Writing

The Writer

For those who do not feel the need to make sense of the world, it serves them well. For others, the poets, writers, artists, they tell their stories in an attempt to make sense of the world they live in, if only for themselves. This, in small part, explains how art is born.

Nepal (post 2015 earthquake)

The first thing that springs to mind when one sees devastation like this is how hopeless the task of rebuilding appears to be. It’s not just the homes and the temples, it’s the lives, particularly in light of the knowledge that there is no one to help.

Thoreau was right

Am I happy? It doesn’t matter, it’s not relevant, I accept my fate. Thoreau was right, the mass of men really do lead lives of quiet desperation

The longer read

What was meant to be an evening of conviviality amongst friends and acquaintances amidst the deep furnishings, large squashy cushions, paintings and dark woollen wall hangings from Turkey in the living room lined by book shelves containing manuscripts and novels

Road Trip (Part 1) 2006

There is not much to recommend Ballarat. It’s flat and it’s flatulent. Its people walk slowly along grey bleached streets with grey gold smiles on orange wrinkled faces. To drive through it, to the other side, is to celebrate restrained liberty.

The Brain Tumour Diaries

For most of us, dare I say all of us, our lives are filled with the mundane. I’m sorry to break it to you this way, it may come as a shock. With the profound on the other hand, where an insight of emotional depth and intensity is revealed, we often, as individuals, as a society, flit past it, shaking our heads in wonder.

Kat

It commanded my attention searing its way through my chest, its steady rhythm building to an ominous crescendo, the reverberation ricocheting between my ears as it clutched my throat in a vice like grip.

A tribute to Clive James

In the words of Robert Johnson, the great 1930’s blues man, I went ugly early with Clive James. I probably should have started with Unreliable Memoirs, and worked my way through the literary gears.

Collision (Chapter One)

The road from Hamilton to Melbourne has nothing to recommend it. Most of the time it’s the heat. It seeps and the wind, dry, ruins thoughts. It glints out over horizons, like a youngster peering through his neighbour’s window, but with sinister intent…

Road Trip (Part 2) 2006

Caravan Parks. Classes don’t so much merge, as congregate there. Images of atmospheric smoke induced fellowship. Joy in green cans and littered superlatives. Smirks between crooked weathered tram lines suggesting paradise is at my doorstep.