The difference between literature and journalism is that journalism is unreadable and literature is not read.

It's a long way to the top (if you want to rock 'n roll). Liverpool Street, Hobart. December 2011.

A couple of books this week as we near the end of the year. These two represent numbers 98 and 99 for the year and I should finish Martin Amis's Times Arrow shortly to crack the hundred!

First Love by Ivan Turgenev was first published in 1860 and concerns the memory of the narrator’s first love. I have read that the novel is regarded as a Russian 'classic' and an important book in teaching young Russians. The conclusion itself is masterfully done, not really a surprise as such, but it does force the reader to reassess what had happened up to that point.

While the romantic tensions inherent in First Love might seem somewhat naive to present sensibilities, it has a restrained charm that makes it an enjoyable read. Highly recommended.

The second book is Revolutionaries is a collection of reviews and essays by Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm written through the 1960s. I have read most of these before, but not much since Henry has been around.

There’s no doubt that Hobsbawm's style is among the most accessible and lively of historians, and Revolutionaries covers all sorts of topics related revolution, high politics and (or course) socialism. As with any such collection, the quality varies a bit, but it is generally high. Obviously the content is somewhat dated (the world has changed a little since 1968), but there remain some really pertinent points.

For example, the essay on Vietnam – first published in 1965 just as the United States was escalating its commitment of troops – succinctly and presciently maps out the reasons why the victory of the Vietnamese Communists was inevitable. In many respects, *some* of this logic can be extended to the Afghanistan situation today.

So, if you are into that sort of thing, this should be well worth picking up and giving a go.

Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it...

I still have the robot on the job. Here you can see the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery . And here is a poem: Soliloquy for One Dead Bruce Dawe Ah, no, Joe, you never knew the whole of it, the whistling which is only the wind in the chimney's smoking belly, the footsteps on the muddy path that are always somebody else's. I think of your limbs down there, softly becoming mineral, the life of grasses, and the old love of you thrusts the tears up into my eyes, with the family aware and looking everywhere else. Sometimes when summer is over the land, when the heat quickens the deaf timbers, and birds are thick in the plumbs again, my heart sickens, Joe, calling for the water of your voice and the gone agony of your nearness. I try hard to forget, saying: If God wills, it must be so, because of His goodness, because- but the grasshopper memory leaps in the long thicket, knowing no ease. Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it... I like Bruce Dawe. He just my be my favourite Austral

There was nothing left. No reason, no conscience, no understanding; even the most rudimentary sense of life or death, good or evil, right or wrong.

Here is a self portrait. I’m calling it Portrait of a lady in a dirty window . Shocking, isn’t it? However, it is apt! Samhain , Nos Galan Gaeaf , Hop-tu-Naa , All Saints , All Hallows , Hallowmas , Hallowe'en or HALLOWEEN . It’s Theme Thursday and we’re talking about the festivals traditionally held at the end of the harvest season. Huh? No wonder Australians have trouble with the concept of HALLOWEEN. For the record, in my thirty-two L O N G years on the planet, I can’t say I’ve ever seen ghosts ‘n goblins, trick ‘n treaters or Michael Myers stalking Tasmania’s streets at the end of October. [That said, I did once see a woman as pale as a ghost turning tricks that looked like Michael Myers in late November one time.] Despite the best efforts of Hollywood, sitcoms, and innumerable companies; it seems Australians are impervious to the [ahem] charms of a corporatized variant of a celebration of the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darke

In dreams begin responsibilities.

A life at sea, that's for me, only I just don't have the BREAD. That's right, Theme Thursday yet again and I post a photo of a yacht dicking about in Bass Strait just off Wynyard. The problem is, I am yet again stuck at work, slogging away, because I knead need the dough . My understanding is that it is the dough that makes the BREAD. And it is the BREAD that buys the yacht. On my salary though, I will be lucky to have enough dough or BREAD for a half dozen dinner rolls. Happy Theme Thursday people, sorry for the rush.

This will hurt me...

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