[Brisbane, 6/20/24] Two weeks ago, I joked, “So fine, I’ve booked a wrong flight. Lots of biryani and samosas for the next three weeks then.” Seeing so many Indians at the departure gate in Saigon prompted that. After 8 1/2 hours, I did land in Australia, of course, but now, I’ve done it. Buying a ticket back, I got the date wrong, so am trying to fix my costly mistake. Confusion, blunders and possible accidents keep many folks at home.
To make a sharper distinction between Lawson and Paterson, I just added this paragraph to the essay:
As poets, they used conventional forms, but Lawson’s diction is much more natural. Unlike Paterson, Lawson didn’t poeticize his landscape or people, so there are no “fairest maids,” “city urchin,” “fields of youth,” “carol of the magpie,” “smiling plain” or “swain.” Instead, we get “a stealer and duffer of cattle,” “treacherous blacks in the darkness crept,” “men whose childhood knew the brothels and the slums” and “the spiritless dingo in tow of my heels.” Lawson’s people die of disease, rum and sorrow. His women plough, grub, mend fences, milk cows, drive nags, sew, wash and sometimes sing to themselves until they drop dead.
Your past few articles about SE Queensland have made enjoyable, and educational, reading. There's been a subtle change of tone between the way you describe the eastern USA or eastern Asia and how you've experienced Australia. Perhaps that comes from being so intimate with the two former areas by contrast with SE Queensland which you seem to view slightly more abstractly - but with no loss of penetrating observation.
I don't know who that Tom Herzog guy is, but if I were him I'd flush myself down the toilet expecting the worst, but hoping for the best. Or at least something better such as the legendary, mythical large alligators and snakes in the New York sewer system.
Better to live with real snakes and alligators than two legged ones. At least the real ones are honest.
I find myself seeking a room for rent as studio space. I had one for 300 pre-co-vid and now I can't find one for 600 after. Tried a nearby town w/ a decent bus commute but the rooming houses were for Hispanics. Seems retirees don't get much respect in the NE of the USA. Bridgeport sounds a lot like Westchester. Unless you have money, it's tough, amigo.
Splendid! Anh Linh thấy có sách của Henry Lawson hay ai đó viết vui thì mang về cho em 1 2 cuốn nhé? (Hy vọng sách không làm còng thêm cái lưng lão của anh.)
Hi everyone,
To make a sharper distinction between Lawson and Paterson, I just added this paragraph to the essay:
As poets, they used conventional forms, but Lawson’s diction is much more natural. Unlike Paterson, Lawson didn’t poeticize his landscape or people, so there are no “fairest maids,” “city urchin,” “fields of youth,” “carol of the magpie,” “smiling plain” or “swain.” Instead, we get “a stealer and duffer of cattle,” “treacherous blacks in the darkness crept,” “men whose childhood knew the brothels and the slums” and “the spiritless dingo in tow of my heels.” Lawson’s people die of disease, rum and sorrow. His women plough, grub, mend fences, milk cows, drive nags, sew, wash and sometimes sing to themselves until they drop dead.
Linh
Your past few articles about SE Queensland have made enjoyable, and educational, reading. There's been a subtle change of tone between the way you describe the eastern USA or eastern Asia and how you've experienced Australia. Perhaps that comes from being so intimate with the two former areas by contrast with SE Queensland which you seem to view slightly more abstractly - but with no loss of penetrating observation.
I don't know who that Tom Herzog guy is, but if I were him I'd flush myself down the toilet expecting the worst, but hoping for the best. Or at least something better such as the legendary, mythical large alligators and snakes in the New York sewer system.
Better to live with real snakes and alligators than two legged ones. At least the real ones are honest.
I find myself seeking a room for rent as studio space. I had one for 300 pre-co-vid and now I can't find one for 600 after. Tried a nearby town w/ a decent bus commute but the rooming houses were for Hispanics. Seems retirees don't get much respect in the NE of the USA. Bridgeport sounds a lot like Westchester. Unless you have money, it's tough, amigo.
Heretofore my first and only reference to Henry Lawson was from a song titled Shakers and Movers by Aussie band Midnight Oil:
Our poet Henry Lawson he named them
The lay'em out brigade
Here they come there they go
Oh great god of development
Don't really know you yet
Coastline hosed down washed away
Economics, now there's nothing left
Tomorrow's child takes concrete footsteps
And they'll drink champagne or be damned
Great Clive James quote. Good find.
Splendid! Anh Linh thấy có sách của Henry Lawson hay ai đó viết vui thì mang về cho em 1 2 cuốn nhé? (Hy vọng sách không làm còng thêm cái lưng lão của anh.)