Four Aussie Heroes
September 9th 2006 07:35
It’s been quite a week or so for Australians. We have lost Steve Irwin our passionate lover of animals who believed that as ‘he touched an animal he touched the heart of a person too”. We have also lost Peter Brock, a great ambassador of the car racing world – who aimed for perfection in all he did. Men gone before their time, in many people’s eyes. I, like many, extend sympathy to their nearest and dearest. Earlier we lost a larrikin politician, in Don Chipp who dared to make politicians more accountable.
But as I am someone of a certain era and someone who enjoys Aussie stories, I am feeling the loss of Colin Thiele. It was he who made me realize that there were people who still wrote about what happened in their part of Australia – beyond the earlier writers like Henry Lawson and Banjo Patterson. He is most famous for “Storm Boy” but he wrote many, many other books.
I love “the Sun on the Stubble”. Remember Bruno Untermeyer Gunther, whose mother proudly wrote his initials on his bag so everyone called him “Bugsie” - whose teacher confided in him that she used to be called Guzzly – because her name was Kathryn Evelyn Gent? And remember his mum who thought that “every one …was born with a fixed reservoir of blood in their body, and if any was allowed to leak away… it couldn’t be replaced…and if that was the case it was obvious that Dad must be very nearly empty…”? Not to mention the stray cat with fireworks on its tail that ran through the wheat crop and his father who drained the oil of his new truck but didn’t know he had to fill it up again. All good tales that will be with me all my life.
All four men were important to the fabric of this society- each in their special fields of endeavor. So thank you Don, Steve and Peter – and thank you Colin Thiele. Australian heroes who left us this week.
But as I am someone of a certain era and someone who enjoys Aussie stories, I am feeling the loss of Colin Thiele. It was he who made me realize that there were people who still wrote about what happened in their part of Australia – beyond the earlier writers like Henry Lawson and Banjo Patterson. He is most famous for “Storm Boy” but he wrote many, many other books.
All four men were important to the fabric of this society- each in their special fields of endeavor. So thank you Don, Steve and Peter – and thank you Colin Thiele. Australian heroes who left us this week.
| 51 |
| Vote |
Subscribe to this blog
Comment by Cinico
Small Business Scope
Great post.
Comment by bumpkin
Surviving Rural Life
Living Rural
Thanks for your comment. Storm Boy was also very special. As you sad all four heroes to someone - the world need such heroes hope we can all be someone's hero (isn't there a children's book about that somewhere?)