Category Archive: AUSTRALIANIA
Villers-Bretonneux re-taken: a century ago
Gouache by A. Forestier
24, 25 April, 1918 A bloody, senseless slaughter, with superior tank support, had left the town occupied by a German Spring Offensive. Foch and Rawlinson ordered the town to be re-taken. This meant a night attack (zero hour, 10 pm) against fortified enemy positions, including machine guns. The Australian 13th and 15th Brigades struck, using bayonets like stilettos, the so-called ‘peaceful penetrations,’ and despite being well-outnumbered and incurring heavy losses, took Villers-Bretonneux. It was a charnel house, but the objective was achieved, within the ambit of Clausewitz’s dictum to ensure that the gain should always outweigh its cost. The allied forces…
Continue Reading →Should I Leave Again?
Glenelg vs Eagles @ Woodville Oval, 22/4/18 Having fled the country after an insipid Good Friday performance against those perennial strugglers South*, naturally the Bays fired-up and started having a real go in my absence. After falling three points short against last years’ Grand Finallist Port, Glenelg then whipped Norwood by 5 odd goals, a patchy but impressive effort according to The Varnished Culture‘s mail. However, seeing Norwood flogged by North on TV on Saturday put that win into context. Thus with trepidation did we contemplate another trip to play that toxic hybrid, the Woodville-West-Torrens Eagles. Having matched the hosts…
Continue Reading →Off Their Feed
Glenelg v South Adelaide, Good Friday, 2018 – At Noarlunga Oval, the re-jigged Tigers, under new coach Mark Stone, took on South. We were hoping to be able to adapt the headstone to the unfortunate Hannah Twynnoy, mauled to death in Malmesbury in 1703: “In bloom of life South’s snatched from hence, They had not room To make defence; For Tyger fierce Took life away. Here panthers lie In a bed of clay Until the Resurrection Day.” ———————————– Unfortunately, the Tigers looked inept and listless and were out of the game by halfway through the third quarter. South took the…
Continue Reading →Knifing the Dark With Deadly Photographs
Kenneth Slessor (27 March 1901 to 30 June 1971) – He helped Australian poetry transcend its traditional town-and-country ballads and move into the 20th century. See how this distant memory, from Country Towns, perhaps a fragment of time from his birthplace of Orange, New South Wales, compares with, say, A. B. Paterson: “Verandas baked with musky sleep, Mulberry faces dozing deep, And dogs that lick the sunlight up Like paste of gold – or, roused in vain By far, mysterious buggy-wheels, Lower their ears, and drowse again….” Judith Wright wrote – “…the note of hollowness and hopelessness in Slessor’s work is inescapable…in…
Continue Reading →ADEL-AID
16 March, 2018 at “Jade”, Adelaide Fringe Raw, but we ate it up. This performance was one of those closest to the spirit of the Fringe, where non or semi-professionals can test their abilities, and material, in front of an Adelaide crowd, a crowd that is no pushover, albeit less querulous than Milan and less violent than Edinburgh. Co-producers Simon Coad and Adrian Nippress, in collaboration with Simon Goodes, created the gruesome conceit of a mock ‘Telethon,’ with all the forced striving to entertain and chaotic variety which that entails, and whilst The Varnished Culture had reservations (of which more…
Continue Reading →