully by ritual that members of Jan Wade's own party have also crit­ athletic negotiation. icised her for misunderstanding the principles of the And now Italians can negotiate in ways undreamt of before rule of law. mobile phones became so compact and widely available. Not Finally, I was Victoria's last Commissioner for surprisingly, Italians have taken to the cellular phone like Equal Opportunity. I was removed and replaced by a Australians to wine-coolers. After all, when all else fails one five-person commission of very limited independence can negotiate via phone. No well-dressed young man about town on 1 March 1994 because complaints of discrimina­ would think of leaving home without a mobile phone in a tion had been made by people affected by new gov­ designer-leather pouch clipped to his designer-leather belt. And ernment policies-employment laws, public sector speaking of phones, the advent of the phone-card has completely cuts, school closures, public transport and women's changed the public phone system. Gone are the ubiquitous prisons; I was blamed for enabling them to assert their gettone-the telephone tokens that used to serve as currency in claims of right, and thus being an obstacle to efficient times when change was short. government. Individual rights complaints are always It is hard to take predictions of cultural extinction too seri­ a splinter in the bannister of administration. It was ously when surrounded by abundant evidence of the technolog­ my statu tory du ty to promote the human rights that ical prowess of previous Italian cultures. The ancient Romans the Equal Opportunity Act was enacted to protect, had heated swimming pools and flushing toilets, and better roads originally (again) by the Hamer Liberal Government, than their modern counterparts have. In the Coliseum they pro­ and I was appointed to do it for five years, by the Gov­ duced a stadium the equivalent of an MCG which has lasted ernor-in-Council in 1990. two millenia. And all this technology hardly seems to have de­ Kennett's Government is committed to absolute stroyed the vibrancy of Italian culture. authority and to free-market principles, and to being There is one thing Italian scientists could work on, however. accountable only through elections and the measures If someone could genetically engineer an Italian dog to clean up of economic performance that it sets itself. after itself in the same way that millions of Roman cats do, then Happy anniversary, fe llow Ozarkians. • cultural life would be greatly improved. •

Moira Rayner is a lawyer and freelance journalist. Tim Thwaites is a freelance science writer.

V oLUME 4 NuMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 21 R EPORT

JoN G REENAWAY Migration: the flow becon1es a triclzle

S>NC' wo"w w" "Au ' " ' h' "' hm tive impact, arguing that no definite Migrant Reform Act 1992 came into becom e accustom ed to comprehensive conclusions can be drawn until exten- eff ect on 1 September. The overriding immigration program s. Governments sive studies are conducted over a longer feature of the new legislation is the have done much m ore than secure the time frame. greater discretionary power placed in integrity of our borders: they have sought Even though the Government has the hands of the Minister and the de­ to introduce policy that m anaged the decided not to use the stimulus of immi­ partment. Most significantly, the act m ovement of people in a way that would grant labour as we m ove out of recession diminishes the power of the Federal help develop the nation as a whole. Given (as has been the policy in the past) it still Court to review the decision process. our history it's no surprise that the settle­ recognises the economic potential of What the Government is designing m ent of people lies close to the heart of migrants. Included in the planned in­ is a leaner, more econom ically dynamic our nationhood. However the intake an­ take for 1994/95 are those designated as program . But the concern the Govern­ nounced for 1994/95 by the Minister, having investment potential. Canberra m ent has shown towards the cost of N ick Bolkus indicates that w e may be hopes to bring $600 million in to the settlem ent extends beyond the migra­ witnessing the demise of the extensive tion program itself to those admitted on immigration program. humanitari an grounds. According to Senator Bolkus, the Labor has presided over a steady dim­ nominal increase of 10,000 (to 73, 000 inution of the offshore intake under the for this year ), m ainly m ade up of individ­ refugee and humanitarian program. Over uals already on-shore, was not a prelude 21,900 people were settled in 198 1/82. to a m ore active immigration program. This has fallen to a projected fi gure of H e stated that the low increase was a 13,000 for 1993/94. Nicki Marshall from recognition of a 'n eed for the benefits of the Ecumenical Migration Office in Mel­ Australia's economic recovery to be fo­ bourne finds it unacceptable that these cused on the country's unemployed'. fi gures have dropped: 'You have m as­ Despite the impression that in the sive increases in global m igration and future policy will no longer be framed displaced people and refu gees and at the on an economic basis, Labor still pays very same time we actually have a halv­ regard to notions of how immigration ing of Australian refugee and humani­ can best serve our economic goals. In country over the next three years in this tarian intake'. many ways the policy that is currently way. If those arriving on humanitarian being articulated by Canberra represents For the Government, such migrants grounds are accepted on a different basis a con venient m arriage of the arguments represent a magic solution. The resourc­ from other migrants, why is it that the both fo r and against immigration . More­ es they bring to Australia, both personal two intakes rise and fall together? Mark over, the refu gee program is now m ore and financial, provide a much-needed D easey from Community Aid Abroad dependent upon questions of cost than fillip to the econom y, and they are not as argu es that it has much to do with the need. much of a burden on government servic­ intertwining of immigration and refu ­ Those opposed to high immigration es. It is the search for the perfect mi­ gee policy: 'These two have been con­ argue that new arrivals place dem ands grant, and the bureaucratic process of fused. As the migration intake has been on the public sector, requiring extra filling those 73,000 places will function progressively pegged back we've had spending in housin g, h ealth services, to support this. the refu gee intake pegged back as w ell'. education and social security. This A third of the n ew arrivals in 1994/ Deasey concedes that the Refugee Re­ spending stretches the current account 95 will be admitted under the 'skills view Tribunal, established in July last defi cit, which is not adequately com ­ component', which is administered by a year as part of the new act, has the pensa ted when migrants find their feet points test. Applicants are assessed on potential to provide a more just process and become more economically produc­ their level of education, work experi­ for on-shore claimants for refu ge, but tive. Most importantly they compound ence, age and command of English. This that off-shore numbers seem likely to our unemploym ent problem. also applies to a quarter of the places put rem ain more or less at cu rrent levels. Opponents of this viewpoint believe aside for family reunion. If an applicant The shift from a m ass immigration the net economic eff ect of immigration fits into the 'concessional category', i.e. policy is perhaps a reflection of the must be assessed more closely. Austral­ he/she is not a parent with more chil­ change in the fundamentals of an econ­ ian-born residents also place dem ands dren in Australia than elsewhere, a omy no longer reliant upon labour-in­ on the public sector, so these costs are spouse or dependent child of someone tensive production . The Government not solely imposed by migrants. And already in Australia, then he or she must would now prefer new arrivals to start a new arrivals tend to show m ore than the also comply with the test. Effectively, company of their own rather than go on usual am ount of initiative and thereby this m eans that half of the migrant in­ to the factory floor. Refugees, on the contribute more through their very en­ take will be accepted by the department other hand, must fit in where they can.• terprise. Supporters of immigration pol­ on the basis of their skills and resources. icy dispute figures that show its nega- Added to these policy directives, the Jon Greenaway is a staff writer.

22 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 Isolation

to be the maximum-security punishment section in Pentridge. It was built ers broke rocks as punishment there up till the mid 1970s.By the time it c1 d spent four long years there. I was assaulted on occasions, but the real tor the sense of isolation. I wrote what follows during 1993. It touches briefly _,_,.,..,.,... was like, and draws from my years there. -Craig W.J. Min

MY PRISON BED I SLEEP C URLED UP, my arms tightly wrapped around the pillow. I long for th person, to feel their breath and heartbeat on me, to touch the soft skin of my lover. The isolation closed in on me at first; the world withered away and I was enclosed in a dar , damp the walls slowly moving in. Outside the door are disembodied voices. Three times a day, har ds1>ush food through a small hole in the steel door. I look up to see the face but the opening slams shut. After some time the claustrophobic shrinkage stopped. My mind took over and expanded the space. It compensates by running at full speed, filling the void with snapshots of my life that flash past in a blur of colour. In spite of myself I grow to like the isolation. I have only myself, I don't have to interact, I don't have to be real. I just exist; me and my mind. I become accustomed to the 4 x 6 metre yards with drain holes to urinate in. But then I fight against the shame and embarrassment, as I squat over a drain hole to defecate because they will not let me out of the yard. The worry of becoming sick grinds me down. There is no real medical treatment in H Division. Don't get sick, I say over and over to myself. Human touch becomes something I don't know how to approach. How do I shake hands? I have to be too close. Touch your fellow isolatees on the shoulder and they spin around, their accusing eyes burning. I find it hard to touch. I don't know how to do it, and it becomes normal not to touch. Visitors arrive. I feel the strangeness when shaking hands. My mind transports me out of the scene and I become the observer; there is something wrong but I cannot put my finger on it. The handshake breaks. No longer the observer, I wonder if it was too long or too hard. I feel the embarrassed flush of blood to my face and hope they have not noticed. We hug. My flesh hardens, a shell forms on me like a dead thing which is not my own. This is not me. I love, I feel, but I now find it hard to express emotion, they are taking it from me. I wonder if my visitors see behind the veneer I am working so hard at making. I want to fight against what this place has done to me but I can only try to cover it, to hide it from view. The isolation, it's an empty space. Not like an isolated landscape, it has nothing in it, only my mind that goes over and over every conversation, every moment. It's all churned up. I feel worn out as I return from the visit. A letter awaits me. A man I saw in our prison yard only days before writes for help. He had stepped onto the tram only metres from the prison gate, and felt like exploding-he felt threatened by the people, the noise, by an ordinary weekday tram. H e writes: 'if only I had a gun I would be safe. The people were too close, they were looking at me. I sat there and saw myself shoot them all.' He is slowly coming to terms with the effects of this place and has not exploded. But as I write this I am only a few cells down from where I remember lying on the concrete floor, my naked body shaking from the bitter cold and isolation that ran through me like an electric current. Toilet paper wrapped around my icy finger tips. The world evaporated, I could not picture what lay beyond the cell, it was all blank. Graphic by I concentrated on the warm patches that were my bruises and baton welts and tried to make the Tohm Hajncl warmth spread. I slept. Another day in an Australian prison. Isolation. •

Craig W.J. Minogue is serving a term of a minimum 27 years in the Victorian Prison System.

VOLUME 4 NUMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 23 EssAY My childhood door Cynthia Rowan retraces h er Murri family life

WTwm I "'"'' Wh" c•n I "Y about my 'uch thing'" om meat [totem) and whm om fa· life when I have had so m any different experiences as thers' country was. We knew some of our language the second youngest of eight children. It could be just and would take great delight in exchanging words and my perceptions of what it was like growing up on the their m eanings with the other Murri kids. These fringes of society and becoming a mother at 15 years m om ents were magic. The experiences reinforced our of age. Aboriginality, and gave meaning to our existence. The one constant aspect which has sustained m e My fi rst experience of the way in which 'white' throughout m y life is the unconditional love andre- Australians considered us as inferior was when play- spect that we as a family have for each other. Our ing with a 'white' girl. Her next door neighbour told mother, only surviving brother, sisters and our child- me that all I needed to know was how to write my ren are the immediate spiritual strength which ena- name. At the time I did not think much of that com- ble us to overcome the pain and indignation of racism ment. When I returned home I told our m other what and prejudice in our lives. Our mother has had a pow- the lady had said to me. I recall Mum's saying that erful influence, but her love and understanding could education would help me not only to write m y name, not always protect and keep us safe from the bitter- but to learn many things. ness and hate projected from the wider community As we grew older we becam e more exposed to to us, just because we are Murri people. In spite of comments such as these and began to realise that we this, we have survived, and look back in astonishment were considered different from other children and that on the many trials we faced and overcame. we should not aspire to anything higher than domes- My earliest m em ory of our mother was h er beau- tic work, even though my sister and I had dream ed of tiful voice. She sang to us when she was working becoming air hostesses when we grew up. around the tin humpy. Some times she would whis- Our school ex- d e various tunes; it still brings joy to my heart when periences rein- I think of those times. Even though we lived on a pen- forced what 'white' sioners' reserve, in a tin shack with a dirt floor, it adults were saying seems that the sm aller children were sheltered from to us, that is, we the struggle that our parents were going through. should not expect Our parents had separated when I was a small t o get good jobs. child, but our father lived near by and had close con- My most painful tact with us throughout his life. Dad died when I was experience oc- very young. As a result my only memories are of a curred when the man who would do anything I wanted. My sisters tell School Inspector m e that Dad spoilt me. asked m e to read a On reflection it seems that, unlike many Murri section from our families, we were not exposed to the family network Social Studies during our early years. It was later in life that we found book. The section out that Dad's relations were on government reserves was on Aboriginal and could not com e and go as they pleased. I recall people- we were one cousin who would visit us at school. He was not described as dirty, allowed on the school grounds. We had to go to the lazy blacks. I still front gate to speak to him. Much later we came to rem ember the hu- understand that he was permitted to visit us when he miliation and indignation I felt when reading the par- was brought to town as part of his work. But we were agraph. I became upset. The teacher attempted to never given an explanation as to why he was not al- console m e by saying that I was a 'part Aborigine' lowed onto school grounds. and it did not refer to m e. I often wondered if they We were grea t explorers and would mount an had ever considered what they were really saying. We expedition into the bush and discussion would focus were unable to attend school sometimes because we on what Murri people would do in the area. We knew did not have any food or money for bus fares. that this was not our country, and made sure that we On many occasions we had to explain the situa- only went to areas where we were allowed to go. When tion to the Head Master, who was sympathetic but we played with other Murri children we discussed unyielding. We go t a good talking to. At times the

24 EUREKA STREET • O c TOBER 1994 racism from other children would become unbeara­ school the attitude of our friends towards us had be­ ble, but we fought back. On several occasions we were gun to change. The warm friendship of the early years ganged up on by 'white' kids, but we were good fight­ of primary school was no longer there. It seem ed that ers and would come away winning the battle. After there was no future for us in the education system . these experiences the 'white' kids would tease us from After leaving school I gained employm ent in a varie- afar. ty of jobs. These ranged from do­ But not all our experiences m estic duties to factory work. were negative. We had som e real­ We often talk of our childhood ly good friends who would invite experiences and the happy situa­ us to their homes and their parents tion of our growing years. When we would welcome us without reser­ ga ther on occasions such as Christ­ vation. We went to birthday par­ m as or other holidays, laughter and ties and other family activities. teasing are part and parcel of our Some of the teachers taught us well activities. Card games and story­ and encouraged us to learn. As a telling keep our children amused result I have warm m emories of for hours. Like many Aboriginal their eff orts-they were contrary families, we marvel at the expres­ to what other 'white' adults were sions on our children's faces when telling us. they begin to realise that we were We were encouraged to learn on ce children who s truggled as much as possible. Our parents against racism, prejudice and rejec­ purchased a set of Encyclopaedia tion. Our experience in overcom­ Britannica which was kept in our ing such situations has prepared tin humpy fo r us children to use. our children for these issues. When I think of the condition of our housing (if you I worked in Brisbane for almost a year and re­ could call it that ), our most expensive asset was books. turned home when I was pregnant. All m y former We were also encouraged to read as much as possible. school friends avoided m e and 'well-m eaning white' This included reading m agazines and newspaper arti­ people told me to give m y baby away. My fa mily sup­ cles to Mum, and drawing up a list of groceries. Any ported me in m any ways and did not reject me like so government documentation was interpreted by us and m any others did. At that particular time, single moth­ we were expected to undertake household duties, as ers were frowned upon and considered to be a blight well as school work. on society. On reflection, these skills have stood us in good I was blessed with a healthy son w ho grew up to stead. Our mother constantly told us that honesty is be thoughtful, kind, considerate and unconditional the best policy. As an adult I tend to becom e very in his love for m e. Most of all he is m y friend who indignant as I expect people with whom I interact to looks out for me. I often thank God for the many bless­ be truthful. But sadly this is not always the case. Other ings bestowed on m e, especially for m y son who has values our m other enforced included sharing of our been my strength and the focus of m y love. resources without reservation. To this day she still After the birth of m y son I did not work for sev­ would give her last cent to assist someone in need. eral m onths. I then found employm ent that took me Her words were: 'Share what you have with others.' from home early in the morning and I arrived hom e Mum also told us that we were equal to everyone else. late. The heartache and joys of being a single parent A person in the gutter is just as good as som eone who have sustained m e throughout m y life. I had to con­ is rich. It seem s that this was her way of teaching us tend with racism but m y son faced both racism and that everyone has human dignity and should be treat­ the stigma of being a child of a single woman . How ed with respect regardless of their situation. She rein he survived he has never told m e, but he fo und a good forced these values daily not only in words friend, who considers him as his brother, and their but also in her interaction with others. friendship has spanned more than fifteen years. On m any occasions in his growing years there M UM ALWAYS C AR RIED HERSELF with dignity and would be up to six boys in my house, visiting and was proud of her American N egro/South Sea herit­ checking out the refrigerator. To this day I cannot age. understand why they would open the fridge door to I seem to recall that it was only a small group of check out the contents. The ritual of walking in the 'white' kids who found offence with our colour. Dur­ back door and opening the refrigerator may have been ing all our schooling experiences our mother never another way of saying hello. • failed to support us in words and action. As the young­ est children in our family, we grew up pretty fast and Cynthia Rowan is a lecturer at the Capricornia Abo­ we were soon taught how to handle 'white' people riginal and Islander Tertiary Eduction Centre in the who tried to belittle us. By about grade six in primary Central Queensland University at Rockhampton.

V OLUME 4 N UMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 25 Sound Bites PoE Domenico Scarlatti was driven almost batty by friends who said, 'Please won't you play Kitten on th e keys?'

Gregorio Allegri enjoyed watching Maigret Each Morning Once More Seatnless but Arcangelo Carelli despised the telly. Mother and type of evolution, Maria Callas the New Testament of the scholars turned down a part in Dallas, may be likened to a library catalogue saying 'I'm La Divina, of the old type, a card index console booK. me jOT Palestrina. ' of wooden drawers, each a verse. And you never know which ones are out, Jean Baptiste Lully stacked up, spilt, or currently back was such a bully in, with som e words deleted he even got his way then restored. And it never ends. with Le Roi Soleil. Reputations slide them out, Baldassare Galuppi convictions push them in. was a bit of a yuppy; Speculations lool< backwards once there was no one smarter and stiffen to salt-crystal proofs. at a toccata. Dates grow on palms in the wilderness and ferm ent in human minds - When Harry Bil'twistle and criticism 's prison jOT all poems choked on some gristle was modelled on this traffic. he complained, 'The gra vy's all gone to Maxwell Davies.' Most battered of all are the drawers labelled Resurrection, The. Peter Porter Ba shed, switched, themselves resurrected Rain continually. Because it is impossible, as the galaxies were, as life was, Late afternoon: rain brush es past the window as flight and language were. Th e impossible, And I feel less alone. I K.now that, soon, evolution's prey, shot with Time's arrow. It will all stop; but now it breal<. s the day But this one is the bow of time. In a procession of days, each shining, whole, Shadowy at a little distance tower And turns stray minutes into som eone's life. other banks of card-index drawers, Not mine: in jOTty years I've n ever thought other myriad shelves, jammed with human names. How strange to hold a cup and watch the rain, Some labelled in German are most actively The tea gon e cold, my finger wandering worked over, grieved, and reinserted. Over the rim; and for the first time ever More stretch away in Eastern scripts, I feel thick drops of varnish, and tal<.e them scarcely visited. Dust softens their h eadwords. As kindnesses, not m eant for m e but loved Yet the only moral reason to leave any As though they were. The Hassidim will tell in silence fragments and reassembles in the swarmed over, nagged, fantasized About the life to come, how everything word-atoms of the critics' Testament. Will stay the same. That stain upon m y chair, It must remain; my cup cannot be smooth. Les Murray This world will be untouched, they nod and say,

But just a little changed. Late afternoon: I sit h ere, deep inside this April day, Half- thanking som eone I will n ever m eet, Th e rain outside now striking hard and fast.

Kevin Hart

26 EUREKA STREET • O cTOBER 1994 Don't Do Anything Silly or Clever 1RY Stay close to the upper world where fantasy is just a tory, don 't consider the number you must wear of all the never-to-be- counted numbers in the catalogue of DNA, pay respect to this extraordinary misrule we call reality, perfect the mantra of your fear in steady repetition of your love, your family and your sense of others, aclmowledge that both guilt and shame make n o preten ce of offering eviden ce, practise faith as you would polish the one good table in the house, ignore your animals' ignorance of death, your body is more privileged, shout at your kids on the escalator 'don 't do anything silly or clever! ' which m eans that vindication belongs to bankers and not ballerinas, indulge the aphorism s of the future but live only in the present, observe great artists with detachment accepting that the brain's an arriviste.

Despite all this dying will thrust on you the inevitable heroism of a god. Pebbly Beach Peter Porter Ice Bear The sand the mirroring sand Hour after waking hour the white bear sm ooth of pride is on the m ove, leaving in the full glass of wine pug behind pug in the smashed crystals, his body dusk a wedge driving towards you, the black cap of his nose drinl

Dorothy Porter Peter Steele

V O LU M E 4 N UMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 27 Missolonghi

" 'Tis time this heart should be unmoved." Byron fan.22 1824, Greece

1 Death And The Maggie

Even the leeches, Loulws, Good Morning, Citizen Cat, don't bleed I am Death who's com e my lust for astonishment To take you from this flat Back to where you're from. how does the heart Are you ready, Comrade Cat! that disobedient pump make its choice! Don't pester m e, Sir Death, This is my morning rest why do I drag Wh en I forget that teeth myself out of bed Shred flesh from bone with zest. I'd fillet you, proud Death. every morning Stay calm, Signore Gatto, ju st to watch you! You have to leave but you're In that anthology from Chatto 2 On page 174. Va ben', amico gatto. I'm not really asleep, Loulws Listen, egregious Hades, I'm only foxing Those only give you power, so I can watch you Fin e Gentlemen and Ladies moving about my room Who recognise their hour. Don't mix with rough trade, Hades. take it, take it, 3 it's only my watch The time has come, Herr Katz, I've had a gutful of Time Last night I dreamt To chew what you have bitten, I took you pistol shooting This languor is ersatz- hold its old gold finish That you're no sl

we were pistol shooting

the ground was smoking a ghost dawn.

Dorothy Porter

28 EUREKA STREET • O c TOBER 1994 Diptych

I

Purple sails, Tyre, girls tormenting fabrics, rocks, a green sea, the Greel

The ocean sizzles, II titanic bouillabaise, tall clouds of black steam. a tanka runs for five lines of five syllables Enough is enough or segm ents, seven, the poxy young blade let drop five again, and seven twice, to the guillotine. no rhyme, no m etre, chunked sense.

A bench, advoca tes, a tanka is less sill

Meat is weeter near a tanka is less the bone, wheezed Casanova Jungian than a haiku, forking a lean dish. those extra fourteen syllables coagulate Salade Rachel, eels, the blood of arch etype, m yth. bearded clams a la de Sade, peche pudding, whipped cream. a tanka is less Wittgenstein than a haiku, Meat is sweeter near those added fourteen the fat ejaculated syllables can lure poets the Sumo wrestler. from the malls of common sense.

Beethoven expired a tanka is more unwifed, loverless, shaking orchestral than a haiku, his fist heavenwards. those furth er fourteen syllables babble over Beethoven 's coiled brain the stark aphasia of sound. uncoiled the future's music with brown growling sounds. Jack Hibberd

V oLUME 4 NuMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 29 T RAVEL

CHRIS M c GILLION The Cuban conundrum

Mothers of the revolution: women W CN I WAS 16, in 1970, I picked up " book in many had chosen the Vietcong as their heroes. It was in Santiago, Cuba. the local libra ry entitled Venceremos: A collection of serious stuff but all so confining. Besides, H o Chi Photo: Tania the writings and speeches of Ernesto 'Che' Guevara. Minh had nothing on Fidel Castro. Ho was old and fovanovic, The text left m e cold, as does the dreary earnestness frail even then, and unexciting in that Orien tal sort M33 Ph otoagen cy of so much Marxist polemics. But the picture of Che of way. Fidel was electrifying. Castro had arrived in on the cover-the youthful stubble on the chin, the Havana on 6 January 1959 like Jesus entering Jerusa­ dash of the green m ilitary fatigues, the huge cigar pro­ lem on Palm Sunday and the jubilation, like the truding from a broad, confident smile- caught hold Christ-like beard, had stayed. Everyone associated of my im agination and wouldn't let go . with the revolution- even Che who seem ed to court My interest then was purely aesthetic. Profession­ martyrdom and achieved it in the jungles of Bolivia al radicals at the time, in schools and universities, in 1967- was oddly carefree, enthusiastic and, well, had adopted the war in Vi etnam as their ca use and happy.

30 EUREKA STREET • O c TOBER 1994 It was as though the pieces of that jigsaw puzzle spoke for three hours about the revolution's most re­ called the 'Sixties'- Jimmy H endrix, free love, cam­ cent achievem ents in milk production, animal hus­ pus revolt, and getting stoned- had com e together and bandry, hospital beds and schools. Then he finished it was Cuba. with his standard rhetorical flourish: Socialismo o I took a m ore serious interest in Cuba in the mid- muerte! Venceremos! ('Socialism or death. We will The old 1980s, when I was asked to help teach a course on win! ') I don't think anyone realised the full implica- consenSUS was US-Latin American relations at a university in Sydney. tions of that choice in 1989. Given the misery and repression so typical of the rest Within a year of my visit the Soviet Union was built on an of Latin America, Cuba seem ed like an island of sane falling apart, Cuba was losing its old Communist-bloc policies and human values. There were prisons and subsidies, spare parts and m arkets, and the island's agreement to prisoners of conscience in Cuba, but I also knew that economy was defl ating like a pierced balloon . Fidel there were no death squads or bodies being dumped announced the beginning of a 'special period in time deliver rising on the rubbish tips in the middle of the night. I appre­ of peace' and began putting the country on the equiv­ living standards ciated that Cuba had swapped its economic depend­ alent of a war foo ting. ency on the US for another kind of dependency on There was rationing and belt-tightening as liv­ to all. But these the Soviet Union . ing standards were cut and labour disciplined to build But people were fed and housed, and there were an internationally competitive export econom y vir­ days winning education, health and careers open for all. I was aware tually overnight. There were shortages and blackouts, that Cuba was a one-party state. But I knew as well and little time or opportunity for fun. The carnival in overseas that decades of U S h ostility h ad thrown the Havana was cancelled. There would be no m ore cheap markets and polit ical development of the revolution off beer, all-night street parties or salsa bands for the cou rse and that, to som e extent, it continued to m asses- but there would be a thumb in the nose for keeping them explain some of Castro's excesses. I was curiou s. the Yankees and a grim determination to survive. And so I decided to visit Cuba in July and The situation aroused m y curiosity again and so requires a new August of 1989. I returned to Cuba fo r another look this August. The first thing I noticed on my second visit was culture of ERS T IMPRESSIONS ARE EASILY RE CALLED: MiG fi ghters that the elegant decay of Havana had turned into m ere entrepreneurship, on the runway at Havana airport, the drive through decay. The sewerage system, the water supply and streets where billboards advertised revolutionary val­ regular garbage collections were clearly breaking individual ues instead of Coca-Cola and Sony cassette record­ down. There were still plenty of cars on the roads but ers; cold beer and cool jazz in the bar of the Inglaterra none of them seemed to have exhaust system s. The incentive, and, Hotel; old Havana with its vista of domes and rooftop two electricity-generating plants in H avana were dare one say it, statues; the diplom atic suburb of Miram ar with its burning a particularly low-grade crude and they were leafy colonial m ansions and police drowsing lazily in doing it without an y thou ght for fi lters. class division. pillboxes; and the lovely wide Malecon joining both There was a brown slick in the air above the city parts of the city and cradling them from the sea. on the days when there wasn't a black one. The port This is the real Cubans could be intrusive and inquisitive in of Havana, I was told, had earned the dubious honour those days but generally they were relaxed and friendly of being the second most polluted harbour in the crisis of the as well. Young girls giggled as they tried to hustle world. By the look of the grease and grime in the wa­ revolution. male tourists-in a land of sexual liberation, easily ter, that wasn't hard to believe. The buses were over­ available contraception, and abortion on demand. I crowded, the restaurants appalling, the queues long, guess they felt there was nothing much to be lost by and the state stores generally bare of goods and cus­ off ering companionship for the night in return for a tom ers. Cuba truly had joined the Eastern bloc, even trip to the dollar store in the morning. though the club was now deserted. There After several days in Havana I fl ew to Cam­ was no reason to celebrate. m aguey to hear Castro give the annual '26 July' speech commem orating the Moncada uprising in 1953 and B UT THE BIG GEST CHANGE was in the m ood of the the first shots fired in the revolution. While there I people of Havana. The frustration and discontent were visited a new rural housing project only to find m y­ palpable. Every Cuban I spoke to was hustling-sell­ self joining a select tour group being led around the ing sex, cigars, interviews, anything-in return for a complex by Fidel himself. few dollars that would buy m eat or soap or designer The 'maximum leader' had little time for foreign labels in the hard-currency stores. There was a sul­ journalists but an obvious rapport with the construc­ lenness on the streets, and a danger there too. Tour­ tion workers and campesinos. He embraced them and ists were robbed with violence in downtown Havana they badgered him about poor electrical wiring and during broad daylight-som ething that was unthink­ the lack of onions in the market. able five years earlier. And the girls were no longer Fidel seem ed genuinely interested in these mi­ giggling. nutiae of the revolution . It was part of his attachment Back in the 1950s, Cuba was a whorehouse for to his people. At the open air rally the next day he gangsters from Las Vegas and businessm en from Mi-

V OLUM E 4 NUMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 31 ami. These days it is fast becoming the brothel-of­ economic independence-the two are inseparable­ Cubans buy choice for package-deal tourists from Moscow, Buda­ from the US, an end to exploitative labour relations their supplies pest, and Mexico City. in Cuba, and the construction of a society in which It is easy to exaggerate the m eaning of these im­ there would be opportunities for all, even if that meant on the black ages. After all, there are no beggars in Havana, no one taking away the privileges of some. living on the streets, and no one selling their bodies The reality may not have lived up to the prom­ lnarket­ just to survive. The food ration has been cut repeat­ ise, but at least the effort was made. What many Cu­ edly and severely, but infant mortality rates have con­ bans now wonder is whether the effort has been stolen goods­ tinued to drop throughout the 'special period' abandoned. or steal the1n indicating the strength of the country's nutritional These days it is often said that Cuba's revolu­ and health-care programs. And in the countryside out­ tion brought health and education and housing, but from state side Havana, where 70 per cent of Cubans live, the that it has outlived its usefulness. Those who say that decline in living standards is not so apparent. usually then add that what Cuba needs is freedom, at warehouses or Household gardens supply many people with a varie­ the ballot box and in the market, and everything will ty of fruit and vegetables that they wouldn't get in be right. Most Cubans appreciate that this is nonsense. directly from the city. New apartments are still being built for They know that they are still better off than they were other Cubans. rural workers, although not quite to the standards of before the revolution. those I had seen in 1989. There is far less mechanisa­ Back in the 1950s, they toiled long hours for lit­ Individual tion and more use of animal power, but then tle reward to please Americans. Desi Arnaz was the life is generally slower and more relaxed gringos' idea of a likeable Cuban buffoon and every­ initiative is anyhow. body was expected to live up to the image. And in the encouraged last days of Batista's dictatorship you could end up I T IS ALSO TEMPTING to blame Fidel-once referred to dead and hanging from a lamp post as a warning to but social by The New Yorl< Tim es as a 'Marxist museum those who would seek change. piece'- as the culprit behind Cuba's backwards slide. Most Cubans don't want a return to that. And breal{down­ But Cuba is not the only Latin American country un­ when they see the pimps and casino operators and dergoing a difficult transition from an economy geared assorted opportunists in the Cuban American com­ division, to domestic consumption to one primed for export, munity circling the island like vultures, they appre­ and in many ways it is doing better than most. ciate that this is their most likely fate if Fidel goes discontent, At a summit meeting of Latin American leaders now and the revolution comes unstuck. distrust-is earlier this year. Castro pointed out that Cuba had But the social fabric is being ripped apart even not closed one school or hospital during the 'special before the vultures have landed. In July 1993, the gov­ the result. period'. By contrast, much of the social wage has been ernment passed a law allowing all Cubans to deal in destroyed by free marketeers in countries like Argen­ US currency. Ordinary Cubans can now shop in the tina, Brazil and Peru and public infrastructure has been dollar stores for the luxuries unavailable on the ra­ abandoned or sold off to profiteers. tion card. Like Hemingway, they can sip Mojitos in Moreover, Cuba's transition has been made more the nightclubs and dine in the 'better' restaurants- if difficult than most. Its economic lifetime to the So­ they have dollars. viet Bloc was unexpectedly severed. The US contin­ The change means the difference between a bear­ ues to wage an economic war of attrition against the able life and a comfortable one and it ensures that island. (The 1992 Cuba Democracy Act provides for hard currency eventually finds its way out of private sanctions even against US allies for trading with pockets and into state coffers, where it can be used Cuba.) Internally, the adjustment has been enormous. for the benefit of all. But not all Cubans have access The old consensus was built on an agreement to to dollars. And those who do are not all that interest­ deliver rising living standards to all. But these days ed in sacrificing their personal advantage for the good winning overseas markets and keeping them requires of all. a new culture of entrepreneurship, individual incen­ People with friends and relatives in the US have tive, and, dare one say it, class division. access to dollars-or at least they did until President This is the real crisis of the revolution. Hardship Clinton stopped remittances when he tightened the is tolerable as long as it is shared, but the need to economic embargo in August. Employees of foreign compete in the international market is leading to pol­ companies get dollars as an incentive to turn up for icies and practices that conflict with the collectivist work. (Worker absenteeism is more than 10 per cent and egalitarian ethos of the revolution. in the state sector but less than one per cent outside Western liberals, generally, fail to grasp this. it.) Workers in the tourist industry, black marketeers Their disenchantment with Fidel and Cuba's revolu­ and prostitutes have access to dollars. tion began early, when it became apparent that the For the rest-perhaps 85 per cent of Cubans­ overthrow of Batista was not about fulfilling a bour­ it's beans and rice and a cake of soap a month. All geois dream of electoral democracy and an end to cor­ Cubans are equal, but some are becoming more equal ruption in the bureaucracy. It was about political and than others.

32 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 It doesn't end there. Recently, the Cuban gov­ The minutiae of the revolution now are balance ernment privatised about 140 service occupations. of payments figures, hard currency reserves and over­ Cubans can now go into business for themselves as seas investment flows. The most obvious, or at least taxi drivers, handymen, or vendors supplying small the most visible, beneficiaries are the slick operators private markets. But the materials necessary to make and anyone with 'connections'. Those outside the these businesses viable are unavailable. The petrol group are angry. When I was in Havana in August sev-

ration, when it operates, is half a tank of gasoline a eral hundred Cubans threw rocks at a tourist hotel Knotty problem: m onth. There are no nails in the shops, and few of and trashed two downtown dollar stores. They were Cuban cowboy practises the raw materials needed to make crafts. the outsiders trying to get in. Once again, it may come for a rodeo in the shell of Consequently, Cubans buy their supplies on the to Cubans fighting Cubans. Or in the name of libera­ a dinosaur park. black market-stolen goods-or steal them from state tion the revolution may have to adopt the tactics of Photo: Tania Jovanovic, warehouses or directly from other Cubans. Individu­ oppression. Interests are dividing. Moral principles are M33 Ph otoagency al initiative is encouraged but social breakdown­ getting confused. The US desire to see Cuba destroyed division, discontent, distrust-is the result. Moreover, as a possible model for the rest of Latin America is to add insult to injury, other private business oppor­ being realised from within. tunities are now open to foreigners, including Cuban Socialism or death- if only the choice were that Americans- the gusanos, or 'worms' as they are simple. • known locally, who deserted the revolution for the bright lights of Florida- but not to Cuban citizens Chris McGillion writes for The Sydney Morning themselves. Herald.

V oLUME 4 NuMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 33 Trade winds

/SoLlVING mHoNe KoNc AGREES WJTH YOu?' The old man's satyr face rippled into furrows, The old man grimaced as he drained his coffee which rose and fell with the hacking cough that was cup, lit another cigarette and then pressed it into a as close as he ever came to a genuine laugh. 'That's mound of stubs in the saucer in front of him. 'Well, it! That's the old hate! You're a tonic, mate, and wast­ it'll give me something to do until '97. Watching all ed on those Christians you mix with now. Nice peo­ that happen, I mean. I don't know that the job is any ple though they are, I'm sure, but I bet they don't know more satisfying there than it was here, but I've long how to use hate like that.' since passed the age where the job was the main game, 'In one way or another, Clarry, I've mixed with anyway.' Christians all my life. I haven't met one who was 'I don't know that the job is all that satisfying incapable of hate.' anywhere these days, mate. Certainly not in this town. The satyr laugh returned and subsided like its You've done the right thing, finding an interesting predecessor. 'Yes, mate, I know. And you've remind­ place to live where you can also sell whatever skills ed me why I never bothered with that Christian stuff they're prepared to buy.' myself.' He fell silent, and then tried to find a new topic A waiter stooped to announced that Clarry's taxi of conversation by congratulating me on my marriage. had arrived, and the old man began to make his But that made him remember that marriage is not his farewell. Neither of us really expected to see the other favourite subject. He had had three wives and been again but he went through the motions. 'Bring your married four times-the first and third marriages were wife to Honkers, mate, and the kid, too. We'll have a to the same person-so we were soon back on the only good time, just like the old days.' thing we had in common. Newspapers. I smiled and promised something indefi- He mentioned meeting a friend with whom we nite. used to work on a Melbourne daily. The friend had told him about a meeting of the paper's journalists H E NEVER WROTE AND NEITHER DID l. But his wife that passed a vote of no confidence in the editor for, did, as she had for all of their marriage, to all of his among other things, failing to ensure that there were friends. Long, matter-of-fact bulletins about sights enough subeditors to produce the paper each night. seen and restaurants visited, and trips to Beijing or 'That wasn't any news. It's obvious just from Shanghai to satisfy her curiosityi or shorter, coy reading the paper. If you can still find anything in it bulletins about trips to Manila or Bangkok to satisfy that you actually want to read, that is.' his satyr-like propensities. It was that sort of marriage. 'The circulation figures suggest that fewer and Then for months there was nothing. I thought fewer people want to read the paper.' about him sometimes, when our former paper The old man grunted and steered the conversa­ published some new idiocy that I knew would amuse tion back to subeditors. 'Nice of all those gilded youths him. But I never bothered to send the clipping, and and cafe courtesans to acknowledge our presence at merely wondered whether perhaps his wife had last.' He always reminded me of the fabled American stopped writing because she was tired of the trips to editor who, on being handed the results of a readership Bangkok and Manila, and he was now looking for survey, was said to have wheezed: 'What the hell spouse number five. Or number four, depending how would the readers know about newspapers?' you count these things. 'It always was the sort of job that people only When the letter came I realised I had been notice when it's not being done,' I offered by way of expecting it. His wife sent me a clipping, from the consolation. 'The gilded youths will never know how South China Morning Post. There was a covering note many of them owe their gloss, such as it is, to you.' which read: 'Clarry always said that if something like 'Yeah, but the generation before them wasn't like this happened I was to send you the story from the that. The reporters always hated the subs, true, and paper. He said you'd understand.' the feeling was mutual. An' it was all good and proper 'Post Journalist Found Dead', it was headed. Then because great newspapers were made out of hate like three paragraphs reported that his body had been found that. But the old reporters didn't think they were all in a hotel room in Manila, and that the police had that special, either. They didn't suffer from the said there were no suspicious circumstances. The illusion that the paper couldn't come out each usual euphemism for suicide, a form of words that morning without their particular sparkling contribu­ has been in the trade even longer than Clarry himself. tion.' He knew what he was talking about. He was an He would have liked going out on a traditional note. old reporter, too. Pity they couldn't spell his name correctly, 'Yes, but mate, you're talking about reporters. though. • The problem with the gilded youths and cafe courtesans is that they're merely writers.' Ray Cassin is the production editor of Etueka Street.

34 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 P OETRY

Mending Gloves at Anglesea

Uphill from Demon 's Bluff and the long blue haul To pack-ice and white night, The curtains drawn, slow bubbling at the stove For company, a year and a day near done, I'm needling the soft leather, with all A male's half-lost, half-won 1894 Belief in patience, pleasure at putting right Something gone wrong, and an eye to the next move. That wall, h ow long did it take t h em~ Lil

Of them selves, and ourselves, and pelted in the pelt, In Today's Paper Born and bred for display. Pricking a thumb-ball, I thinl

Peter Steele

V OLUME 4 N UMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 35 TRAVE L: 2

SHANE M ALONEY It's hard to get good

T,ccc,No s ~:,~,~~ ~ ~~'~ ~.~ ~~:, , w~:x ~m one of the Io iou s, but none is m ore strange than the tale of the cal pueblos? In any case, I was prepared to bet he'd Nuns who Sold their Miracle. It begins with the Indi- driven into town in a dusty old Ford pick-up. ans. Okay, Native Americans if you prefer, but bear 'What language are yo u folks speaking7' he asked with me here. softly. We saw them across the Plaza, hunkered down Australian, my wife told him. His face creased in t he winter sunshine on folding chairs, their pot- into a knowing smile. 'Ah', he said. 'Walkabout tery and jewellery sprea d before them on blankets. Creek'. He paused while this sa nk in. Okay, so every- They sat with their backs to the thick adobe wall of body in the global village watches TV. We knew that. El Palacio Real, the Governor's Palace from which Then he went on, 'I guess that makes me an Aborigi- Spanish grandees had ruled a province stretching from ne. Do something for the Aborigines - buy some of the Mississippi to the Pacific. They wore bat- m y stuff'. tered Levis and tractor caps and looks of How could we do otherwise7 We stoic indifference. Great, we thought. bought the earrings, two pairs. He guar- Exactly what we'd come to Santa Fe an teed the silver content, showed us to experience. Indigenous culture his maker's mark, gave a discount meets Hispanic ambience in a gen- for cash, and handed us his busi- uine setting. ness card. As he began to wrap our O ur little family ambled purchase in tissue paper, I asked along the portal checking out the abol't the designs. With this in- wares. Concho belts and bolos, digenous stuff, yo u've got to get bracelets set with turquoise from the m ythology if you want full the hills of Cerrillos at the tail value. of the Sangre de Cristo m oun­ 'A source of grea t power,' he tains, Kokopelli the Flute Player said. 'Found in the desert. High in beaten silver, money clips and voltage electricity pylons. ' tie-pins. The craftsmanship was If the loca l Aborigines weren't superb, the prices as tronomical. going to cough up with any mys­ These Indians hadn't com e down teries, it was time to turn to more with the last rain dance, that was for traditional sources. We got our map out sure. and headed east, looking for St Francis' They, their ancestors at least, had been Cathedral. Its sonorous bells, according to sitting here w hen the Franciscans trudged up the Official Santa Fe Convention and Visitors from Mexico in the 1540s. They were here when the Guide, still call the faithful to prayer. Those few who first cowboys drove their longhorn ca ttle up the San­ don't yet own digital alarm-clock/radios, presumably. ta Fe Trail out of Texas, and when US territorial gov­ Those not too busily engaged in arts trafficking, the ernor Lew Wallace sat inside of those adobe walls and main business of the district. wrote Ben Hur. And they had been here in the sum­ Fortunately for the late sleepers, the sonorous mer of 1945 when the physicists with European ac­ bells were silent that Monday morning. T he cathe­ cents came down the hill from Los Alamos to do a dral itself stuck out like a sore thumb, a bristling little shopping and take a brea k from the Manhattan Gothic revival pile in a street of curvaceous adobe, Project. Although maybe the scientists didn't notice badly out of sync with a municipal building code that the Indians. When yo u're up to your cerebral cortex has made it illegal since 1957 to build anything in­ in the thrill of particle acceleration, you can't be ex­ side the city limits that doesn't look like a set from pected to notice the natives. Th e Magnificent Seven. We passed it by without go­ We stopped to admire some earrings, beaten sil­ ing in and moseyed down the Old Santa Fe Trail. ver teardrops, each with a device etched into it, a stick That's when we saw the sign. Struck paydirt, as I sin­ fi gure with outstretched arms. I recognised them as cerely hope they still say up in them thar hills. Lore­ yei, the local earth deities. The jeweller, a hefty, fit­ to Chapel, it read. Miraculous Stairway. Open Daily. looking guy with long black hair, pushed his hat back 'The original Stairway to Heaven7' our son won­ off his face and leaned forward into our conversation. dered. He might be only eleven, but he's very cultur-

36 EUREKA STREET • OcTOBE R 1994 ally literate for his age. 'And who are these Laredo The Kid headed m e off at the pass. 'And what's Sisters?' said his mother. She probably thought they Shane m ean?' he said. were k.d. lang's backing band. Handsom e stranger, I told him. High in the sad­ 'That's Loreto', I said. 'An order of nuns'. dle. Fast on the draw. Killed Jack Palance, but only 'Oh no', said the Kid, making a break for it. 'Not because he had to. At which point we were back in another church'. the hotel lobby, facing a counter selling locally pro­ It's time like this you need roping skills. 'I used duced pieties. Turquoise and silver rosary beads, that to go into churches all the time when I was your age. sort of thing. Never did me any harm, did it? ' Before he could an­ 'Hey', said the Kid. 'More Indian jewellery.' swer that one I wrestled him through the entrance. What this boy needed was a severe close of the 'Besides which, going into churches is what tourists nuns. I went looking. There weren't any in the lobby, do . It's in our contract.' or even the bar. Long gone, I was told. Over the years Only we weren't in a church, we were in the an­ so many visitors came to view the staircase that a nexe of a hotel lobby. Through an arch we could see hotel chain made them an offer for it, chapel and all. the check-in desk. The chapel was to our left. We paid Those Loreto sisters were no fools and knew when our admission, opened the door and came face to face they were on a good thing. So they sold their Miracle. with the Miracle. Now it's called the Best Western Inn at Loreto. It has 1876 was a worrying year for the only nuns west a toll-free number for worry-free reservations. I won­ of the Pecos. To the north, Custer's cavalry were com­ der if the local Aborigines knew that? ing off second best to the Cheyenne and the Sioux. In I consulted my tourist guide and tugged the fam­ neighbouring Arizona, Geronimo's Apache had bust­ ily away from the rosary franchise. 'You want scenes ed off the reservation. Ranchers were using gunslin­ of amazem ent, paths to heaven ?' I said. 'On the bridge gers to run homesteaders off their land. And in the at the end of this street, a perfectly rational man called Chapel of Our Lady of Light there was one mucho Klaus Fuchs gave the secret of the Atom Bomb to grande problema. Three years into construction and Joseph Stalin. Out of love. How's that for incredible?' nearing completion, it was discovered there was no 'Another Joseph! ' cried the Kid. 'How am I sup­ way up into the choir loft. posed to keep up?' H e was right. All this chasing With money in even shorter supply than archi­ superseded cosm ologies was hungry work. It was time tectural common sense, the sisters took the only for lunch. And in the Wild West that calls for a de­ course open to them . They fell back on prayer. They gree of expertise I do not possess. prayed and prayed and prayed. And one clay their 'So tell m e again, son ', I as ked. 'What's the prayers were answered. difference between an enchilada and a burrito?' • Out of the west rode a stranger. Quite a strange stranger, actually. Very mysterious. A carpenter, no Shane Maloney is a Melbourne writer. His novel, Stiff, less. H e threw his saddlebags over the convent was published this year by T ext. hitching rail, unpacked his tools, and asking no pay­ ment, commenced to saw and to chisel. This he did for many weeks, saying only as much as was needed for the sisters to hustle up some tubs of hot water in Share your good Will. .. which he might soak and shape his timber. No nails did he use.Then one clay, hey presto, he was nowhere The Jesuits are committed to a Christian faith that seeks to build to be fo und. Vanished. Rushing inside the chapel, the a more just world. nuns were confronted by a wondrous sight. Linking To continue their work both here and overseas with: nave to choir-loft was an incredible staircase. Two complete 360-clegree turns with neither internal nor • Youth external bracing. A self-supporting spiral, a • Refugees technical impossibility. A certified Miracle. • Aborigines • Prisoners • The Homeless BUT WAIT, THAT'S NOT ALL. The mystery deepens. The timbers of the staircase, it was discovered, were the Jesuits rely on the generous support of donors. neither of pinon nor ponderosa, nor any of the locally You can help sustain these efforts by making a bequest in your Will. known woods. And the lumber merchants of the town had filled no orders on the convent account. 'Obviously the work of St Joseph', I said. For further information contact: 'Who's he?' said the Kid . Fr Daven Day S.J . This was going to take som e time. Where to start? 130 Power Street 'Did you know/ I began, 'that in ancient Irish our Hawthorn, VIC 3122 surname m eans 'servant of the church?' Not lately, Telephone (03) 818 1336 though.

V oLUME 4 NuMJlER 8 • EUREKA STREET 37 T RAVEL: 3 South Seas traveller James Cook was reminded of Scotland so he called it New Caledonia. Robert Louis Stevenson's reaction was mixed. So was Peter Pierce's.

W,,~o "ToNToun icant numbers; Tahitians too, as Airport in the dark, which was well as people from the poorer just as well. The mini-bus drive islands far out in the Pacific, through scrub country into Nou­ such as Wallis and Futuna. Seem­ m ea was frightening en ough ingly at ease in their condomin­ without the knowledge, (which iums perched on hillsides above we would acquire when leaving) Noumea's corniche, or relaxing of the cliffs that fell away sheer in the yacht clubs of the Baie de beside the road. A few weekends l'Orphelinat, the French have before, seven people had been subtly begun their withdrawal killed in traffic accidents in N ew from the centre of the islands' Caledonia. life. The daily newspaper extrap­ We had come to the main olated with curious civic pride: island of N oumea and parts south this would have m eant 2000 for a holiday. For those who pre­ deaths in the 'm etropolis'. The fer the monoglot company of fe l­ mathematics was odd, and no­ low Australians, a Club Med is one is quite sure how many N ew located around the h eadland Caledonians there are to multi­ from the Baie des Citrons. More ply, although the high figure of luxury hotels are planned. In the 270,000 is now given most cre­ Val Plaisance, for instance, the dence. N evertheless, the chief race-track has been demolished inference was clear: we had en­ and a temporary swamp created tered a departem ent of France. before the foundations of m ore Noumea was its capital, but Par­ condos are laid. Tourists who is the m etropolis. The political adventurously leave the Club violence of the 1980s is now a Med, and the nearby, over-priced diplomatically suppressed mem­ restaurant strip of Anse Vata ory as N ew Caledonian separa­ Beach, can take the genial, green tists look to the 1998 referen- Number 6 bus into the centre of dumforresolutionandindepend- '"--L--....;..------' Noumea. Or can in theory: at ence. various times of the day the bus The well-togged In daylight, one could take in the busy road at the fine and resonantly is so crowded with people going on traveller: distracting indications of all the named Baie des Citrons. The centre and off shift at the Club Med or the Robert Louis things in the streets of Noumea of town is a reminder of a century of Casino, that not a seat remains to be Stevenson which aped, and the others which France at war, from Napoleon's time folded down for passengers. Thus in tropical kit. resisted, France. The old, open-sided (Rue D' Austerlitz) to the Crimea one is left with the pleasant alterna­ From a drawing by market is now the bus station. Its (Rue De l' Alma, Rue de Sebastopol ), tive of walking by the edge of several AS. Boyd modern replacement serves coffee to the Great War. bays into the place which Robert and cr6ques- messieurs in the Paris­ Yet tourists and expatriate French Louis Stevenson described as ian fashion. Traiteurs offer brilliant folk shared the streets with the more 'a town built upon ver- versions of the take- away food in numerous Kanak residents of the mouth crates'. which one rejoices everywhere in islands, many of whose T-shirts did France. The consommation (tariff) homage to Bob Marley, rather than 0 N A SUNDAY M O RNIN G , we sign that hangs in all French bars to La Republique. There were West climbed the hill above this town. was prominently di splayed at the Indians in plenty, part of the varie­ From that vantage point, Noumea is Hotel Ibis, but when one stepped gated waves of immigrants to N ew ringed on three sides by mountains fr om the bar onto a terrace, it was to Caledonia since the nickel boom of which appear perpetually to be un­ be caressed by warm, sub-tropical 1969-70. Japanese and Indonesians der grey mist. In town, rain falls air and to look across a hazardous, have also settled in small, but signif- sudden and sharp; stops as quickly .

38 EUREKA STREET • OCTOBER 1994 Yet in this Southern Province of New which,-although own ed by Air especially come to see, he had ar­ Caledonia, the earth is red and dry, France- was exempted on account rived too late. After the suppression smeared rather than enlivened by of its name from the bitter strike of the Paris Commune in 1871, 270 the frequent showers. A harbour view that grounded all other airlines. Air people were sentenced to dea th, near­ completes the hill-top prospect . France jumbos were stranded on the ly 4000 more 'to transportation to a There are yachts and cruise ships to tarmac, daubed with slogans, barri­ fortified place'. Communard Louise the south, a nickel-processing plant caded with fork-lift trucks and sun­ Michel demanded to be hot, ex­ to the north. In an optimistic inter­ dry debris. ln N oumea, the Air France claiming to the prose- pretation of this outlook, the indus­ office prudently closed. Along the cutors at her trial 'If you trial complex represents the econom­ Rue de Sebastopol, enraged 6tages are not cowards, kill The bus is so ic past of N ew Caledonia, the mari­ d'Air France marched in search of me! ' nas its hopes of future prosperity. someone to take the blame for their Instead, they sent her crowded with Walking back down the hill, we being marooned. No-one was ready to N ew Caledonia, in cam e upon the two largest churches to accept responsibility, so that they particular to the Isle of people going on in Noumea. Initially the evangelical were still fuming when we left Tont­ the Pines, off the south­ Protestant Church of N ew Caledo­ outa, waiting for Qantas to fl y them ern tip of the mainland and off shift at the nia and the Loyalty islands detained to N ew Zeala nd, whence a n (o r La Grande Terre). us. The women of its congrega tion escape to Europe might be The prison convoys left Club Med or the wore bright dresses and flowers in effected. France in May 1872fora their hair. This was an outing in five-month voyage. casino, that not a which they seemed to find more of BEFORE THEN, we had fl own south When the Orne docked pleasure than duty. A few hundred from the old Noumea airport, travel­ in Melbourne, 300 of the seat remains to be metres on, the worshippers at the ling above the vast, reef-bound la­ Communard convicts Sa ere Coeur Cathedral had solemni­ goon, to the Isle of Pines. For my (more than half its com ­ folded down for ty and European faces to show. In ­ wife, it was a nostalgic culmination plement) h ad scurvy. laid in the far;;ade of the cathedral, a of the trip. Twenty-nine years be­ Those who survived the passengers plaque informs the onlooker that fore, she had spent six weeks study­ journey, bar a handful Guillaume Doumre, first bi hop of ing French at the Lycee La Perouse who later escaped to One is left with New Caledonia, 'a donne ce pays a in N oumea . The school is still there, Australia, were to re­ Dieu' (has given this land to God). one wing given over to the use of the main in New Caledonia the pleasant Oddly, the Protestant congrega tion many Australian school groups until the amnesty of appeared m ore receptive to thi which buy a cheaper serve of French 1880. alternative of h appy circums tan ce tha n their language and cui ture than is to be To receive the Com­ Catholic counterparts. Here again, had in Paris. In 1965, her student munards, the headland walking by the perhaps, were N ew Caledonia's past party from Launceston made an over­ by the harbour on the and future juxtaposed. night excursion to the Isle of Pines, Isle of Pines was fo rti­ edge of several It was James Cook, passing in long before it had made its h esitant fi ed. A doctor's and the 1774, who was reminded improba­ way into travel brochures and onto commandant's house bays into the place bly of Scotland by the topography of the itineraries of cruise ships. She were built there in stone, these islands, and called them N ew had travelled, then, from one Pacific and still stand in the which Stevenson Caledonia. Unlike the N ew Hebri­ prison island, one paradise defiled, sunlight, outwardly as des to the north (named on the sam e to another. benign as the non-peni­ described as 'a principle, and now Vanuatu ), New In Augu s t 1890, Stevenson tentia ry buildings of Caledonia did not suffer the peculiar embarked from the stea m er Janet Port Arthur, away across town built upon government by condominium which Nicoll to spend a week in N oumea the Pacific to the south­ gave Port Vila two of everything­ before resuming his voyage to Syd­ west. Inland from the vermouth crates'. gaols, municipal offices, police sta­ ney. He stopped over, as he wrote to harbour on Kuto Bay, tions, languages. In 1853, New Cal­ C harles Baxter from the H otel five kilometres along a road cut edonia was annexed by France and­ Sebastopol, 'partly to see the convict through encroaching bush, the main if reluctantly of late-with France it system, partly to shorten my stay in prison buildings are to be found. has remained. the extrem e cold ... of Sydney at this Grim shells in pale stone, gone pie­ During our visit, the nub of irri­ season'(!) the idea of settling in Samoa bald with age, they rear above the tation with the colonising power was fixed in his mind, but Stevenson undergrowth which has fl ourished concerned Air France. Annoyed that found plenty of incongruities to in their insides. This is a desolate, Corsair and Avion Outre Mer had amuse him in Noumea, as the French and sinister place. moved into the N ew Caledonian authorities sought to translate m et­ Away from the most bea utiful market, the national carrier respond­ ropolitan decorums to a setting beaches that God put in the Pacific, ed haughtily, cancelling two weekly which soon undid them. Stevenson there is much to disturb one on the 747 services to France, and sacking wrote of 'this town of convicts at the Isle of Pines. Mooching islanders numerous local staff. Fortunately we world's end'. with cane-knives and sacks on the.ir had flown with Air Caledonie, If prisoners were what he had shoulders vanish up bush tracks. Like

VoLUME 4 NuMB ER 8 • EUREKA STREET 39 CCI make Prospera's, 'the isle is full of noises/ The hitherto near-empty beach was sounds and sweet airs'. Trees sough infested with Australian tourists, de­ • in the warm morning air. Birds call. livered ashore in hundreds from the protecting your Somewhere out of sight, domestic Crown Monarch to harvest this idyl­ animals- dogs, horses, cows-make lic landscape with cameras. Feeling racket. Dogs infest the Isle of Pines, an improper proprietary resentment, home and family fighting on its beaches, interrupting we watched while island children, tourist somnolence. On the main early apprenticed to cynicism, posed as easy as island, their depredations are more for cute photographs. Helpings of serious, threatening with extinction bougna were offered to those who the national symbol of New Caledo­ trudged along the beach. This was calling nia, the cagou, a bird which has for­ the same fare which had been made gotten how to fly. for us as a feast the previous evening. 008 011 028 From our gites (concrete bunga­ Staple root vegetables of the region­ lows, rudimentary but altogether taro, yam, manioc-are cooked over Call 008 011 028 now and find out adequate for reasonable needs ), it hot coral in a pit, then mixed with more about CCI House and was a three-minute stroll to Kanu­ chicken or lobster and served within Contents and Childrens' mera Bay. Walking there, we en­ the green outer leaves of the banana. Accident Insurance. You'll find countered giant snails, coloured 'The only meal of any complication the service personal and attentive, chocolate with cream stripes, which in the Melanesian diet', as the author the rates competitive and making a are everywhere in the woods. They of a recalcitrant guidebook, Reflec­ claim easy right from the start. are the island's export industry. The tions of New Caledonia, tartly in­ For honest protection for your home beach is a dream of paradise- white forms the sojourner there. and family call the Church's own This was neither the language insurance company - CCI Insurances. sand, the bay's limpid water clear for ten metres clown, an enclosing reef nor the spirit of that tourist propa­ CCI Insurances behind, a desert island in the fore­ ganda which promises in the islands CtllhOliC Church lnsuranc£s L1m11ed A.C N 000 005 210 ground-and all in such extravagant of the Pacific, not only escape to 324 St . Kilda Road, Melbourne, 3004 measure as to mock the postcards on exotic elscwheres, but illusory fr ee­ which, assiduously, we scribbled. But dom from the demands of time. Chal­ as we strolled beyond the beach, to lengmg that possll)1hty arc the con­ the next day, chainsaws disturbed vict ruins of the Isle of Pines. Bluntly the air, returning us to a fallen world. visible, if usually ignored, they have Another modest resort- the only not yet been turned into the History­ kind which the Commune de l'Isle world of Tasmania's Port Arthur. Spiritual des Pins, quaintly named, given this Yet that fate may be in store, as the history, will tolerate- is being con­ presence of the serpent in the gar­ structed. Nearby is one more set of den, the conterminousness of prison Companioning ruins: the Club Med which found­ and paradise, become the tourist bro­ ered years ago on the hostility of the chure's guarantee for tomorrow. • locals. Formation Lest this place lull us into too Peter Pierce is Eurelw Street's turf much contentment, the third morn­ and travel correspondent. He teach­ ing of our stay delivered a garish es Australian Studies at Monash awakening. Hell came to breakfast. University. Talking Point Common Sense Putting People's Hopes Back On The Agenda This ecumenical course will be conducted How do we find a voice in society to name the sort of world we want to pass in 1995. on to our ch ildren? In a public conversation dominated by economics, many of us feel other priorities need to be named, and Fair Share have put out a sma ll It comprises a guided reading program and kit to foster such discussion. The kit, Common Sense, consists of A2-s ize colour a residential school at the Melbourne posters, with five one-page discussion starters and background articl es. Four of Anglican Retreat House. the five sessions ca n be used by any concern ed people. The fifth one ca ll s on our Ch ri stian heritage as a source of strength for this enterpri se. Common Sense Full details are available from: is geared to ordinary people: most of us have enough common sense to feel a ll The Registrar (Mrs Pat Hydon) is not well, but don't know where to start workin g for change. 3 Dalton Court, Mulgrave VIC 3170 Order from: Fair Share, 2A Chapel Street St Kilda 3182. ph (03) 5294377. Pr ice: $10.00 per kit

40 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 BooKs: 1

MICHAEL M c GrRR Three's company

CASTRo' s Drift HAD A Drift Brian Castro William m ember the past and live their own strange beginning. So me years ago, Heinemann, Melbourne, 1994 lives beyond easy words. his local library was selling off un­ ISBN 0 85561 570 2 RRP $24.95 Emma M cGann's bro th e r, wanted books. Outside the library, The Ya ndilli Trilogy Rodney T hom as, makes this point. He is a Hall Picador, Sydney, 1994 Castro noticed sheets of paper blow­ kind of tour operator. Initially, we ISBN 0 330 27491 0 RRP $17.95 ing around in the street. The pages see through the eyes of visitors the happened to be part of a work by B.S. ton-James 'had real material to write kind of comfortable frisson to be Johnson, an English novelist who about', he is put ashore on an islet expected fr om convict ruins: 'the was renowned for producing the kind without his logbook and quill and is institutionalised viciou sness of the of book in which the chapters were faced with the task of remaking him­ past rem ained the one true reposi­ bound individually and sold in a slip self on his own. McGann, the only tory of anticipation for present-day case so you could read them in what­ other literate on board, scuttles the tourists, its gloom powdered with ever order you chose. Yo u got the ship elsewhere and pitches a barbar­ English lawns, mouldering stones raw ingredients for a novel but had ic settlem ent beyond the reach of and m elancholic trees, its savagery to m ake them up into som ething written laws. When Pennington is residing only in popular mythology yourself. Another ofJohnson 's books eventually rescued, the effort of writ­ and im aginings.' T homas McGann was published in a loose leaf fo lder. ing a simple explanation is beyond denies his tourists such pleasure. He This was the book which Castro's him. He is mistaken fo r Mr Crusoe. shows that 'there's absolutely noth­ local library had withdrawn from Generations later, one of Sperm's ing here '. He hopes that 'they've circulation. Unfortunately, the buy­ descendants, an Aboriginal, Emma stumbled upon loss. En­ er had only wanted the folder and McGann, initiates the correspond­ lightenmentcomes when cast the contents to the breeze. So ence which brings B.S. Johnson to you 've lost.' Castro first cam e across Johnson, Tasm ania. Johnson's story tacks in If anything, Rodney If this tangled picking pages of his writing at ran­ and around the cruel wind which Hall's Yandilli Trilogy is dom off the footpath. You can only blows back from last century. At one even more ambitious in moral wilderness suppose that Castro is the kind of stage he almost drowns and is regur­ its recreation of the nine­ reader Johnson would have died for. gitated by the sea as Jonah Johnson, teenth century. Hall's is what the 20th At the time he committed sui­ a writer who 'cannot form a basic three novels are set in cide in 1973, Johnson had finished sentence'. He is brought back to a the same area of settle­ century makes the first volume of a trilogy in which world in which 'words are no longer ment, on the south coast he invited the reader to complete the sovereign' and decides to accept that on N ew South Wales, of the 19th, God work. This is precisely what Drift ' the core is an emptiness' because about a generation apart. does. It adds 20 years to the lifespan this means that 'dea th is The location holds the knows what the of B.S. Johnson and, in spite of his '"r inside life'. work together. Each nov­ having been a notorious stay-at­ el is the confession of a 21st will make home, takes him on a trip to Tasma­ .1 HECORE OF Drift is its quest for a different kind of violence. nia, a place which 'has madness in way of spea king of the unspeakable. The Second Bridegroom of our own. its name'. There are plenty of voices from the (published in 1991) is the Castro is one of our m ost sophis­ literary past within the novel and it story of a transported ticated storytellers. A the title sug­ treads, for example, some of the same forger who attempts to kill the con­ gests, different forces make the run­ ground as Marcus Clarke's For The vict to whom h e is shackled, jumps ning in Drift at different times. But Term of His Natural Life . Convict ship and is subsumed by a group of at the heart of the book is an unset­ cannibalism and juvenile incarcera­ native m en. Being shortsighted, he tling vision of the 19th century. tion at Point Puer trail in the shad­ sees close detail but not the com ­ Orville Pennington Jam es, cap­ ows of both works. But Clarke turns plete landscape. 'I had arrived at a tain of the Nora, embarks upon a this nightmare into melodrama, pull­ place where all m y knowledge was whaling expedition because h e ing emotional responses with fright­ useless. The joy, as I found myself dreams of writing the book which ening confidence in a book's capaci­ filled with it could not be described.' Melville eventually achieved in ty to titivate and pleasure the reader. The Grisly Wife (published in 1993) Moby Dick. He puts 'the book before Clarke shares with his time a belief tells of Catherine Byrne, wife of the real life'. His first mate, Sperm that, whatever experiences may be­ self-s tyled prophet, Muley Moloch McGann is a sadist who keeps cap­ fall, words will be found. Castro and one of the 'Household of Hidden tured wom en below deck. McGann undermines this belief. He reduces Stars', a community of physically leads a mutiny against the captain. his characters to silence. He believes damaged wom en which Moloch es­ At the very m om ent that Penning- ultimately in their capacity to re- tablishes on the fringe of the bush.

VOLUME 4 N UMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 41 Captivity Captive (publish ed in ing able to call this thing a cabbage, Yet, th e deepest irony is that these 1988) deals with a triple m urder this thing a peapod.' Before leaving inabilities, these unfrcedoms, can which has festered unresolved with­ England, Muley Moloch takes Cath­ be freely spoken of. It is the second in a community for sixty years. The erine Byrne on a tour of a tannery, a bridegroom who is redeemed by storyteller, Pat Malone, is a brother manufacturing plant which is a vi­ using 'words to take captivit y of the three victims. In 1956, the sion of hel l. He arrives in the tangled captive'. In Captivity Captive, fabricated confession of somebody wilderness with one of their wed­ Malone's brother, Willie, once stood else draws the story from him like an ding presents, a lawn-mower, tucked up to their seething father and was impacted tooth. up nea tly in a box, not unlike the permanently handicapped when the Occasions of violence flirt with piano sitting on the beach in Jane father chained him to a bed and religion. In the mom ent he satisfies Campion 's fi lm. Pat Malone look thrashed him. He is a victim of his lust for the blood of Gabriel Dea n, on as a photographer fakes an aborig­ straight talking, the kind of truth the convict forger finds 'he beli eved inal camp scene and advertises the that can both 'love and defeat' the in a forgiving God.' Catherine Byrne prints as 'a m ost appropriate wed­ dark forces which, time and again, believes she is carrying the second ding present'. He understands his get the flesh creeping in Hall's over­ incarnation when in fact in the complicity in th e murders as a powering prose. depths of consumptive delirium she result of his being tempted beyond Both these trilogies are crafted has been violated by Muley Moloch. ' the very bo undary of our with the kind of close accounting Pat Malone's parents observe a flint­ known world and its which gives up its riches slowly. like Catholicism. His mother dies of n1orals.' They are both superb. Mind yo u, if gri ef because she ca nnot weep; the this tangled moral wi lderncss is what fa ther never laughs. A T EVERY TURN INH ALL'S TR IL OGY, the 20th century makes of the 19th, Hall pulls at the acceptability of the imported culture and its impedi­ God knows what the 2 1st will make profound untruths. In each n ovel, menta arc made ridiculous. Above of our own. • there arc vivid icons of this. The

M AX TEICHMANN

WORK FOR ALL Cold comfort for Full Employment in the Nineties Cold Warriors John Langmore MP & John Quiggin The Shadow of 1917, Cold War Confl ict in Australia, Robert Manne, Text Publishing Com- pany, 1994. RRI' $16.95, ISBN 1 87584 703 0 Work for All describes public policies 'IHIS IS AN IMPORTANT !lOOK . It All but the first and last chapters and changes in business and union focuses upon the role, the morality have been published in other places, practice which would increase and the psychology of left activists, and even one of the two 'new essays' especially the left intelligentsia, dur- turned up recently in the Melbourne employment. The authors outline ing the 50 years of Cold War in Aus- Age. The reason for this recycling feasible strategies which show tha t tralia. Riveting concerns, so to speak. seems clear enough . Four chapters work for all is an achievable goal. But there are also studies of Wilfred appeared in Quadrant, which m ost Burchett, the Petrov affair and the leftists I know boast they never read, election of M ay 1954, the self- and never will. (Pri ncipled, cnlight- 'This is an excellent, bold, timely, destruction of Dr Evatt, Pol Pot and en ed lads they arc). Much of the persuasive book for its profoundly the intellectuals, and the Coombe Burchett ma tcrial a ppca red overseas. affair. Manne attempts to block the And so on. important purpose' return of the mythmakcrs, the re- What Manne fears is the opera- Hugh Stretton writers of the rewriting of his tory. tion of the laws of denial, selective Whe th er he succeeds, whether m emory, andpoliticalrccidivism on RRP $24.95 Paperback anyone can succeed in such prophy- the part of Australia's left intelli- laxis, isdiffi culttosay.Butit's worth gentsia. They denied or scrubbed MELBOURNE UNIVERSITY PRESS a try. around the endless atrocities and

42 EUREKA STREET • 0 CTOilER 1994 destruction of human rights of Rus­ only to support the Eastern Europe­ and suffered death by a thousand sian communism, from the tim of an, Russian and Chinese regimes, moral compromises. the Cheka almost until the Wall fell but managed to deny, for so longthe Manne's fo ur important articles down, and then suddenly admitted m anifest moral and political failures from Quadrant probably wouldn't it had all been a terrible mistake. But of those regimes and their endemic have been published elsewhere­ nothing fo llowed from this barbarities. The answers are multi­ such was, and is, the measure of admission-nothing good that is. causal, but as Manne is concentrat­ intolerance in our public dem esne. No remorse, no contrition, very ing upon our left, some illumination And for years Quadrant seemed a little of the self-criticis m the is possible. sole unpopular witness to the mon­ party had always been call- It helps to have been around long strositie going on in the major com ­ ingfor. enough to remember, or to have been munist countries. (Som e other parts told at first hand, of the events which of its agenda gave me the irrits- but M ANNE, I THINK, has a lot of produced the kind of left and leftists w hat's new ?) The author feels angry unfinished business to settle with whom Manne now abhors. The rul­ that not only were he and other bear­ the old left, and feels chea ted of his ing classes-or elites-of the Anglo­ ers of bad tidings regularly reviled prey. So there is a m easure of con­ European West failed their countries and sometimes marginalised, but cealed anger running through this and their peoples three times run­ that, along with this, tragic and book. Perhaps one thing that sticks ning. First, in leading their citizens momentous human events and proc­ in the author's craw is the reappear­ to the mindless slaughter of World esses were ignored or denied. ance in our political life of people War I, then denying that it had been He is right to be angry. It's just who cheered on Uncle Joe, Chair­ a monstrous blunder. Second, in giv­ that his charmed circle have done man Mao and Pol Pot, people who ing us the Great Depression. Third­ the sam e to us, w hen strong enough, called critics of those creatures fas­ ly, they plunged us into a dreadful and would do the same again again. cists, cannibals, CIA running dogs, Second World War by encouraging The fault lies not in the stars, or lily- livered liberals. and appeasing Hitler and Co., in­ Horatio, but in our national charac­ People who, with new flags, slo­ cluding Japan, until the very last ter. • ga ns and uniforms, are practi ing moment. Our conservatives very the same intolerance, the same out­ nearly lost us the West, and showed Max Teichmann is a freelance writ­ ings, censorings and character-assas­ their unfitness to rule; plus their er and reviewer. sinations, the same holier-than-thou fatal attraction toward armed right­ posturings that made so many of the wingers a lot nastier than them­ left anathem a to those who had lis­ selves. They still indulge this taste. tened to the cries and scream s from And yet, by means of the exploi­ T HE within the communist systems, and tation of the Cold War, and the hadn't hardened their h earts; who almost total domination of the Amer­ had li stened to those who had es­ icans, we and just about everyone CATECHISM caped from those nightmare coun­ else fo und ourselves landed with the tries, and didn't call them liars or sam e seedy, compromised, misan­ reactionaries. thropic bunch who had sold out to COMPANION Manne thinks that the people Fascism in Europe, and nearly let who refused to hear tho e cries, w ho them through the gate here. This drowned them with bluster and crowd started up as soon as World abuse, should at least be on a good­ War II ended, with the obvious in­ behaviour bond; should resume the tention of destroying a decent social­ ways and attitudes of Liberal democ­ democratic government-by what­ racy-or else adopt them for the first ever means-and paying back all time. But our contemporary world is critics, left a nd oth erwise, of too tragic and chaotic a place to their past and present con- afford, let alone empower, new waves duct. of great simplifiers, organisers of fresh intellectual and political pro­ I TWAS THE OBVIOUS malevolence of grams. There are no heroes or gurus the right, and its insolent refusal to left standing, no high moral ground, admit fault or to concede any patri­ The Catechism: Highlights and Commentary so far as I am concerned. Only too otism and goodwill to their intended by Brennan Hill and William Madges many skeletons in too many cup­ victims, that kept so many on the Australian edition boards. And this applies to Austral­ left for so long. To leave the field to ia's right as it does to its left . the McCarthyites, Colonel Spry's ISBN 1 86371 382 4 RRP $18.95 One of the important dimensions happy band, and newspapers that missing in Manne's collection is an could have had names like Der =CollinsDove Tel: (03) 895 8195 explanation of how many Western­ Stiirmer, seemed like ratting. But it A Division of HarperCollinsPublishm Fax: (03) 895 8182 ers of apparent good will came not was a mistake. The left lost the plot, A.C .N. 005 677 805 Mall: 22-24 Joseph Street North Blackburn Vic 3130

VOLUME 4 NUMilER 8 • EUREKA STREET 43 Splendid Isolation and that's the my northern, Protestant past? Will I "'""" rr M'CHT " tho "m' fm junior barristers in their firs t court- book we'll talk about. The critics we have to keep off the politics of the room and for the new season's AFL tell m e it's something new for her, a book ? recruits in their fi rst gam e, but when wider canvas with violence and I'd be am azed if we did, and dis­ the Melbourne Writers' Week Com ­ politics on it. An English journal­ appointed. In one printed interview mittee said we are putting you on ist-splendidly called Dorian Wild­ she says- andllike this very much, Edna O'Brien in a Spotlight Inter­ tells us the book shows a gunman as it's what I've been trying to do as an view this year, m y knees went a human being. 'This is perilously acadernic-'Everything political is wobbly. close to saying Adolf Hitler was a also human; everything human is I've always been nervous about statesman, but O'Brien is adamant. also politica l. I wa nted, for the first doing interviews and there's a set of She abhors bloodshed but she under­ time in my books, to gel those two stages I seem always to have to go stands what the IRA is fighting fo r. aspects of people.' through. She sounds h opelessly romantic Anyway, she's a writer, not a First, will I be eaten up? Edna about it, but that's nothing new for politician. The commentators are O'Brien's motto is 'I don't want to be O'Brien .' saying what's new in the new book to war or to tragedy or to laughter a I'm reassured by the fact that is the Troubles in the two Irelands. tourist'.' She tells a critic, who un­ 'hopelessly rom antic' are his words. But she says what's new is men. In doubtedly needs no telling, 'I want But still, how we will get on, both of this, her 18th book, she has been to disturb people. Let's have a bit of us Irish but not living there, and me 'more mindful of and compassion­ disturbance. Who needs nice nea t the wrong sort. For here, I mean. ate towards the masculine sensibil­ books?'. And: 'You say my book is Dinny O'Hearn let me join in his Oz ity'. di sturbing, and I say "Yes ' That's Irishism and we were sentimental That's the third stage of prepar­ the kind of writing I'm interested together over stout and stories of ing for an interview. It's not exactl y in."' Irish heroism and a snap of his Dad. finding common ground, w hich Then there's me and what I think But though as usual the only born sounds a bit like committee wor k, of her writing. What if I don't like it? Irishman in the room , I still had only and I imagine she's no better at that Photo of Should we only interview the people honorary statu as an Irish Austral­ than I am . I like the idea that Donald Graham Little we admire? Or people like ourselves? ian. Winnicott, paediatrician and psycho­ by Bill Thomas O'Brien's latest boo k is House of What will Ms O'Brien think of analyst, had of 'potential space'-

44 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 the trustful space where the mother And maybe one or two she's sorry and the baby, and later two grown about. Will she let me ask about her human beings, meet to learn by childhood, how it shapes her world creating things. Or even if it escapes from it? I don't know if every interviewer Above all, I want to know what it goes through the same thing, turned means that she goes 'demented' when by the charm and the beauty and the she can't be forming sentences. What intelligence of the unmet guest into is language that being a master or a a grump looking for faults and re­ mistress of it can keep a body sa ne? hearsing to be clever. A stage of envy House of Splendid Isolation is and self-doubt. But stage three, where one of those books that warns, as you start to trust yourself and the maybe all best books should, against guest, is all the better for it, perhaps. relying too much on books. Here is There's a French phrase about step­ how it concludes: ping back a pace all the better to go forward. Anyway, it was always a To go in, within, i the blood­ marvellous moment when I was do­ iest journey of all. Inside you get ing interviews for Sp eaking For My­ to know. That the same blood self on SBS when she or he arrived. and the same tears drop from the They'd be so alive, so actually there, enemy as from the self, though you realised you wanted nothing not always in the same propor­ more than to show them off. tion. To go right into the heart of There was a view around that I the hate and the wrong and to sup wasn't as good at interviewing men; from it and to be supped. It does it is true my interviews were about not say that in the books. That is the parts of life supposedly assigned thefutureknowledgc. ThelGlowl­ to women. I remember Captains of edge that is to be. Industry and Captains of Labour seeming, throughout the interview, I've found the French phrase. It either bemused, their eyebrows applies equally to high jumpers, writ­ raised, or shifting in their seat and ers who've lost the plot or the verb, on the point of bursting out, 'What's generals making strategic retreats my childhood got to do with the and all of us at times of personal economy!' Mind you, the last inter­ crisis where we have to take stock view I did was with the guitarist even at the risk of getting depressed. John Williams, who came into the Reculer pour mieux sauter ('To step studio rubbing his bands and saying backward in order to leap forward'). 'Oh I do so enjoy this sort Unfortunately self-examination rr of thing! I is anathema to much of politics because it slows the momentum of .1. HERE'S A PROBLEM THERE that writ­ battle-though just now, in Edna ers present too. Edna O'Brien must O'Brien's Ireland and mine, it's sud­ Please send two free copies of have had her fair share of interview­ denly, apparently, almost in vogue.• Eureka Street to: ers w ho ask about her life because they're too ignorant to have ques­ Graham Little's series of half-hour Narne ...... tions about her work. I would hate to interviews, Speaking For Myself, ran be like them so I start wishing I were on SBS for several years and he re­ Address ...... a professional literary person. I'm fl ects on being an interviewer in the trying to recall what people asked in book of the same name published by those famous Parisian Review inter­ McPhee Gribble. views with writers we read many ...... Postcode ...... years ago, or what Helen Daniel ask­ Talking Point ed Robert Drewe at the last-but-one Writers' Festival. Mynameis ...... But I hope she'll let me ask where The Way Community is some of the things she writes have having a Springtime Gala at Address ...... come from, and why from her in 7pm on Friday, 14 October, in particular, and a little bit about how St Ignatius Hall, Church St, ...... Postcode ...... she does it, the job-of-work aspect, Richmond. All welcome. and about which parts, lines or char­ Tel ...... acters or insights, please her still. Enquiries: (03) 417 4898

VOLUME 4 N UMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 45 THEATRE

GEOFFREY MILNE Wrestling with the angel Recent American drama in Australia

I ""' "coM• eowccumo W

46 EUREKA STREET • OcTOBE R 1994 audience into wishing the peeling'-plus an extraordinary vis­ student to be so thrashed. ion of the thea tre that is his All of this brings us to alone. the latest wunderkind Alas, the of American stage writ­ ing, Tony Kushner, whose Angels in America: a Gay Fantasia on Na­ tional Themes pretty much all of the above. A Sydney Theatre Compa n y produc­ so very tion of frighten­ Angelus ex machina: Angel s ingly in Part Margaret Mills (the I of Angels in angel) and David America (in Tredinnich in the play and per­ Melbourne Th eatre formance alike) Company's production descend into ba­ of Angels in America. thos, repetition and bewilderingly Ph oto: Jeff Busby. obscure sociological cant in Part II, when Prior is sent out into Company production this the world by a wonder­ year, received rave reviews. Th e fully theatrical angel. two-part play is a seven-hour mara­ The ending, which seem s thon that tackles all the big ques­ i s e d to argue both that we can­ tions of American national life. portrayal of the not live our lives without It is an end-of-millennium project one- time McCarthy a proper theoretical perspec­ to bring about reconciliation and con­ sidekick and 1980s power­ tive and that we must con­ cerns, among many other things, the broker). It is revealed that Cohn is tinue to choose life in this ambivalent nature of love, loyalty also dying of AIDS, even though he hell on earth, seem s limply and betrayal, law and justice, poli­ is 'not a hom osexual'. H e is a hetero­ simplistic after so much compelling tics and democracy, theology and sexual who sleeps with m en, -'oth­ evidence to the contrary. belief, many of these being set up as erwise how could I gain this much Still, the best of Part I remains binary opposites. And, in a second­ clout?' America is portrayed, som e of the most thea trically thrill­ ary project, the thematic and stylis­ potently and compellingly, as being ing American writing I have seen on tic history of recent American dra­ in the grip of institutionalised an Australian stage since I first saw ma comes togeth er in Kushner's bril­ disease, corruption and Who'sAfraidofVirginia Woolf? near­ liant, if som etimes wayward, writ­ m adness. ly 30 years ago. ing. Those who prefer a tamer, more In Part I, 30-year-old Prior Walter KUSHNER'S SEEMINGLY DISPARATE civilised vision of the loving Am er­ is dying of AIDS and is deserted by characters are on collision course ican family will find Wendy Wasser­ his guilt-ridden, left-leaning Jewish not only with each other but with a stein's Sisters Rosensweig, replete lover, Louis. He takes up in turn fearsome kind of Judgm ent Day. with its cast of TV actors, in Sydney with a Mormon, Republican-voting His dramatic tools of trade in­ for m ost of October, and in Canberra lawyer, Joe, whose agoraphobic wife, clude, in rollercoaster-ride succes­ Theatre and Perth in November. • Harper, takes exhilarating/frighten­ sion, the gritty realism of Miller, the ing Valium trips (all over the world, go thic vision of Shepard, the pistol­ as it happens) while Joe goes out fire linguistic dexterity of Mamet, 'walking' in the parks of Brooklyn. the outrageous campery and brilliant Geoffrey Milne is head of the Thea­ Joe is in turn being courted-in the wit of Fierstein and the moody sex­ tre and Drama Department in the line of business, that is-to join forces uality of Williams, not to m ention a School of Arts and Media, La Trobe with the evil Roy Cohn (a fictional- complete mastery of Albee's 'layer- University.

V OLUME 4 N UMIJER 8 • EUREKA STREET 47 laughs and titillation. Ms Pfeiffer, T he filmmakers can be acq ui ttcd for example, gets sniffed in all sorts of the homophobia they've been of intimate places. - Ra y Cassin accused of by som e American gay organisations. Scar, the villain, is not gay; it's just that to many Amer­ Reanimation icans an English upper-class drawl (provided by Jeremy Irons) sounds The Lion King dir. Roger Allers and camp. I enjoyed the well-drawn, bril­ Rob M in koff (Vi ll age, th rough liantly voiced hye na gang (wh ich was selected cinemas). As is our wont noLa stereotype of marginaliscd ur­ when road-testing a Disney cartoon, ban black yo uth ), bu t it would have we took along a motley crew ranging been better if, in their quest for some in age fro m kin de r t hrough to baby­ natural-law justifica tion fort he 'born Wolf at the door boomer fogcydo m . Only the baby­ to rule' them e, the dia logue writers boomers were at all worried by the h adn' t committed the scientific film's dubious poli tics. 'You ca n't howler of pl acing hye nas 'at the bot­ Wolf, dir. Mike Nichols (Hoy ts) is a as k for democracy in a fa iry tale,' tom of the foo d chain '. The phrase werewolf movie, and if that seems to admonished the Generation X-er. doesn 't m ean 'last to get a bite of the be stating the obvious it's because in 'You have to see it in Jungian terms,' kill'. It mea ns pl ants. this instance the obvious needs to be scolded the undergraduate. 'It was T he unease I experienced was at stated. Pre-publicity for th e fi lm good,' decreed the primary school the gratuitous reference to Islam as made much of the metaphorical kids. 'Let's go aga in,' pleaded the Scar ra llies hi s troops to take over significance of its man-into-beast kindergartener. the kingdom . It came, strangely story, but despite the guidance of a And there arc many positives: enough, aft er a scene that was un ­ celebrated director (Who's Afraid of the animation is, as with each suc­ doubtedly mea nt to evoke Nurem­ Virginia Woolf!, The Graduate), per­ ceeding Disney project, yet m ore berg, and possibly also prc­ fect casting (Jac k Nicholson-who brilliant than before. Wide-screen Gorbachev Moscow, with armi es else-as the werewolf, Michelle sweeps evoking the Serengeti give a goose-stepping past Scar on a balco­ Pfeiffer as th e beau tiful wom an ny. It then cuts to Scar standing atop whose love just might save him ), Eurel

48 EUREKA STREET • O CTOBER 1994 iscs a covert guerrilla action against (Ruth Cracknell) being given an ous game-playing. The film pulls the cartel of Erncsto Escobedo. An ambulance trip away from a Sydney apart, in relativising fashion, the explosion at a hacienda alerts both hospital to her Coonabarabran home shared assumptions that make up a Ryan and Escobedo's principal ad­ to celebrate her 70th birthday. She culture but it also celebrates them, viser, Felix Cortez (Joaquim de Al­ has angina and a fly phobia. She and that celebratory note is possible meida) to the presence of American hates flies because she found her because Satyricon,like all of Fellini's troops. The former sets about expos­ husband's body covered in them after work, is animated by an '-ism' that is ing the truth while the latter tries to the car accident that starts the film. now out of fashion, humanism. All usc this information to build his In fact, at the start there is a of the master's delight in carnival- own cocaine empire. promise of some depth. Ruth Crack­ The film revolves around the res­ nell is, after all, one of Australia's olution of the plans of these two best actors, and when you are intro­ Valhalla/Kino giveaway characters and, as you'd expect, duced to the intense first scene you Love and Human Remains, star­ Cortez comes a cropper while Ryan think well, it's not exactly Bergman ring Thomas Gibson (right) is the manages to rescue the troops left to but it's not at all bad-and then sud­ latest film from Canadian writer/ fend for themselves in the Colombi­ denly it's as though someone cl1anged director Denys Arcand, whose Je ­ an jungle before presenting the US channels to Hey Hey It's Saturday. sus of Montreal won the Palme Senate with his damaging revela­ Suffice it to say that the rest of the­ d'Or at Cannes in 1989. Eureka tions. for want of a better word-plot is Street has 10 double passes to see The plot is complex and at times something like Harold eJ Maude Love and Human Remains at Mel­ confused-you get the feeling to­ meets Alvin Purple, in which the bourne's Valhalla and Kino cine­ wards the end of the film that the grace, dignity and beauty of Ruth mas, for the firs t 10 people to write writer suddenly realised things had Cracknell are very badly served. to: 'Valhalla/Kino ticket offer', PO to be resolved, and the easiest way to -Juliette Hughes Box 553 Richmond 3121 do this was to focus on the plight of the abandoned Gis. The storyline show humanity is on display in this demands so much of your attention Come all ye satyrs film, which marks a shift away from that the performances almost slip by the realist mode of early work such unnoticed, save for Ford, in the sort Fellini Satyricon, dir Federico Fell­ as La Strada towards the fantasising of role he probably plays in his sleep ini (independent cinemas). 'No one of his later films. Satyricon, made in by now, and James Earl Jones as his paints pictures like this any more,' mid-career, is to Fellini's opus what ailing boss and mentor, Admiral laments the failed poet as he guides The Tempest, Shakespeare's last Greer. the young student around a museum play, is sometimes said to be in the In Clear and Present Danger filled with cracked Grreco-Roman bard's work: an encapsulation of all Clancy has applied the Monroe doc­ murals. Watching this scene in his art. But enough about classics­ trine to an age where the threat from Fellini's screen adaptation of the 1st just go and see it. -Ray Cassin the south is cocaine, not commu­ century Latin novel by Petronius, nism. While Cuba and Haiti continue one chuckles at the director's joke­ to give the Clinton administration it is a modern museum into which unlimited headaches at least Jack these characters from classical liter­ Ryan can still get his man. ature have strolled-and then realis­ -Jon Greenaway es that the joke has got even better since the film's first release in 1969. T he new print that is now work­ ? Tangled web ing its way round Australia's art­ house cinemas is more than just a e Spider and Rose, dir. Bill Bennett welcome revival of a cinema classic. Looking for a (independent cinemas). When a new It is a chance to witness a witty Australian film comes out, I really debunking of the very notion of a Challenge? try to give it a fair go, so I didn't walk classic, so the fact the film is itself If you are a single, Catholic out before the end of Spider and now a classic only adds to the fun. woman aged 21 - 40 years, Rose. Perhaps I should have, because This sort of debunking, of course, you could combine pursuit of it descended deeper and deeper into has become an academic industry your career with consecration the pit it had dug itself. It is ostensi­ since 1969, as wave after wave of to God as a member of a bly a road movie, but it never settles Althusserian Marxists, and sundry Franciscan Secular Institute. on whether it wants to be a road deconstructionists and poststructur­ Enquiries welcome! movie sensitive to the problems of alists, have overrun departments of VOCATION DIRECTRESS ageing, or a road movie completely film studies everywhere. Fellini was S.I.M. blind and deaf (but unfortunately playing the deconstructionist game not dumb) to any sensitivity at all. long before the term was coined, but P.O. Box 356 The story is that of a woman there is much more here than tedi- Doveton Vic. 3177

VOLUME 4 NUMBER 8 • EUREKA STREET 49 Two-faced criiTie show

M uch of the pmi'e l•vi,hed on of what makes Janus compelling: it's Good versus Evil, the ABC's Janus in the first few weeks the best plot in the world, but it's also not as simple as of its run concerned its producers' pre­ that. occupation with authenticity. The Age The episodic subplots add variety and density to the Green Guide (1/9/94) reported breath- central narrative, as does the focus so far on the assorted lessly that production designer Sally Shepherd went all losers hovering round the edges of the family (a besotted the way down to Altona (where from, the ABC studios and newly pregnant girlfriend; a broken-down heroin-ad­ in Elsternwick? Right across town, fancy that) to find a dicted 'mate'), rather than on the family itself. The screen­ real prison truck. play is a gift to the actors, who rise to the occasion; the Now I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm not undervalued Tracy Mann is making the most of her lim­ all that interested in seeing a real prison truck. I am, on ited role, and the vulnerably thinning hair and soft wor­ the other hand, very interested in dramatic representa­ ried face and manner of Jeremy Kewley work beautifully tions: of legal systems and processes; of humanity, in the against one's stereotyped expectations of what a Crown dock or on the bench, wrestling with its own rituals; of Prosecutor is supposed to be like. the way that language tries, and honourably fails, to re­ The camerawork is varied and inventive; the use of construct wordless episodes of violence and cruelty. If the black and white to signal episodes of private memory is a show's documentary approach to facts doesn't enhance simple idea working surprisingly well, not least because this subject matter, then neither, on the other hand, does we-most of the people watching Janus, anyway-uncon­ it get in the way. sciously associate black-and-white, the news and doco But what is it about the police and the judiciary- The medium of our childhoods, with realism, authenticity, Law-that makes film and TV critics wheel in the criteria the genuine. It's also a highly effective and efficient way of authenticity when talking about aesthetic value? Why round the old stage/screenwriting problem of conveying are so many TV critics saying Janus is fabulous because inner visions and voices, in a medium where you can't it follows police and court proceedings accurately? If it use the fiction-writer's device of internal monologue. were a documentary, then that would be an appropriate­ Most significantly, though, the black-and-white indeed a crucial-criterion. But it's supposed to be fiction. sequences show the viewer what really happened-which Isn't it? And if it isn't, then what is it supposed to be? is, after all, the thing the court always wants to know, One story (Green Guide, same article) highlights the and never fully can. When a character in court has one of sort of problem created when authenticity and aesthetics these flashbacks to the episode being discussed, what's come into opposition. Former chief stipendiary magistrate always emphasised is the difference between the publicly John 'Darcy' Dugan, billed in the credits as a special con­ said and the privately seen, a gap exemplified most pure­ sultant, was asked his advice about whether a policeman ly by the failure of language ever to convey the real na­ would stand in a particular place in court; it would 'help ture of violence. Even when the witness is trying hard to the composition of the shot'. Dugan's response? 'Sorry.' tell the truth, sometimes events as visually remembered Whether they went in the end for composition or for doco­ are just not verbally representable. The black-and-white realism isn't m ade clear, but the story seemed to indicate flashback technique demonstrates this unbridgeable dis­ that in such matters, Dugan's word is law. tance between events themselves and later attempts to The 26 episodes cover a year of legal procedures reconstruct them; one of the spookier things Janu s is tell­ against a 'dirt-bag family', the Hennessey clan, perpetra­ ing us, in fact, is that in aiming to get at the whole truth tors of numerous crimes. Janu s is tapping some very strong and nothing but the truth, courtroom procedure and prac­ and very odd national attitudes to legal and/or uniformed tice is always already a failure. · authority- courtesy, probably, of such hot spots in the Meanwhile, TV's moment of the month was the sight nation's collective unconscious as the convict past, the on SBS's Australian Biography of the great Dr H. C. 'Nug­ Kelly gang and the Eureka Stockade. For the Hennesseys get' Coombs with his eyes fnll of tears as he discussed may indeed be dirtbags, but to one's horror one occasion­ the failure thus far of white Australians to accept black ally finds oneself barracking for them. Their emotional Australians on their own terms and to work out a way of power over other, nicer, weaker human beings demon­ living harmoniously with racial and cultural difference, strates their ratbag family charisma, as peripheral char­ describing this failure as the greatest disappointment of acters are sucked into or centrifugally spun out of the his life. A week later, as though to corroborate, Nine won whirling Hennessey narrative. Shirl the battleaxe matri­ this month's Arthur Tunstall Race Relations Trophy: arch (like Ma Kelly) is someone whom we are clearly ex­ 'Coming up on A Current Affair, the man who built his pected to regard as a right old character, to be cheered dream home on a sacred site ... He never dreamed he'd with whenever she scores a point off some policeperson have to share his back yard with the local tribe.' or legal eagle. At least two of the Hennessey boys are I bet the 'local tribe' wasn't all that thrilled, either. undeniably cute; and the word 'larrikin' lurks near the Who writes this stuff? • surface of their characterisation, uncomfortably close to the word 'psychotic'. Such appeal, however bent, is part Kerryn Goldsworthy is a Melbourne writer and teacher.

50 EUREKA STREET • O cTOBER 1994 Eureka Street Cryptic Crossword no. 27, October 1994

Devised by Joan Nowotny IBVM

ACROSS '•I. 1 Win the lot or clean up for the aquatic races. (5,3,4) 8 Duty list includes nothing for the bird. (7) 9 Feast again or go back to secluded spot. (7) 11 'Am I dust, designed for the arena?' the gladiator asked apprehensively. (7) 12 At the beginning of March and at Easter, some receive a Commission. (7) 13 Turnip for a European native? (5) 14 Shopkeeper giving directions to a sales representative possibly. (9) 16 Numbers of them may be in conclave. (9) 19 Plant on the southern border of the marsh. (5) 21 One may drive an armoured division into the country. (7) 23 It's sad to fail badly with silly fib told to the sheriff's officer. (7) 24 Sensitive to the sun, rove about aimlessly, fearing a kind of breakdown. (7) 25 Perhaps I am in Laos or some other country. (7) 26 Unfortunately, dogma ruins reason- without a son to provide a possible yardstick. (9,3) Solution to Crossword no.26, September 1994 DOWN 1 Rot rises in herb container that could be kept in the warehouse. (7) 2 Interweave it among the compass points. (7) 3 Foolishly I pay Roman arsonist's disease costs. (9) 4 Her ma may be in the Sultan's enclosure! (5) 5 Favourite international body makes first-class bloomer. (7) 6 Subdue m e, perhaps, 0 weaver of dream s. (7) 7 Representative sample annoyed religious group in accepting nothing. (5 -7) 10 The stage for conflict? (7,2,3) 15 Lave graduates in suitable container. (9) 17 An about-turn is always in the second half of the course. (7) 18 Sin, or do otherwise, but not outside. (7) 19 Will h e object with me confined within the extre m es of summer glistening light? (7) 20 Doctor lied about Left . He n eeds to be exercised in discipline. (7) 22 An ea rly one catches the sun, perchance, on the vertical pipe? (5)

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A Place in the City is Edmund Campion's most personal book to date. As a young priest, Campion was stationed at StMary's Cathedral in Sydney, where he occupied a lowly place at the cardinal's table. The fare was 'meat and potatoes washed down with lemonade'. But Campion drew life from the smorgasbord of characters, both famous and unknown, who passed through the cathedral and the city. His stories make a book even more vibrant than either Rockchoppers or Australian Catholics.

Eureka Street has half a dozen copies of A Place in the City to give away to anybody who can tell us whose statue they would most like to see inside or outside their local cathedral. Mark your entry 'Eureka Street/ Penguin October Book Offer. 1

Last month we asked for suggestions of faces to include on the cover of the Cambridge Biographical Encyclopedia. Christine Coo from Leederville, WA suggested Mrs Bandaranaike of Sri Lanka, the world's first woman Prime Minister; John Upton of Eastwood, NSW suggested Captain Cook; and Julie Willis, East Brunswick, VIC suggested Agatha Christie. Congratulations to our winners.

Uniya and EUAI:-KA SJAI:-ET Present two special days of ideas and stories 2020 Vision: Present Ideas For The Future Saturday October 22, StMary's College, University of Melbourne Tim Costello, Moira Rayner, Shane Maloney, Judy Brett, Graham Little, Paul Collins MSC Philip Kennedy OP, Peter Norden SJ, Chris McConville, Mary Keneally, Rosemary Crumlin and others will talk about 'Justice in 2020,' 'Faith and Meaning in 2020', 'My Suburb in 2020', and 'The Nation in 2020'.

Cost: $15 ($10 concession) Venue: West Hall, StMary's College (off Tin Alley) Melbourne University Time: 9.30am (registration 9.00am), finishing at 4.30pm. Enquiries: Michael McGirr SJ (03) 427 7311 The day is jointly sponsored by The Australian Centre at The University ofMelbourne. Australian Politics: Catholic Perspectives Saturday October 29, Aquinas Academy, Sydney Paul Smyth, Edmund Campion, Race Matthews, James Macken, David Pollard, Chris Sidoti, Anne O'Brien and Ray Cassin will look at the contribution of Catholics to Australian Politics. What has been the legacy? What should we be taking into the future? Cost: $20 ($1 0 concession) Venue: Aquinas Academy, 141 Harrington Street, Sydney Time: 9am (registration 8.30am), finishing at 4pm Enquiries: Paul Smyth (02) 356 3888