Time out for research and relaxation - and the ideal holiday

Everyone needs a break from the daily grind, especially when that grind includes a constant state of dismay and indignation at the never-ending manoeuvrings, manipulations, hypocrisy and prejudice of our liberal society's dominant political class. It was time for me to head for my favourite holiday place: Burleigh Heads on Queensland's Gold Coast.

Naturally a satisfactory holiday for me must include a stack of reading. I took one work of fiction, Evelyn Waugh's The Loved Ones. I came late to Waugh's work, drawn in by the Granada television production of Brideshead Revisited which I saw for the first time a couple of years ago on the Ovation channel. This production is in my view the best ever television drama series. It prompted me to read the book which now takes its place in my top five novels. In fact, I have since become a great admirer of Waugh's work both in terms of story and style. I am now very conscious of Waugh's style while attending to my own fiction writing. The extensive revisions of my two novels, The Castle of Heavenly Bliss and In This Vale of Tears, could be called the "Waugh revisions".I did not take any other fiction works, thinking that I would probably succumb to the temptation to wander around the many second-hand bookshops on the coast.

It was also time for me to undertake some overdue research for my childhood memoir (Me and Pete: Recalling a Fifties Childhood). I took Donald Horne's The Education of Young Donald, the first title in a trilogy of autobiographies. I am not on the same political and philosophical team as Horne, but found this first well-written title fascinating when I first read it a year ago, mainly because his childhood was so different from mine - different in terms of attitudes and activities. I wanted to re-read it as a contrast with my proposed memoir.

I also took The 1950s by Stella Lees and June Senyard which I borrowed from La Trobe University library. This book is choc-full of historical information and reference but, as I discovered, appallingly biased culturally and politically. The authors' ideological framework is simply assumed in the background, never argued or defended. Naturally, conservative Sir Robert Menzies, Australia's longest serving and most successful Prime Minister, could do no good, his attitudes and views mocked and ridiculed at every opportunity, and his motives painted as base and self-serving. It's just the sort of book that would thrill the staff at The Age. Opinions editor, Roslyn Guy, would probably get dopey Tracee Hutchison to review it if it were published today.

Thus armed I had beautiful days of reading, note-taking, cups of coffee and walking up and down Burleigh Heads beach. To round off an ideal set of circumstances I succumbed, as I knew I would after finishing The Loved Ones and The Education of Young Donald, to visiting the second-hand bookshops. I found some gems.

I paid a pittance for Dickens of London by Wolf Mankowitz, which I got through in a couple of days. My appetite for biographies on Dickens is insatiable. Then at a terrific second-hand bookshop at Carrara markets I found Evelyn Waugh: Portrait of a Country Neighbour by biographer Frances Donaldson (which I read), Larger than Life: The Story of Eric Baume by Arthur Manning (to be read), and The Wit of Sir Robert Menzies compiled by Ray Robinson. I was overjoyed to find this last. Menzies was famous for his wit in dealing with hecklers. I skimmed through the book saving it for later when I was writing the memoir. Just an example:

A heckler at noisy meeting consisting largely of coal miners shouted at Menzies: "Tell us all you know Bob - it won't take long." Menzies: "I'll tell you everything we both know. It won't take any longer."

Menzies' wit was quick, sharp and amusing - nothing like the nasty abuse Labor Prime Minister Paul Keating cultivated to the delight of his many admirers of a similar mentality. Political and social commentator Eric Baume, by the way, would be known to anyone in Australia who lived through the fifties and sixties. I also happened on What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to whist - the facts of Daily Life in 19th-Century England by Daniel Pool ($3.00). A great read, one that you can dabble in continually to get you up to speed on the social and cultural background of the 19th century English novel. It is a good companion to The Jane Austen Handbook: A Sensible Yet Elegant Guide to Her World by Margaret Sullivan, which I already had.

There was a pile of other books for my library and later reading including a hefty well-received biography, Jane Austen by David Noakes ($9.00). Finally, I picked up a tattered Penguin edition of The Sword of Honour Trilogy by Evelyn Waugh for the absurd price of fifty cents. This I started on at once (for the second time), finishing Men at Arms and getting half way through Officers and Gentlemen before the holiday came to an end. The three novels that form The Sword of Honour Trilogy (Men at Arms, Officers and Gentlemen, and Unconditional Surrender) are considered by many critics to be Waugh at the peak of his powers. Well-known literary critic, Cyril Connolly said: "unquestionably the finest novels to come out the War (WWII)." As great as these novels are, I place Brideshead Revisited at the top of Waugh's achievement.

During this time, the usual youth violence, child abuse, political nastiness, gangster glorification, bigotry etc etc went on unabated under the supervision of the dominant political class who hold government captive at all levels, state and federal. It will be interesting to see how that class deals with the recent lies and thuggery of two of its members. Well, I suppose they can afford to burn a few of their devotees while they hold their hands over their compassionate and tolerant breasts.

My ideal holiday is at an end.

comments: gerardwilson01@optusnet.com.au