A few of my favourite books by First Nations writers!
This week has been NAIDOC Week in Australia - a week to celebrate and amplify the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. It’s something I have started to really look forward to over the last few years. As someone who spent over a decade away from Australia, the small changes are very noticeable to me. When we were catching a connecting flight on our way home from the UK a few weeks ago, the Qantas boarding gate in Perth had “Naarm, Wurundjeri Country” as the destination as well as Melbourne, which made me quite emotional and proud to see. I’m not suggesting for a moment that there isn’t far, far more progress still to be made but I have noticed many changes in the time I was gone, particularly more acknowledgements of Country, which makes me feel hopeful that things are moving in the right direction.
You won’t be surprised to hear that I like to mark NAIDOC Week with literature! I have many favourite books by First Nations authors, as pictured above, so I always make a point of rereading some in NAIDOC Week, and discovering some new ones. Anita Heiss, one of my favourite writers, has an excellent recommendation list on her blog and my personal recommendation is Anita’s book Am I Black Enough For You? which I think is essential reading for all Australians. It’s not only funny, wise and insightful, it makes you challenge and think deeply about your own assumptions about what it means to be Aboriginal in Australia today. She has just released a tenth anniversary edition of the book too which my friend Kim has just reviewed on her blog (side note: Kim is an excellent reviewer and I have bought so many books because of her reviews!). But in short, if you have not yet discovered Anita Heiss and her brilliant books, I am envious! I’ve been a fan for about 20 years, since she was a guest lecturer in one of my undergraduate units. Fabulous then, fabulous now! I’m so excited to see what she writes next.
I was also excited to see that Clothing the Gap have an Ally Friendly section - as someone who wants to be a good ally, I often wondered if it was appropriate for me to wear clothing like this and most certainly didn’t want to cause offence if it wasn’t. I’m grateful to Blak businesses like Clothing the Gap who make it easy for us to show our support. In their words: “when we see Aboriginal designs in the world, it means we’re not invisible in the landscape. It makes us feel seen and heard.” I’m looking forward to wearing an Always Was, Always Will Be shirt and hope it’s a starting point for some important conversations.
Favourite experience/s of the week
Apart from seeing all the NAIDOC Week activities? And Boris Johnson’s resignation?!
Starting a business with my husband, which we’ve been talking about for years.
Reading
To mark NAIDOC Week I started another read of Larissa Behrendt’s novel After Story, one of my favourite books of 2021. Beautifully written, with so many wise and insightful observations about life, loss, trauma, connection and family, I think it’s just fabulous.
Sydney Review of Books: Re-Mystification: Adele Dumont on the Writer Laid Bare by Lee Kofman. Such a great article about a book I have been savouring slowly and enjoying very much. Dumont writes: “One of the things I love most about Kofman’s writing is her suspicion of fashions. She questions popular writing maxims, such as ‘show don’t tell’, and is critical of students’ over-use of dialogue, which she attributes to the influence of film. She believes social media is damaging our brains: ‘when not petty or nasty then nice, saccharine, friendly and chit-chatty daylight of our online interactions encroaches on the silent, dark spaces within us’.” OH GOD YES. I have so much I want to say about this. On Sunday it will be six months since I last used Instagram or Twitter. Six months. I have so much to say, mostly about how I feel I have my life back. It’s extraordinary.
Also from SRB - Snail Trails: Jessica White on Gentle and Fierce by Vanessa Berry - two writers I love! I also attended a writing workshop with Jessica White a few weeks ago which was so refreshing and fun. It got me thinking about nature and sensory detail in my writing, and being more conscious of which of the senses I automatically tune into when I write (sight and taste, interestingly).
Eating
Dave Grohl’s bad-ass lasagna got made and eaten for three dinners - I screwed up the homemade pasta dough so it was a bit chewy, but I didn’t mind! There’s no such a thing as a bad lasagna, am I right?
Chilli non carne from Linda McCartney’s Family Kitchen cookbook that I picked up in the UK - delicious!
But everything pretty much had lentils and beans in it this week…if you are a vegan or vegetarian, you’ll understand what I’m saying here.
Nigella’s vegan gingerbread is still going strong, by some miracle (though we are down to the last few pieces now). It has only got stickier and more delectable with the passing days. A friend came round for a chat this afternoon and I served her a slice. The look on her face after she took a bite was of utter bliss. “This is so good it’s almost sexual,” she said. I wholeheartedly concur.
This is the film poster I remember being everywhere when I was a child! [source]
Watching
Parks and Recreation (Netflix) - enough said. The perfect comfort watch. Ben reminds me so much of Tom! And apparently, I have Leslie’s sweetness, quirkiness and ambition but not (too much of) her scary intensity, haha!
Strictly Ballroom (Blu-Ray) - OMG, where do I start with this film? My friend Nigel Marsh has a wonderful podcast called The Five of My Life and one of the five things he asks his interviewees about is a film that has profoundly affected them. Nigel, if you ever interview me (sorry for the spoiler!), this is the film I’d pick.
I have seen this film so many times but on this viewing on Saturday night (of the Blu-Ray Tom surprised me with for my birthday), I sobbed in a way I’ve never done on a previous watch. Perhaps I just needed a good cry, I don’t know. But for a film that is 30 years old next month, it has lost none of its emotional punch. I still think it is so powerful, moving and relevant. Some critics may deride its simplistic, predictable story and Baz Luhrmann’s style of filmmaking, but Strictly Ballroom (his first) is a masterpiece.
I may write more about it to commemorate its 30th anniversary, but in short, Strictly Ballroom is a beautifully-realised film about wanting to express yourself and follow your creativity, rather than get lost in the world of external validation, awards and “shoulds”. “A life lived in fear is a life half lived,” Fran tells Scott and that is the thread that runs through the entire story, as it slowly becomes obvious that so many of the characters are ruled by fear and how diminished they are as a result.
I saw this film when it was released in the cinema in 1992, age 11, and I just loved the costumes and the romance of it all - the deeper messages were possibly lost on me. Only when I rewatched it in my early twenties did I realise that my own life was entirely governed by fear. All my decisions had been made from that place. Like so many characters in Strictly Ballroom, I was so afraid to be myself and take chances. I can’t tell you what an influence this film has had on my life, albeit probably subconsciously, in giving me the courage to go after things I really wanted and, instead of half-living, to start creating the life I really wanted to live.
The story of how Baz Luhrmann struggled to get the film made in the first place (go to the Production History section) is also very inspiring.
Quote of the week
This is a poem from Ellen Van Neerven’s marvellous collection Throat, one of my favourite books of 2020. The image is from Jonathan Shaw’s excellent blog. Jonathan wrote a wonderful review of Throat and analysis of this particular poem which I highly recommend checking out.
If you’d like to share your thoughts on this post with me, please do! Stay tuned for another exciting weekly update soon xx