Book Review - Wings of the Kite-Hawk by Nicolas Rothwell

 Wings of the Kite-Hawk: a Journey into the Heart of Australia by Nicolas Rothwell

Melbourne: Black Inc., 2009* (first published 2003)               ISBN 9781863954457

Recently, in a book of essays by Tim Parks, I read of his contention that all great literature is trying to come to terms with death, and that all great writers tend to return to one great over-arching theme throughout their works, however varied they may seem to be on the surface.

If that is the case, then Wings of the Kite-Hawk is great literature, and Nicolas Rothwell is a great writer. Many years ago I read his book Quicksilver and felt I didn't really grasp what he was getting at, but after reading Wings of the Kite-Hawk I feel that I have moved closer to what Rothwell is trying to express in his writing.

Rothwell enters the desert country of Australia on a search for meaning: "... the desert always gives those who search in its emptiness the dream, at least, of their desires." Rothwell's dream is to reconcile his life with the never changing rhythms of the desert. He wishes the desert to enter him (as all those who have spent time there wish).

Particularly, as an emigrant to Australia, he tries to find his way into the country through his fellow emigrants, the explorers. Through long meditations on the lives and explorations of Leichhardt, Sturt, Strehlow and Giles, Rothwell muses on life, on dreams of success and the reality of failure, and on the certainty of death - "[y]ou're much closer to death out here than in the city; you can feel it bending humanity to its will." 

The four explorers Rothwell chooses to focus on had a desire for death haunting their lives: Leichhardt, that strange visionary who has haunted the minds of white Australia for over a century and a half, actually did meet his demise in the back country - a demise that one feels he was actively seeking.

Sturt's voyage to the Inland Sea - a romantic folly that ennobled those that undertook it - was a doomed voyage that seemed made for the times. What was Sturt seeking? It surely wasn't an actual sea, which it seems he knew wasn't there: in leaving his wife and child, what was he doing? Rothwell speculates - "[w]here was he bound? Like every noble or beautiful thing, to the kingdom of death - that kingdom he longed to see with his own eyes, to endure, and to return from, with golden words upon his lips." He of course did return, unsuccessful, and with no golden words for recompense.

Strehlow was an explorer of culture rather than land, famously working his way through the traditions of the Aranda people. He eventually saw himself as the keeper of their traditions and (in)famously collected and photographed many sacred objects and events. He spent his life amongst the Aranda, but in the end completely failed to understand the culture he felt he was a part of. Rothwell describes in his recollection of the sale of the Strehlow Collection how Strehlow's efforts to preserve a people and their culture led only to fracture and decay. 

Rothwell himself as represented in Wings of the Kite-Hawk mainly interacts with white residents of the Outback, all the while understanding that it is the Aboriginal people who fully understand the country and its dreaming. In the cast of characters that cross his path, it is those who have absorbed some of the ancient learning that connect most with the spirit of the country which, for Rothwell, is embodied in the Kite-Hawk.

These birds permeate the story of Rothwell's journey: from being a sign of good fortune to a presager of death when his colleague Esterline hits and kills a Kite-Hawk with his car and bewails the bird's and his own demise (when he perished in the desert soon after killing the bird).

I think it is in the story of Giles that Rothwell finds a character most in tune with his own quest. Late to the country, Giles never gets to make a discovery that others would recognise as great or useful "...for in its last phases exploration, like life, becomes a retreat, a silence, a turning in."

In the end, despite his hopes, Rothwell does not find the answer to his quest in the lives and deaths of the explorers as he had hoped. Like him, they traversed across the country rather than into it. It is rather the encounters that Rothwell has on his journeys with those that have embedded themselves into the desert that show him the way. Enlightenment and peace will come if you let them, but not if you chase them.

A deservedly praised book: history, philosophy and a life-lesson. Highly recommended.

* The 2009 edition of this book has new foreword by Pico Iyer and preface by Rothwell that both shed light on what Rothwell was hoping to achieve with this book

Cheers for now, from

A View Over the Bell

Book Review - The Whale's Journey by Stephen Martin

 The Whale's Journey by Stephen Martin

Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2001                                 ISBN 1865082325

This is a fascinating book, summed up by the note on the front cover "a year in the life of a humpback whale, and a century in the history of whaling". Martin tracks the yearly migration of southern humpbacks from their feeding grounds in Antarctica to Northern Australia and the Pacific Islands, interspersing descriptions of the creatures and their habits with man's efforts to hunt them as they travel.

Martin notes throughout the book how little we know about some aspects of a humpback's life even "now" (the book was written in 2001), and how much of what we do know came from a collaboration between science and commercial whaling.

The information that interested me most was about the shore-based whaling that occurred in Australia and New Zealand, which tended to focus on catching humpbacks, as they usually kept close to shore and were relatively easy to catch given their slow speed. The surprising thing for me was that most shore stations were only active for relatively short periods of time, sometimes barely a dozen years in some cases.

What Martin makes clear in this book is that from even the late nineteenth century it was becoming clear to many whalers and scientists that the numbers of whales were diminishing quite quickly, and that catch levels were unsustainable. This didn't stop the industry from growing, even though many governments sought to put limits around catch sizes. When the Norwegians (followed by the Japanese and Soviets) developed factory ships that didn't rely on a shore station to process the whale, fisheries developed in international waters and little could be done to effectively manage whales and whaling.

Whaling for humpbacks eventually ceased for the simple reason that they had been fished out. From populations of tens of thousands, numbers were down to a few hundred by the 1960s. This made the catching of humpbacks uneconomical, and the catastrophic drop in numbers led to a complete ban on catching the species from 1962. Whaling in general was becoming more uneconomic by that time anyway, as the products of the whale, particularly the oil, were no longer needed for items such as foodstuffs.

The whaling itself, from shore stations, was often financially very precarious. Martin relates how some stations closed down and re-opened several times over the course of the twentieth century, as the economics of whaling waxed and waned. The lives of the people engaged in this activity were often hard - the whaling stations were usually in remote areas, the work was hard, dangerous and offensive to the senses, and the quarry became more elusive as each year passed. There is a certain sense of irony that much of the scientific knowledge we have about humpbacks come from scientists studying the whales caught by the whalemen, not to mention that whale tourism now brings almost as much money as whale killing used to, and is altogether a much more pleasant interaction for all involved.

This book well conveys the story of both the whales and the (mostly) men who fished for and studied them. There are some interesting photographs to illustrate the text, but I feel that there could have been a few more maps to help illustrate not only the whale's journey north to their breeding grounds and back south to the krill, but also illustrating the locations of the main whaling efforts.

Cheers for now, from

A View Over the Bell

Book Review - Crossing the Dead Heart by C.T. Madigan

 Crossing the Dead Heart by C.T. Madigan

Melbourne: Georgian House, 1946 (1948 reprint)

As the author states in the first lines of the Preface, "This book is a popular narrative of the Simpson Desert Expedition, 1939." And it's quite a good read. Cecil Madigan had spent quite a bit of time in the country skirting the Simpson Desert, and had even organised to fly over it in an airplane in 1929. He had longed to cross what was to the white man (and quite possibly the black) untracked country, and when A.A. Simpson, former president of the South Australian branch of the Royal Geographical Society of Australasia (and the person who's name has been given to the desert) offered to fund a crossing, Madigan jumped at the chance.

1939 was a propitious year for an attempt, as it was particularly wet in the Eyre Basin area. It's ironic that a description of crossing one of Australia's harshest deserts is beset with descriptions of bogs and cold weather, but that was the truth of it during this winter crossing. The aim of the Expedition was to be the first to cross the Simpson, taking note of the geography, botany and fauna of this extremely remote area of Australia.

As we now know the Simpson desert is covered in huge sand dunes that run parallel with each other for hundreds of kilometres. Any crossing from East to West requires the explorers to cross over these dunes, which is a tiring and sometimes dangerous task. The expedition travelled with camels, which in 1939 was the only feasible way to go. Travel by camel is slow, but steady, and, depending on how many dunes needed crossing, the group did not travel huge distances each day - it took approximately two weeks to cross the Simpson, although to get the camels back to Marree took the best part of another month, travelling down the Diamantina River and alongside the Eastern shores of Lake Eyre.

For me, it was the descriptions of the Channel Country that were more interesting than the crossing of the Desert itself. To read about so many deserted cattle and sheep stations was an insight into how this country can fool the traveller: if you arrive during a wetter season, as opposed to the usual drier ones, you might be convinced that you can run a decent amount of stock over the country, which of course is not the case.

This is, of course, a book of its time. Many birds are shot for food, or killed to be taken back to be studied. There are no women on the expedition. The Aboriginals are treated as novelties, although highly valued for their skills, and their stories about the country.

That stated, for those of us who haven't been to or traversed this country, this book gives a good description of the desert itself, travelling by camel (the wet weather didn't help - camels don't like damp or muddy going), how (white) people lived out in this country, as well as vignettes about way-finding and water supply (there is a lot of information about water, as you would imagine - Madigan writes a lot about the quality of the water across their journey, and in an informative and useful appendix, discusses in detail the variability of rainfall across the Eyre Basin and the inability of the country to provide permanent feed for stock).

Nowadays of course, many people have traversed the Simpson. Even with motor vehicles it's still a tough trek, although it can now be measured in days rather than weeks. One day, maybe, I'll do it, and see with my own eyes what Madigan describes in this book.

Cheers for now, from

A View Over the Bell

Book Review - To Ayers Rock and Beyond by W.E. (Bill) Harney

 To Ayers Rock and Beyond by W.E. (Bill) Harney

London: Robert Hale Limited, 1963

If you are thinking of travelling to Uluru (Ayers Rock), it would be worthwhile to read this little book before you go. Written by Bill Harney, who by the time he wrote this was a well known author of books about Central Australia and Aboriginal life and lore, To Ayers Rock and Beyond is a book written about aspects of his time as the first appointed Ranger of the Ayers Rock-Mount Olga National Park. While the book talks about the antics of the early tourists to the park, and some of the problems of transport and so-on that came with opening up the area to tourists, the book is mostly about the Aboriginal story of the area.

While Harney had spent a lifetime in Northern Australia, until he was appointed Ranger he had never been to Uluru, and he was determined to find out as much as he could about the Aboriginals of the area, and their stories and traditions. Like many white northern bushmen, Harney had a deep respect for Aboriginal Australians and their way of life, and he soon was able to spend time with local men, in particular Minyinderri, a Loritdja (Luritja) man, who could describe for Harney the dreamtime stories to do with Uluru and its immediate surrounds.

Harney spends a few chapters of this book writing about the mythical meaning of many of the features of Uluru, which has much to do with fertility and the beginning of man in that area. He describes how Minyinderri and his tribesmen, who had been living at a Mission Station some distance from their traditional lands, took some time to re-aquaint themselves with the Rock, before beginning to sing to the country, allowing Harney to transcribe some of their chants and ask as to the meaning of what they were singing. As with much Aboriginal mythology, there are many layers of meaning in their chants and singing, and what Harney describes is, I'm sure, the version that is allowed to be told to non-initiates of the tribe.

The latter part of the book describes a journey made by Harney to the Petermann Ranges, where he not only traverses the spectacular country, but learns from Djuwerri some more about the mythology of the area. Djuwerri had not been on his home country for many years, and the raw emotion that overcame him when they arrived on country is well described by Harney.

As with many books written about Central Australia in the late 1950s and early 1960s, there is an inherent sadness at the passing of one phase of Aboriginal life in the Centre. Much has been destroyed by the white man, and yet Harney can rest in the knowledge that the culture is hanging on, and even rebuilding.

This is the first book of Harney's that I have read: I had in my mind that he was a mere teller-of-tales, but this book is much more than that. It is a celebration of Aboriginal culture, as much as a white man of his generation could write. It is also a reflection on the clash of cultures; of white and black; what was passing; and some musing on what was yet to come (Harney was concerned about the commercialization of the Rock in the 1950s - imagine if he could see it now!). I will finish this review by quoting the last few lines of this book - 

"To me he [Djuwerri] epitomized the Australian aborigine. People who  helped us freely in the past, yet because of their colour and nomadic way of life, were on the scrapheap in our social structure.

Yet Welfare is moving on. Obstacles are overcome slowly. The pressure is on from both sides. When the day comes that we understand them as they understand us I hope they will have it in their hearts to forgive us our trespasses against them."

Cheers for now, from

A View Over the Bell

Book Review - Flying Fox and Drifting Sand by Francis Ratcliffe

Flying Fox and Drifting Sand by Francis Ratcliffe, with an introduction by Sir Julian Huxley

Sydney: Sirius Books / Angus and Roberston, 1963      (First edition 1938)

This is a wonderful book, both of Australian nature writing, and as a time capsule of Australian history. Francis Ratcliffe was an early ecologist of the Australian countryside, both in the tropical north and the central parts of Australia. Coming from England, he first came to Australia at the behest of the CSIR to investigate the breeding, eating, and migration habits of Flying Foxes, which were seen to be a menace to fruit growers in Northern New South Wales and Queensland. Later, he was employed to report on the erosion of the pastoral country in the North of South Australia and South-Western Queensland.

Flying Fox and Drifting Sand is Ratcliffe's account of these activities. It is not a scientific book, as his writing is more about the people he met and the adventures he had, rather than the outcomes of his "scouting", although that is there as well. What he does describe is a hard country and a harder life, and the destruction of the natural world.

Ratcliffe is often amazed at what people do to survive in these places, whether it's the Cedar-getters in Southern Queensland working on the side of precipitous mountains, or the drovers waiting out the dust-storms and drought in South Australia for better times and the chance of work. He loves their almost unfailing friendliness and hospitality, and their sheer grit.

What he struggles with is the countryside itself. The eeriness of the jungle unnerved him, as did the vast expanses of the Outback. His journeys in the Outback in particular were ones of constant tension, and fear that he might be trapped in that country for an extended period. This doesn't preclude him from wonderful descriptive passages describing the Saltbush, Dune and Channel Country of South Australia and Queensland.

The description of his journeys up the iconic tracks of the Outback are wonderful to read - it has to be remembered that much of this country had only been opened up a generation before, and that to drive these tracks was really an adventure, with vehicle rebuilds happening sometimes more than once a trip. His admiration for those locals who drove through with supplies and the mail is well-deserved.

Ratcliffe, in his research, shows that it is not nature that is the "problem", but Mankind. He showed that, given that there were millions upon millions of Flying Foxes, the damage they did to commercial crops was really inconsequential, given the cost of any remedial measures that could realistically have an effect.

What he finds in Outback South Australia and Queensland was altogether worse: overstocking was denuding the country of plant-life, and eroding the soil, turning the country to desert. The problem was (and is) simply that the country cannot support - 365 days a year, year in year out - a stocking ratio that provides an economic return. Once the country is despoiled, it is lost for at least a generation, or longer if there is no remedial action. It was Ratcliffe's first-hand experience of these problems that led him to loathe the sight of much of the country in that area.

This book has become a minor classic in Australia, reprinted often enough to be easily available second-hand, and is well worth reading for a taste of Australian bush life in the 1930s.

Cheers for now, from
A View Over the Bell