Missing Manners

Otherwise known as 'Crude Men Who Need to be Removed from the Gene Pool'.

No I'm not being feminist, or pessimistic, or whatever else you want to call it, other than opinionated and brutally honest. I just get fed up of having to deal first hand with the objectification of women me. And I'm not being over dramatic, or egotistically in hoping that this male attention is directed at me.

I know it is. They make it obvious enough, possibly because they think it a compliment.

Let me describe myself; I'm intelligent, witty, I can hold lengthy conversations that go beyond 'small talk' and actually discuss matters of interest and importance. I am not lacking a sense of humour and can talk absurdities for hours on end with good friends. I have many talents, many skills, and many hobbies, with a healthy streak of creativity.

However, I am tall, attractive, neither overweight nor underweight, with a penchant for wearing 4inch heels and clothes that skim my hour glass figure.  And I have a naturally large set of breasts.

Unfortunately, this second description can all too easily overshadow the former and result in some horrible situations that I shouldn't have to be skilled at dealing with.


Situation 1: It's a Friday night and we're at my Grandfather's wake, at the Leopold Hotel where he had once worked as the accountant. The entire family is there celebrating his life, and mourning his death. We have just come from his burial and a traumatic week before that organising his funeral. I walk up to the bar to get drinks for myself and my mother, and a comment is directed at me:

"You have a great pair of tits." 

As though this is a great statement to pick me up. As though this is a suitable statement to make at any time or in any place, in this day and age.
It's not a fact he's verbalising, for he did not say 'you have a big pair of tits' (fact, but no more acceptable, might I add). He provided his opinion with regards to my body and then verbalised it... in my ear.
Standing at a bar, regardless of what I am wearing, regardless of what I am drinking, or how many drinks I have already had, I should not have to hear such a comment directed at me or any other person in the room. I should not have to not register shock at what I have heard and I should definitely not have had to learn how to ignore such comments.


Situation 2: Mum and I are walking through Naples in the middle of summer. As a result we are dressed for the heat. I was not in a skimpy top and hot pants, just short shorts and a loose-fitting summer top that covered my shoulders and my bust (I am modest, and prepared for crude comments). Walking down the main street back to the train stations, we pass by groups of men who make very suggestive comments towards me or about my appearance. Some are touting for customers for the restaurant at which they waited. Others are just hanging around. When they get no response from their sleazy comments said in Italian, they switch to other languages including English hoping that I might be able to understand some of the filth they are uttering.
Mum is freaked out as she could understand everything they were saying or suggesting about her daughter. I think she is also freaked out because I didn't bat an eyelid for the entire duration of the walk. Nor did I say a word. I had simply experienced enough of it over the years to be able to turn a blind eye to it all. I had enough experience to be about to act as though I had not understood a single word they had uttered and had no idea of the sexist filth they were saying.

Unfortunately it was filth they can get away with saying because there were no recriminations. I (probably like most women) have not the strength to deal with it physically and so simply ignore it completely. As a result, they continue their disgusting behaviour and I become more comfortable with the idea of remaining a Spinster Aunt.

Response to a Lecture: Joan of Arc's choice of attire

A friend and I recently attended a free lecture at the Institute of Advance Studies on the reliability of the primary sources concerning the life and trials of Joan of Arc.

Joan of Arc is not someone I am usually interested in (she is the most thoroughly documented person in Medieval history and I prefer historical figures in the shadows or who have almost been forgotten completely) but the lecture was interesting. However being historians and already well aware of the reliability of source material, we came out of it more curious as to the reasons behind Joan's choice in favouring men's wear over women's, and why she did change back and forth between the two. The lecturer had made light reference to the impact of this on her trial and sentence but at the same time had implied that this was not an area he could answer, which was why he wasn't delving into it. Walking across campus afterwards, we, two young female historians, one interested in fashion history, the other in a woman's place in society, had difficulty understanding the difficulty the lecturer felt in justifying Joan's choice in attire. Even without assigning a saintly or Amazonian symbolism to her attire, historical knowledge and personal experience made it seem all too straight forward an answer.

A Timeline of Joan of Arc's attire:
1428
At Vaucoureurs when she stands before Robert de Baudricourt requesting an audience with the Dauphin  she is dressed as a woman in peasants dress referred to by Jean de Nouillempont  (aka Jean de Metz) as 'a red dress, poor and worn.'

Of her earlier campaigns she is later described as wearing 'relatively simple clothes... namely a long hood, a dark pleated tunic with belt and the hips and high leather leggings with pointed toes and attached spurs.'

Later she is accused of wearing sumptuous and magnificent clothes of precious cloth and gold cloth and also furs... She used all of the styles and clothes which the most dissolute men are accustomed to assume, having rejected all womanly modesty and being contrary, not only to womanly decency, but to that which is common to honourable men.*

March 15 1431
Having been arrested and held in an English military prison, guarded by men, Joan continued wearing her men's clothes. She is offered the chance to hear Mass if she will put away the men's clothes. In response she asks to have a long dress touching the ground, without a train, made for me and give it to me for going to Mass... [or then]... Give me a dress of the sort that a bourgeois girl would wear - a long skirt with something like a woman's hood - and I will take them to go to mass in.  This offer proffered no result.

Palm Sunday March 25 1431
Joan is asked if she would put on women's clothing so that she might hear Mass and receive the Eucharist at Easter. She replied that it was impossible for her, and pleased to hear the Mass whilst wearing male's attire as These clothes do not burden my soul, and to wear them is not against the Church. This request was refused.
Later that day she expressed her willingness to resume women's attire.

Thursday May 24 1431 
Joan signed an abjuration. She confesses that [she has] sinned grievously.... in wearing a dissolute habit, misshapen and dishonest, against the decency of nature, and hair cut round in the style of a man, against all honesty of the feminine sex. (I don't know whether Joan was aware she had signed this specific part, as she said she never understood that she had made and oath not to take back these men's clothes. It is possible this part of the abjuration was tacked on after she'd signed, something that sounds likely to have happened).
She is condemned to life imprisonment and led back to the English prison where she is outfitted in women's clothes.

Monday May 28 1431
Joan resumes wearing men's clothes and is accused of being a relapsed heretic.
When questioned why she has resumed women's clothes, Joan is recorded as responding that she had taken these clothes not long ago and had put off the women's clothes... that she likes these clothes better than women's clothes... I have done it of my own free will and because it was more fitting since I am with men. I began to wear it again because what was promised me has not been observed, to wit that I should to to Mass and receive the Body of Christ and be freed from these irons. Cauchon, her chief accuser and judge told her that when she had made her abjuration she had promised not to resume wearing men's clothing. Joan's response to this was I would rather die than remain in these irons, but if I am permitted to go to mass and be put in a decent prison with women to help me I will be good and do what the Church wishes. This was ignored by Cauchon.

Wednesday May 30 1431
Joan of Arc is burned alive.


In Joan of Arc's life, the wearing of male attire probably served a very specific purpose. She wore it because it was practical to the fulfilment of her mission and her role in the Military. One of the earliest mentions of Joan wearing male attire is upon her leaving Vaucoureurs. In one source she is described as wearing her uncle's clothes, in another those of her escort's servant.  Though she is not yet involved with the military, in both sources this is referenced within a few lines of a statement that a horse was procured for her for 16 francs. Regardless, of whom the clothes belonged to, two things are evident: the last minute procurement means that the choice of wearing men's clothing was not part of her existing peasant life or premeditated, and the men's clothing was a practical response to the fact that she would be riding to her next destination. The additional set of clothes she had, had been made for her by the people of Vaucouleurs who were now sympathetic to her cause.

This is supposedly a tapestry of Charles VII meeting Joan of Arc, though it is a little difficult to tell which of the soldiers she is supposed to be. 

Dressing in male attire when on a battlefield or residing in an army camp is practical and understandable. For undertaking the pursuits of a soldier, long, cumbersome, skin tight dresses are not ideal, nor are long flowing locks. Instead, Joan wore men's clothes and had her hair cut in a 'generic masculine haircut'. Her clothes and masculine haircut make her one of the soldiers, an equal with the men she fought alongside and captained. Dressed as a man it would have been easier for her fellow soldiers to forget that she was a woman, that they were taking orders from a woman, a weaker vessel.

It also would have meant that though a woman, she was not associated with the women of the army camp, women who for the most part would have been whores and prostitutes. Looking at the depictions of Joan 60 years later in "Les Vigiles de Charles VII" by Martial d'Auverbne, her appearance in women's attire differs little from the depictions of the prostitutes in another of the miniature illustrations.

Joan of Arc being led to her execution from Les Vigiles de Charles VII by
Martial d'Auverbne written between 1477 and 1483

Joan of Arc chasing prostitutes from her army's camp from Les Vigiles de
Charles VII by Martial d'Auverbne written between 1477 and 1483

Throughout her mission, Joan appears to have been gifted masculine attire; in Vaucouleurs she was made and gifted 'mens suits, hose, and all that was necessary' while at Orleans 'she received from the magistrates a forest-green surcoat trimmed with marten... and a vermillion tunic trimmed with beaver. While the clothes from the people of Vaucouleurs would have been 'relatively simple clothes', those received in Orleans were fashionable garments similar to those she was noted as wearing later in her campaigns. Karen Sullivan in 'The Interrogations of Joan of Arc' says that this 'tendency to adorn herself in the manner of fops and in the manner of the most dissolute men suggests that she experienced her coiffeur, her wardrobe, and by extension, her body not only as a means to an end but as an end in themselves. Because the clerics perceived that Joan took pleasure in her masculine trappings, they concluded that she chose them out of the desire to experience such pleasure.' I wonder instead if this 'tendency to adorn herself in the manner of fops' was in fact due to her increasing fame and the clothes she was gifted as a result. Or simply the result of peer pressure and the desire to fit in with her fellow soldiers or fellow captains. Meanwhile, her 'desire to experience such pleasure' from her masculine trappings may instead have been due to the unusual beauty of the pieces, be they masculine or feminine, resulting from the fact that she would never have experienced such outfits in her previous life as a peasant girl. Secondly, she may have taken pleasure from them because being masculine clothes, they offered her a freedom and security women's clothes never could.


Joan of Arc's capture marks the beginning of a separate period of her life, where her choice in clothing came to play an important role in how she was viewed and what she was accused of. Upon capture she was treated like a prisoner of war and thrown into a military prison where she was guarded by men, as opposed to a prison for women  or where she could be guarded or protected by women. Whilst in prison, to the great consternation/delight of the accusers Joan retained her masculine garb. The question becomes, why? Was it simply that she was maintaining her military habits in a military setting, or was it that it gave her something female garb could not?

Given that Joan did not see her military position as a permanent one, despite the military profile of her imprisonment, but instead that when [she has]done that for which [she has] been sent on the part of God, [she] will take women's clothes, this decision is to continue wearing men's clothes is exceedingly practical. The impression is that Joan planned to resume her female life and as a result tried to ensure that when she was viewed by society as a woman she conformed to expectations and ideals. As a result, it was necessary that she retained the things most prized in young maidens: their virtues and more importantly, their virginity.

At the time of her trials she was 19 years old, an unmarried girl, but of marriageable age. As a result, she offers to resume her female clothes when she has [been]put in a decent prison with women to help me and chaperone her. In addition, when she is offered the chance to attend mass if she will wear women's clothes, she asks for a long dress touching the ground, and a dress of the sort that a bourgeois girl would wear - a long skirt. These requests are for something long and modest and as evident in this second request, for something appropriate to the station to which she hopes to return when her divine mission has been fulfilled. This stance is also supported by the terminology used to describe Joan of Arc throughout her life. The term pucelle (maid) is used as opposed to vierge (virgin) the latter of which would indicate a lifetime vocation of virginity; in the image to the right, Joan is labelled 'Pulzella'.

The date of interest is Thursday May 24 1431 when Joan signs the adjuration and supposedly voluntarily resumed women's clothing. Three days later, on Sunday May 28 her accusers/assessors learn that she has resumed wearing male's clothes. When questioned, Joan is recorded as declaring I did it on my own will. I took it again because it was more lawful and convenient than to have women's clothes because I am with men; I began to wear them again because what was promised me was not observed, to wit that I should go to mass and receive the body of Christ and be freed from these irons. ...I would rather die than stay in these irons: but if it is permitted for me to go to mass, and if I could have a woman to help me, I would be good and do what the church wishes.

from Les Vigiles de Charles VII by Martial d'Auverbne written between 1477 and 1483

When viewed alone, this doesn't make that much sense for Joan does not appear to be explaining why she has provided her accusers with the very proof they needed to prove her a lapsed heretic. What is interesting is what happened during those intermediary days. According to Jean Massieu, having resumed women's clothes on Thursday when she woke on the morning of Trinity Sunday she could not find her women's clothes because the English guards had stolen them and only given her men's clothes to dress herself in. Being a modest young woman, with a choice of men's clothes or nothing/her shift and being overseen by a group of male soldiers, it's perfectly understandable why she dressed herself in the men's clothes which [the soldiers] had thrown at her. 

Martin Ladvenu provides a slightly different version, one which ties in with what Joan herself said in response. On one of these intermediary nights, someone approached her secretly at night; I have heard from Joan's own mouth that an English lord entered her cell and tried to take her by force.  The questions asked of Joan after her resumption of wearing men's clothing were when and for what reason had she taken anew these men's clothes? Karen Sullivan's analysis is that Joan answered the first part of the question but would not answer the second. I believe that in fact Joan did answer the second part of the question: since [she is] with men. The men's clothes, including the leather leggings mentioned earlier, would not only have been less alluring to men contemplating rape but would also have provided more of a barrier to rape than had she been wearing a woman's gown (without underwear as we know it). 

Throughout the ages, women's clothes have been viewed as alluring, regardless of their length, tightness, shape... Almost because bodily features were hidden from view they became alluring and incredibly provocative. An example in point is the female ankle which was hidden beneath long skirts until the 1910s when suddenly its continued visibility caused it to lose its appeal. In an age where excepting the occasional female saint or characters from myths, women did not dress as men, Joan's choice of masculine attire (and masculine attitudes) would probably have played a huge part towards her being accepted by the army as a strategist and a captain, and more importantly as 'one of them'. Her return to women's clothing would have reminded everyone around her visually that despite her attitudes, her military successes, her intelligence and her divine callings, she was in fact one of the 'weaker vessels', a female.

References: 
*Primary source material is marked in italics throughout the post. However this has all been pulled from the secondary sources below and therefore I am unable to verify the translation or indicate which text it originates from. 

Pernoud. Regine, Clin. Narue-Veronique, Joan of Arc: Her Story, 1999, Palgrave Macmillan
Sullivan. Karen, The Interrogation of Joan of Arc, 1999, University of Minnesota

Edmonds. Joan, The Mission of Joan of Arc, 2008, Temple Lodge Publishing

A lesson well taught.

Like with many people, teachers have shaped my life, through school and through uni, helping me to learn the subjects which interested me and those which were necessary through life, and directing me along a path that would carry my interests through from academic transcripts into the rest of life.
In addition I seem to gravitate towards them naturally. It's in my nurture. You see my parents are teachers, so was an ex-boyfriend. My London housemates are teachers, converged in one city to experience the hell of teaching London children, as were many of the friends I made travelling around Europe at the end of my stay.

Seeing a small collection of my old teachers at my high school reunion and recalling to mind many others who I had not seen in so many years made me realise just how much they shaped my memories of school, and how much I have to thank them for. These were the ones who embodied entire years or subjects, or shaped a continued disinterest in various fields. And yet they were also the ones who encouraged interactions, team-based 'learning' and applied everyday matters to the topic at hand.

• One of my earliest teachers was my year one teacher; a brilliant teacher, if a little scatterbrained, who would engross the class so completely in activities that the changeover into new periods would have been missed completely. But she was a teacher who knew how to get the most out of the small charges in her control. Comparing her to my sister's year one teacher a few years later made her dedication and skill all the more striking.
• A early primary school teacher who took over our class in term two only to find the entire class had taken a dislike to her because she was different from our term one teacher. She persevered and opened up a world of art and make-believe before our very eyes and taught us to watch the world grow through tiny plots of garden just outside the classroom door. 
• A carefree, relaxed man who somehow managed to teach in spite of a tendency to wander in and out of classrooms that weren't his own kicking a footy. 
• A teacher with a pride in our achievements, all our achievements and plastered every inch of the walls and windows with our creations. 
• The English/History teacher who knew our names, who knew each and every one of us and encouraged us to expand ourselves. He had an open door policy to his office and we love him enough that me may have abused the privilege ever so slightly. He gave the impression of putting the students first and when he was promoted made a point of wandering the school yard at lunchtime interacting with anyone and everyone. 
• A History teacher who recognised and encouraged(?) the dynamics of her class and allowed them to shape the class for three consecutive years. Whether it was rivalry, combative spirits or something else its hard to say, but in at least one of those years it prompted our progress. 
• A Human Biology teacher who made understanding elements of the human body easier through the use of examples from her son's life... who just happened to be one of our classmates. 
• A short term student teacher who gained the respect of her year 10 class and successfully taught us an understanding of Romeo and Juliet. Though I only like the play for the memories of those classes. 

However unfortunately memories also surfaces of those teachers whom you remember for all the wrong reasons. Those who consistently failed to control the class, those who remain little more than comic figures running through familiar settings. A few were unique though: 

• One was a Maths teacher who was a brilliant teacher of maths and ensured you learnt every concept completely. However this was achieved though fear to the extent that no one liked him as a person and anyone who had to deal with him outside of maths lessons felt as though they were constantly on tenterhooks. 
• The other most memorable one was a physics teacher who has left me with a complete lack of understanding of physics. His class taught me the importance of the circle in meditation, the words to  Monty Python's Galaxy Song and comprised an assignment: 'research the influence the ruling planet of you star sign has on you life'. I never did learn physics, but I got an awful lot of writing done in that class. 

Going back and seeing my old teachers again make me realise how significantly they contributed to my education, not just academically, but to my education as a person, as an informal teacher and to my appreciation of the cultural heritage, history, natural beauty of the world in which we live and the opportunities open to us if we only think to look for them.

Schooling a response.

It's said to contain some of the best years of your life, but truthfully you either love it or you hate it.
I'm talking about school.
If you're lucky, it can teach a love of learning, a curiosity to discover the world and marvel in its intricacy, provide some of the best friends you'll ever have, and prepare you to face the world on your own.
But school is also about petty quarrels, superficial values, crushed hopes, and extreme schisms across a multitude of divides. From the imposed ones of what stream of maths you're allowed to take, what career paths you're encouraged not to dream for, to who's cool versus who is able to slip through the years virtually unknown.

When high school ended it was nice to put it all behind you; take what you want and leave the rest behind, brush the dirt from your shoes as you step through into a brand new world. Start again, from scratch. As you pass through the years, exploring the insular universes of university, work, travel, living abroad... school slowly fades into the background, only rearing its head when you run into familiar faces or familiar places. So when a reunion looms on the horizon, you start wondering.
How many people do you wish you'd kept in contact with? Wish to reconnect with, hopefully pick up where you left off, but on a better footing.
How many people do you wonder what they're doing, even if you know you'll never stay in contact outside of this?
How many people do wish you'd put aside your petty quarrels and befriended all those years ago?
Will this provide the opportunity to make amends? Is it too late?
But there's always the other side of the coin: how many of your classmates are still caught up in those petty rivalries? 'My rock is bigger than yours', 'my baby bump bigger', 'my job cooler, more impressive...' Have they grown up at all in that interspersing time?
Have I?

I suppose you can say curiosity won the day. I went. There were people I wanted to see, people I wanted to reconnect with, people I wanted to connect with for the first time. And there wasn't anyone I didn't want to see. I'd matured since the days of those petty rivalries. Surely they had too. So I went, with some misgivings, few expectations, and I enjoyed it. We'd grown up, we'd arrived with the same motivation, the same mindset, the same desire to celebrate the opportunities we had been granted through a thorough education with a brilliant cohort.

It was delightful to catch up with colleagues, to hear about the success they'd made of their lives thus far. The pure enjoyment they were getting out of life and the work they loved. To hear how they were following their dreams, regardless of whether these had changed or just adapted as we aged. To be remembered for all the right reasons, to be remembered at all...

What the night also offered was a chance to catch up with some of those teachers who had helped to make school so memorable. Those who'd inspired you to learn, who'd made classes worth going to, who'd tolerated your antics however outrageous and whom you just knew had gossiped about you in the staffroom afterwards.

However each evening of happiness is impinged with elements of sadness. Those students who hadn't come, whom you knew would never come, those who had disappeared off the face of the earth and even their friends had no idea of what had become of them. Teachers who had succumbed, however unwillingly, to mental disorders, to early onset dementia. Those who had pored their life into the school to make your experience of learning such a positive one. Those who had been forced to walk away.

Our next reunion is as much as 10 years away.

I wonder...

A familiar object.

I love correcting lessons in history.
Correcting teachers who mention the wrong Queen Mary,
Correcting speakers who reference the wrong historic house,
Correcting movies (my favourite), and
Correcting exhibitions which date fashion history incorrectly (my pet area of expertise).
It's not that I like the superiority of being able to prove I'm right (ok, maybe a little) but it's that I absolutely detest people being fed incorrect history. I'ts hard enough to get people to cultivate an interest in the subject that when you do manage to get someone to absorb meaningful information it should at least be correct. Interesting, maybe even unbelievable, but at least correct.
Condensed I don't mind. Wrong I will not tolerate.

In a similar vein, I like sharing my knowledge with people. Entreating them to see the wonder and beauty and excitement that I see. Providing them with the context with which to better appreciate and understand the things before them. Just ask those friends who have been dragged through museums and art galleries.

The latest example was at the Azelia Ley Homestead Museum in Hamilton Hill. Having already succeeded in confusing the poor ladies on duty (see this post) my mother and I proceeded to explain one of the unlabelled pieces of linen pinned into a display case.

It was a shiny white bow and if you looked closely on one of the tails was the delicate embroidery of a goblet. The ladies had never really questioned its purpose assuming that it was simply part of a lady's wardrobe. In fact it was more delightful than that, if slightly misplaced in the master bedroom of this house.

This delicate white bow was part of a boy's First Holy Communion outfit. It was embroidered with the host and chalice and was worn around the upper arm with the ubiquitous sailor suit that all small boys seem to have been dressed in in the first half of the 20th century. And it looked incredibly familiar. Partially because less than a sennight earlier we had unearthed my grandfather's own arm band, little white gloves and miniscule book. No doubt this was the arm band of my great uncle when he had received holy communion in Alexandria, Egypt in the mid 1930s.

Mum (the lapsed Catholic amongst us) was unaware of how widespread the tradition was.
Were the Mannings catholic and therefore participants in this ritual? Was this ritual, carried out on the other side of the world, accompanied with the physical paraphernalia that our family had experienced in Egypt?

It was an interesting discovery and I like to think I'm, bit by bit, adding my piece to the history of this city. Now just to forward a copy of the delightful photo above to the museum to illustrate the way the bow was worn (and reinforce the twee outfits of the time). 

My inspirational 'list'

Only recently I was asked for a list of people who inspired me, real or imaginary, and importantly, of both genders. A list of names, and why I considered them so important to my identity...

Normally I don't create such lists. I read up on people who interest me and store the relevant novels/biographies in an ever growing personal collection. But I don't see the point in actively remembering a list. It is not the name of the person which is important, but instead the messages they convey through their experiences and how these messages impact upon my life. Rather, the messages get absorbed, the strengths that made them who they are, and the weaknesses that are learned from and applied without the need for personal experiences. The list, who these people are, fades into the background, their importance registered through my continued interest in their lives, the fact their stories never get old. The fact they're people I treasure as my own, as though I have a personal connection with them even though they may have lived and died decades before I was born, or never lived at all.

Recently I discovered a list upon which several of these names resided. A list I too had compiled at some time or other in a bid to suggest reading material to a primary school teacher friend of mine. A list of the 10 Best Literary Heroines for Girls. I grew up with Anne of Green Gables, the March sisters, the Seven Little Australians children of Captain Woolcot, as well as a host of children who didn't appear on that list; Norah and Jim Linton and Wally Meadows of Billabong, Mary Lennox, Little Lord Cedric Fauntleroy. Reading Natasha's list and being reminded of the virtues of these characters, I remember the reasons the stories of each one are still in my bookcase 15 years later. And the reasons I still reread these books every few years.

Later as I got older, as my reading matured, this 'list' of these inspirational people changed, adapted with me. It grew to include real people, past and present. People who were before their time, people who lived unusual lives and were almost forgotten in the annals of history, people who were witty, or just recorded the world around them in their own personal way. People who discovered the beauty of the world and had to share it with the world.
But I will always hold a place in my heart for those early characters, for it was them who encouraged me to dream, to live a full life, to be grateful for what we have as opposed to melancholy about what we don't have or can't have, and to appreciate the beauty of the world around us.

The Joy of Poetry

The Perth Writer's Festival was this weekend passed, and in discussing with my mother the various sessions I would be attending, we lighted upon one which discussed whether it is novelists or poets who are more likely to make us swoon. Now for me, this is easily resolved: in my experience, it's always been novelists.

But is this because the only poetry I've been taught to appreciate is, though well worded, of a depressing nature, focusing not on the beauty of life and love, but on the misery and suffering it can inflict upon some. Take for instance Gwen Harwood's 'Home of Mercy'. It is a thought provoking poem, but its topic is the plight of unmarried mothers forced into a home of mercy where they are make to feel more acutely the social degradation of their situation. And when read from even the slightest of feminine viewpoints its complete absence of menfolk highlights the gender imbalance that we in part are still fighting to this day. Or take John Donne's 'The Apparition', a poem about sexual revenge in the form of syphilis. Even his poems of love fail to rejoice in the beauty of life but instead focus upon the depressing fact of the objection of his lover's father.

In fact, very little of what I studied in English Literature would be deemed as positive reading. The poetry was melancholy and the plays tragic. In three years, the only Shakespeare we studied were three tragedies: Romeo and Juliet, Othello and Macbeth. Shakespeare is renown for the breadth of his plays. He wrote histories and comedies in addition to his tragedies, and yet it is the tragedies alone that we are forced to study on a yearly basis. We are allowed to enjoy the comedy of Juliet's nurse, and the tertiary actors, but only in amongst the greater context of two love lorn teenagers who disregard their parents and take things into their own hands with tragic consequences.

And yet, while we focus upon these stories of murder, deception, youth suicide, injustice... we still wonder why the youth of today are so depressed and so often fail to see the beauty in the world around us.

Is it simply because we've been trained that way? 

My (cousin's) first...

My cousin (technically first cousin once removed) is 11 months old and Christmas Eve marked her first visit to Kings Park, our botanical gardens overlooking the Swan river and city of Perth. Kings Park is beautiful: in On the steep slope down to the river native flora grow wild while above manicured lawns festooned with gardens of natives provide the perfect locale for family picnics and weddings.

Picnicing near a young tree, my cousin decided that now was the perfect time to indulge in a little exploring, particularly of the black dirt in which the sapling stood. With no restraints and little more than a mild protest from her mother, my cousin liberally covered her feet, legs and hands in good clean dirt. Watching such indulgence was a simple classic image that could have dated from anyone's childhood and reminded me of photos of my own sister: I recollect a photo of her from before she was walking crawling across the grass with her mouth covered in dirt and grass and if anything, its just given her a more detailed interest in plant life.

King's Park is delightful for not only does it possess and array of plants native to this area, but it also contains varieties of English trees that herald back to a time when we were still only a British outpost actively tried to recreate the English landscape many settlers missed from home. Wanting my cousin to experience as little more of the park, I kidnapped her from the party and went for a wander showing her some of the different plants and introducing her to some of the sounds and textures of the park. I felt as though I was introducing her to the smooth bark of a eucalyptus, the metal plaque of a war memorial, the crunchiness of the flowers of the everlasting (paper-daisy) and the stiff velvety leaves of a banksia.

It was an utter joy discovering such natural things with her and seeing her follow my example and touch things or just sit there with a smile, taking in the thinks I was pointing out to her: the magpie having a standoff with a crow, the pavilion in which her Nanna married... I know she's too young to remember any of this but I suppose I want her to have the opportunity to have as rich a life as I do but with the type of richness I feel to be most important.

It's All Greek to Me

I've never been good at languages, but I've always been intrigued. Intrigued by their structure, their history, their differences, their similarities. English is a language that is comprised of so many other languages. We are habitual pinchers. And so when I look at French or Italian or some of the other languages of Europe, while I cannot read it, I recognise words or parts of words and it all feels that little more familiar. That little more approachable.

While in Greece, I remember standing in front of a stone monument and feeling completely at sea. It depicted the bust of a lady and a few lines of text, but I could not have told you anything more. There were no indications of what the subject of this memorial were, no identifiable dates or names that I could grasp on to.