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Complete dagg John 'Nobby' Clarke (1948-2017) claimed a PhD in Cattle and held important positions with Harrods, Selfridges and Easibind; was sacked by ABC Radio and worked for various defunct newspapers; he enjoyed such recreations as reading theological works and dog trials. His address was care of the people next door. (Or just pop it inside the door of fuse box for Friday collection.) He really was the complete dagg. Chapters include: Australia - A User's Guide; Celebrity Interviews - luminaries include the late Bob Hawke, Prince Charles and Meryl Streep; Farnarkeling; The Resolution of Conflict; Golf (extensively covered...) This Week On ABC Television; Australiaform; Australia And How To Repair It (with a section on Troubleshooting); Very Worrying Developments. -
Journalists are an irreverent breed who must find humour in any event in order to stay sane. Here is a fabulously varied collection of stories from Frank and Kerry packer, Rupert Murdoch, Ita Buttrose, Ron Saw and many others on the world where truth is often stranger than fiction...When screen goddess Ava Gardner was in Melbourne for the filming of On The Beach (1959) a young reporter was told to get Miss Gardner's opinions of Melbourne, her latest romance, the film, etc. No interviews were being given by anyone and all the reporter could garner was a few scraps of information about the stars and the filming locations. So he concocted a story, the last paragraph being an alleged quote from Miss Gardner via a rumour at third hand from a usually reliable source: "On The Beach is a story about the end of the world and Melbourne sure is the right place to make it." The reporter fully expected that the editor would cut it, realising it was a practical joke. The 'quote' went viral world-wide and was included by by writers whenever mentioning Melbourne (or even Australia) for the next twenty years. In 1980 Miss Gardner was asked about the now-hackneyed quote. She said she couldn't remember saying it, but it was funny and she'd be happy to take the credit for it. The reporter - in 1982 - issued a formal confession and apology to Miss Gardner. -
Barcs, a correspondent for a firm of Hungarian newspapers, had just been expelled from Mussolini's Italy in 1938 when he decided to come to Australia. He arrived with his wife and eight letters from various European newspapers expressing mild interest in Australian life. These sources of income disappeared as war engulfed Europe, and Barcs was on his own. He immediately began contributing to the Sydney Daily Telegraph and was accepted as a member of the Australian Journalists' Association. He was an unusual figure in Australian journalism at that time for his university education, extensive background as a foreign correspondent and ability to speak five languages. He worked as a freelance journalist for Australian and overseas newspapers. Interned as an enemy alien in late 1941, he was called up for full-time duty in the Citizen Military Forces on 27 July, he served with the 3rd Employment Company and was asked to join the inaugural committee of the Association of Refugees (Association of New Citizens). Barcs was naturalised in 1946. It seemed that he certainly became naturalised in Australian humour: the sections of these memoirs are entitled: Nobody Owes You A Living; His Majesty's Most Loyal Internee and The Backyard of Mars. He died in 1990. -
The zestful, indefatigable and irrepressible Frank Clune investigates great cities and small villages, as well as an Old Master or two and chats to a young mechanic - and that contributes to the diversity of his presentation of historical backgrounds and the contemporary feel of the countries he visits - or as he calls it, Random Rambles in Paris, Eire, Iceland, Vienna and Belgium. Illustrated with black and white photographs. -
Mitchell, a former English resident of New Zealand, has written the funniest, frankest and most provocative book about New Zealand, its people, its institutions - in fact, the New Zealand way of life. His shafts, often barbed, a aimed freely at people and institutions but he is well-disposed to New Zealand and New Zealanders and perhaps the natural progression of events is that on his return to England, Mitchell became a Member for Parliament for Great Grimsby, 1977-2015. -
This biographical volume covers the lives great stage actors of the period 1740 - 1914 in six critical yet easy-to-read essays: David Garrick; John Kemble; Edmund Kean; W.C. Macready; Sir Henry Irving and Sir Johnston Forbes-Robertson. The author did not attempt to solve the question of what makes a great actor, but instead offers six kinds of greatness. A book for anyone interested in the magic, glamour and history of the stage. Illustrated with black and white sketches and photographs. -
The story of a nation: on the 1st day of the 20th century, the Commonwealth of Australia came into being. Drawing on sources as diverse as Alfred Deakin's notebooks, Nettie Palmer's letters and the diary of a bank clerk named George M'Clure, Souter describes the birth of such Commonwealth institutions and symbols as parliament, the high court, the army and navy, the flag, income tax, the coat of arms and Canberra. There are lively narrative portraits of the young Commonwealth's great public figures: Barton, Reid, O'Malley, Griffith, Isaacs, Fisher, Hughes, Mannix and Monash - as well as Tom Thick, a telegram boy in western Victoria; Ida Dawson, a governess at a homestead near Collarenebri; Shaw Neilson, a Wimmera bush worker and poet; and Snowy Howe, a young pearler who went from Broome to Gallipoli.There is a wide panorama from the South African Veldt to the Somme for the first Empire Day in 1905 to the slaughter of Gallipoli, from leisurely Edwardian cruises 'home' to Ross Smith's extraordinary London-Melbourne flight in 1919. This is the initiation of Australia. -
The story of the greatest exploratory expedition ever performed in Man's history. It started in Melbourne; a convoy of sixteen men, twenty-four camels, innumerable pack-horses and a number of wagons carrying 20 tons of supplies. It ended with two exhausted, near-starving men, the leader and his second in command, deep in an impenetrable mangrove swamp on the edge of the Gulf of Carpentaria. Then began the long return trek, through swamp and desert, tormented by thirst and near starvation that reduced them to eating snakes and rats. Illustrated with sketches and photographs.. -
From the moment of his accession to the close of his life, King George VI (b. 1895; reigned 1936 - 1952) was faced with a series of major emergencies - the aftermath of the abdication, the Czechoslovak crisis, the six searing years of war, followed by the grim austerity and grave problems of the post-war reconstruction period. In all these vital events the King played his own considerable part with an outstanding devotion to duty, sparing himself nothing and eventually succumbing to the strain of the burden of his office.Almost 900 pages of detailed research including genealogical charts and black and white photographs.
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