Quadrant articles from July 2008

Quadrant archives from July 2008

Garnaut and climate change.(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2008... SIR: Ray Evans' article "The Chilling Costs of Climate Catastrophism" (June 2008) was quite disappointing. I am disturbed about his criticism of Ross Garnaut. Evans criticises Garnaut, as a policy adviser, for using the IPCC report as a source....

The Soft-Marking Syndrome.(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2008... SIR: "The Soft-Marking Syndrome" by Malcolm Saunders (June 2008) is an excellent article. It sums up what most of us have been talking about, once we had left the university (often early)! Hans-Peter Stoffel, Murray's Bay, New Zealand. ...

Defining Gods into existence.(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2008... SIR: Oh dear! They're at it again--those clever Christian philosophers defining their God into existence (Dennis O'Keeffe reviewing Antony Flew, June 2008). That argument is as dead as Anselm himself. As for our brains being hardwired to...

Can science disprove God?(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2008... SIR: For all their scientific hubris and triumphalism, the reasoning of Dawkins and Co falls into the theoretical trap that hindered the development of psychology as a science, when it emerged from the dead-end of nineteenth-century...

The real Samoa.(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2008... SIR: Re John Whitworth's poem about Samoa (May 2008). This nonsense about Samoan women is all Herman Melville's fault! In his novel Oomoo, he created the myth of the Polynesian maiden as a fantastic sexual being, an image that somehow resonated...

The new carthage?(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2008... SIR: I enjoyed Dr Bendle's absorbing commentary (May 2008) which well illustrates the enduring fascination of the Roman empire's rise and demise. The apparent contention of Cullen Murphy's The New Rome? that US military power is increasingly...

Reforming defence.(Letter to the editor)
July 1, 2008... SIR: I write to thank Matthew French for his commentary (June 2008) on my article "Reforming Defence" (April 2008). Matthew's rank was not given, so I hope he will forgive my informality in using his first name. I suspect that he and I are...

What we achieved in Iraq.(Defence)
July 1, 2008... ON SEPTEMBER 11, 2001, the world changed. It changed irrevocably for many people throughout the world and for none more so than the citizens of the USA when 3000 innocent civilians were murdered in a terrorist attack on New York and Washington....

The Burning Fiery Furnace.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... THE BURNING FIERY FURNACE It isn't what you know, it's who you know. If who you know says go you gotta go. You gotta go, you gotta get a life. You gotta get a wife, you gotta grow. You gotta get a life and get a...

Like Smoke.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... LIKE SMOKE Like smoke from an abandoned cigarette, Your hopes have evanesced without a trace: The interviews you wish you could forget, The charms that failed to woo the populace, The speech that brought disaster and...

The pornification of girlhood.(Society)(The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls )(Critical essay)
July 1, 2008... IN HER BOOK The Body Project: An Intimate History of American Girls (1998), Joan Jacobs Brumberg examines the diaries of girls from the 1800s to the present. Extracts from two journals illustrate the significant shifts in the way girls see...

Censorship, liberty and licence.(Essay)
July 1, 2008... THE FIRST BOOK I asked for when I became a reader at the Bodleian Library was Lady Chatterley's Lover--a bizarre choice for a student about to embark on a thesis about formal satire from 1590 to 1650. This was an obscure subject and turned out...

Melbourne Macbeths: the underbelly series.(crime stories)
July 1, 2008... THERE'S A YELLOWING clipping in my scrapbook showing a scene that could be straight out of a film: a gleaming black coffin, covered in red roses, carried by men in sharp suits and sunglasses, coming out of a Catholic church in Kew; a blonde...

The Woman on the Train to Venice.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... THE WOMAN ON THE TRAIN TO VENICE Like a willow, her hair in ringlet curls Hung down in dirty-blonde swags. I spotted the empty seat next to her While hoisting my traveling bags. She understood me with her eyes ...

Four fictions: an argument against a charter of rights.(Law)
July 1, 2008... IF ANYONE WAS IN DOUBT about a charter of rights being back on the agenda for Australia, the 2020 Summit provided some much-needed clarification. While the call for a charter of fights was one of the headline outcomes from the Summit, the...

The Farm Terraces.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... THE FARM TERRACES Beautiful merciless work around the slopes of Earth terraces cut by curt hoe at the orders of hunger or a pointing lord. Levels eyed up to rhyme copied from grazing animals round the...

Croc.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... CROC This police car with a checkered seam of blue and white teeth along its side lies in cover like a long-jawed flat dog beside the traffic stream.

Regrettably.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... REGRETTABLY The signs were plain for all to see, the signs I should have heeded. The stuff out there on offer was the stuff I never needed. He wasn't what I thought he was and not what I required. I...

The visit of the Great White Fleet.(History)
July 1, 2008... WHAT WAS THE BIGGEST public event in the first decade after Federation? According to those who lived through those years it was the visit of the American Great White Fleet to Australia in August 1908. Not only was it a great occasion for the...

The Irishness of Daisy Bates.(Biography)
July 1, 2008... "I'M AS IRISH as Patrick's pig," Daisy Bates told the Adelaide News in January 1941, "but Australia has been my new home since I first landed in the West." Having spent the first twenty or so years of her life in Ireland, practically all of it...

Waipukurau.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... WAIPUKURAU It's knocking at the door in my mind. "See how the serpent dies on distant hills." That can only be the lazy coils evacuated by the dare-devil crop dusting planes. They looped and vanished before they...

Steeplechase.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... STEEPLECHASE The field flows like water over the high hedge we are perched on top of the big silence. The front runners land the sound begins again like an oncoming storm pelting hooves, cursing.

A tale of two leaders: Stanley Bruce and Kemal Ataturk.
July 1, 2008... THIS IS THE STORY of the parallel lives of two men who fought on opposite sides at Gallipoli. They each came to lead their countries, never met, but grew to respect and understand each other after the bloodletting on the Gallipoli peninsula in...

Three Haiku.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... THREE HAIKU one more stop sign away-- the street with a view of the mountain resort hotel-- one view views protected by warning signs-- walls left by the Roman Empire

Trompe-l'oeil.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... TROMPE-L'OEIL Banks classified five species of vermin infesting the ship's biscuit. Gentlemen could put theirs in the not-too-hot oven; crew had to shake the insects off and eat "the stayers". Much wasted...

No Going Back.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... NO GOING BACK In the slap-face cold of abandoned farms Tall grasses starched white in the torch beam's track Small stones chatter on the narrow dirt path Somewhere an owl gloats: There's no going back. Youth's eaten...

China, Taiwan, and the future of geopolitics.(Asia)
July 1, 2008... Taiwan is a keystone for China to cross the Pacific and go out to the world. It is an important strategic space that affects national security and national rejuvenation and affects China's external transformational links, trade links and energy...

The Burmese prospect.
July 1, 2008... I WAS THE AUSTRALIAN Ambassador to Burma from 1980 to 1982 during the rule of President U Ne Win. A recent visit to Burma enabled me to make some comparisons with conditions there then and now. I do not believe the political situation is...

Personal Glimpse.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... PERSONAL GLIMPSE I should have walked right past but something winked From just beyond the road. I turned around. Some angled stones, a jut of char, and then a pin prick Blooming on the wreckage of a house burnt down. ...

The head of state debate resolved.(The Constitution)
July 1, 2008... THE PRINCIPAL ARGUMENT advanced in the current campaign for a change to a republic is that the head of state should be Australian; constitutional monarchists reply that we already have an Australian head of state in the governor-general. A...

Home alone.(Devine)
July 1, 2008... THE LAST MAN to get away with being funny about his incompetence as a housekeeper was probably the American comedian Milton Berle, who faded from the television screen fifty years ago. Berle once claimed that when his wife, temporarily confined...

Liberty, productivity and jobs: workplace relations under the Howard Government.(How Good Was Howard)(John Howard)
July 1, 2008... THE TITLE for this assessment of the Howard government's workplace relations record includes a point often neglected about these matters. Labour market regulation basically restricts personal freedom, and provides an institutional framework...

Belladonna.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... BELLADONNA Belladonna, belladonna, writhing in the rain-What's your problem, belladonna? Paramour a pain? Kids are cranky, school's a nuisance--only work gives joy, He's a problem, belladonna, naughty little boy. ...

Dog in a box.(Theatre)(Theater review)
July 1, 2008... PROLOGUE IN AUSTRALIAN THEATRE the best one-act dramas happen offstage and aren't nominated for awards. When Left theatre critic Alison Croggon published a profile of playwright Joanna Murray-Smith in the Australian, blood soaked into the...

Haddon Chambers and the long arm of neglect.
July 1, 2008... WHO WOULD BE your nomination as Australia's most successful playwright? Ray Lawler? Patrick White? David Williamson? Alex Buzo? How about an Australian who had some thirty plays produced over three decades with the finest actors and...

Duty.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... DUTY She made slow progress down the darkened hall, a cut rose past its prime, head heavy, bloom faded. Lift... push... shuffle... the frame guided by hands half hidden in fingerless gloves....

Midnight train from Budapest.(First Person)
July 1, 2008... FIRST OF JUNE, 1993, 11.30 p.m., platform number 5, the main railway station of Budapest. There is a bit of frisson to the location: the last time I left Budapest by train was in June 1944 and I, with 1680 others, was leaving for destinations...

Today is For Swimming.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... TODAY IS FOR SWIMMING At dawn she wakes to the skip and splatter of rain; today, she decides, is for swimming. Passing cars slice the water on the road, as she walks, wet, with the rhythm of the rain to the beach, to...

On the Way to Your Funeral.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... ON THE WAY TO YOUR FUNERAL Heading to you no longer there the fields and camel-hide hills seem drawn and subdued, the road like an offering at their feet. Every thought of you stains the country-side,...

Bernard Smith and the Formalesque.(Art)(The Formalesque: A Guide to Modern Art and its History)(Critical essay)
July 1, 2008... WHEN THE ART HISTORIAN Ernst Gombrich reviewed a book called On Quality in Art: Criteria of Excellence Past and Present in 1968, he began by saying: "A good race horse, one supposes, is one that wins races, a good chess player one who can beat...

Postscript.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... POSTSCRIPT After it's finished, the be-ribboned car long gone, the bridesmaid walks home. Her choice; past garden lamps, a seed of the moon in their globes. A romantic idea but all day she has drowned in ...

The Art Class.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... THE ART CLASS Arms clutching at the tools of art, she enters the Institute, her grip slipping with each step towards studio doors closed to keep warmth in and voyeurs out. Easels angle to the...

Genesis of an art boom.(growth of art trade)
July 1, 2008... IT BEGAN ON A DAY of prickly Sydney heat, a last hard burst of the dying summer in late March 1962. Over seven hundred people jammed into the plain upstairs auction room at Castlereagh Street to see the selling off by James R. Lawson Ltd of the...

Fickle.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... FICKLE Fidelity's too strong a word But standards must be met-- I never caged him like a bird Nor kept him like a pet. I think that he does all he can In pleasing those above him-- I do not like a fickle man:...

The ethics of literary hoaxes.(Literature)
July 1, 2008... EVERY TIME a literary hoax is exposed--it is a frequent occurrence in publishing nowadays--there will be those who say there is nothing really wrong with faking it in a literary sense. They might argue that it is some sort of a victimless...

Tshwala.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... TSHWALA It bore no resemblance To the amber Castle My father used to drink Before going on to scotch; Plopping ice into crystal tumblers Cleaned and prepared by Dabson The cook boy: Delivered diligently...

A restored masterpiece.(Film)(Saraband for Dead Lovers)(Movie review)
July 1, 2008... SARABAND FOR DEAD LOVERS (1948), just released in the UK on DVD sixty years after its premiere, has to have one of the worst titles ever devised for a movie--up there with The Settlement (1983), Howard Rubie's fine road film only now being...

Light Plane Over Sydney Cove.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... LIGHT PLANE OVER SYDNEY COVE (after Brett Squires) Crossing the Blue Mountains soon after dawn the air like torn canvas you stretch the limits of reflected light promontories reaching out the Harbour...

Paying a Bill.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... PAYING A BILL I am next in the queue you insist, waving me forward. Shaking my head I stand back. We gaze at each other for a moment. You see a woman surely twice your age; I see not only fresh beauty ...

Full moon.(Short story)
July 1, 2008... A woman is lying in the sun, she is wearing a red bikini and half-dozing from the pleasure of the warmth of the sand. She has been for a swim and even attempted, unsuccessfully, to body-surf. The water at Noosa is warm and she stayed in for...

South Sea Shuffle.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... SOUTH SEA SHUFFLE A cynic or medical scientist might say It is the Amiodarone kicking in But my heart begs to differ. The moment I placed both feet On African soil And removed the shaking left leg From the...

Welcome to Country.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... WELCOME TO COUNTRY They purloined your house, Aboriginal Australian And feeling guilty allowed You to stay on in a tiny backroom. Now that they are fully ensconced You conduct a welcome to country, But...

Dilly.(Short story)
July 1, 2008... I love her. I know I do. Breathless, I tell everyone. Mum. Dad. My sister Kathryn. Michael. I leave him till last because, of course, he's the most important. He stares at me for a moment and then he goes over to the fireplace and stands there...

Four Haiku.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... FOUR HAIKU in a queue for take away coffee-- people who will outlive me neighbors-- a bird cage tops their trash bookstore specials-- one well-written life on top the wind not missing...

The empire strikes back.(Van Diemen's Land)(Critical essay)
July 1, 2008... Van Diemen's Land, by James Boyce; Black Inc, 2008, $49.95. JAMES BOYCE'S Van Diemen's Land is a handsomely produced book with a famous 1834 John Glover painting on the dust-cover depicting about thirty-eight Tasmanian Aboriginal people...

The boundless intimacy of strangers.(Prague Tales)(Critical essay)
July 1, 2008... Prague Tales, eds. John aBeckett et al; New Europe Writers, 2007, 5.99 euro. FOR THE TOURIST, Prague yields up its distinctive atmosphere, captured in this impressive collection of recent writing on Prague: stone alleys, music in churches,...

The takeover.(Cry Wolf)(Book review)
July 1, 2008... Cry Wolf, by Paul Lake; Benbella, 2008, US$12.95. IT HAS BEEN RARE in recent years for me to get more than a few pages into a modern novel before abandoning it; rarer still for me to bother finishing it; rarest of all for me to read it in a...

The Dead Girl.(Poem)
July 1, 2008... THE DEAD GIRL One of your eyes is a different colour seeing has done that both of your legs have sores walking has done that your hands are broken into little shards feeling has done...

At the Canberra Hotel.(Ryan)
July 1, 2008... As I WRITE--late in May--all branches of the media are filled with speculation about the leadership of the Coalition parties now in Opposition. A more pointless or profitless activity would be hard to imagine. Most of these numerous...