Naked in Leopard Skin Born into Italian aristocracy in 1881 and heiress to a fortune made in cotton, Luisa managed to run up personal debts of $25 million. She and her sister had been orphaned when both parents died and Luisa was only fifteen years old. The Marchesa Casati was a devotee of the Paris … [Read more…]
Cleopatra’s Erotic Vagrancy Cleopatra V11 – born around 69 BC – was an object of fascination and gossip even in her own time. She was a child goddess who was married off to her brother and became Egypt’s queen at eighteen. After many poisonings, killings, plot twists and turns, Cleopatra went on to … [Read more…]
Romancing the Mushroom pine mushrooms live a thousand years in one autumn Den Sutejo 1633-1698 (translated by Makoto Ueda) Autumn in Melbourne is a fine time to take a trip to the Prahran Market and visit the wild mushroom man, Damien Pike. For many years he’s been sourcing and selling mushrooms. Much … [Read more…]
The Insanity of Love ‘Marriage is the tomb of love.’ Giacomo Casanova Some time ago I went to hear Alain de Botton – philosopher and author speaking about modern relationships and love in Melbourne’s gloomy town hall. I’m not sure our drafty town hall is conducive to love. The couple in … [Read more…]
My Favourite Horror Child Eloise and I go way back. At about seven I discovered six-year-old Eloise. She was parent-free, running amuck in the Plaza New York with her nanny, a pug and a turtle. I didn’t find it strange that Eloise exercised with champagne bottles, as my sister and I had hidden … [Read more…]
25 Cats named Sam and One Blue Pussy The reason I hate regular underwear – and socks, too – is that if you send twenty pairs of shorts and twenty pairs of socks to the laundromat, you always only get nineteen back. Even when I wash them myself, I get nineteen back. The more I think about … [Read more…]
Venus in Steel He has the slimy assurance, the gross patter about transcendence through art, of a blow-dried Baptist selling swamp acres in Florida. And the result is that you can’t imagine America’s singularly depraved culture without him. Robert Hughes on Jeff Koons. Jeff Koons has always been a divisive … [Read more…]
Phoenix Rising ‘Hope. It’s like a drop of honey, a field of tulips blooming in the springtime. It’s a fresh rain, a whispered promise, a cloudless sky, the perfect punctuation mark at the end of a sentence. And it’s the only thing in the world keeping me afloat.’ Tahereh Mafi Moira Finucane … [Read more…]
‘He who loves not women, wine and song remains a fool his whole life long’. Martin Luther – Professor of theology, author, composer, Augustinian monk. Trees of Paradise Historians believe our Christmas trees might be a close relative of the Medieval Trees of Paradise that appeared in Western Europe around late December in … [Read more…]
Pagan Rituals Many present day Christmas traditions were derived from ancient cultures. Originally created by our ancestors, the same rituals manifest across the Western World every December. In the past these traditions were mysterious and sacred rites. They were backed by superstition, belief in magic and the desire to protect communities from fear of the … [Read more…]
FLASH GORDON ‘Flash, Flash, I love you, but we only have fourteen hours to save the Earth!’ Flash Gordon (1980) Ming the Merciless from the planet Mongo, has a delightfully wicked line in evil patter – ‘Pathetic Earthlings … Who can save you now? ’ Played by Max von Sydow, … [Read more…]
BARBARELLA Barbarella psychedella, There’s a kind of cockleshell about you. Dazzle me with rainbow colour; Fade away the duller shade of living. Theme song from Barbarella. When it first hit me just how serious COVID_19 was, the original 1982 Bladerunner movie (set in an apocalyptic world in 2019) suddenly seemed prophetic. I wanted … [Read more…]
HALLOWEEN AND PAGAN JOLLIFICATION October turns my local supermarket black and orange. Ghoulish looking snacks appear and recipes are popular for anything that resembles decapitated hands, lost eyeballs, witches, jack-o-lanterns and skeletons. Currently popular are frozen hands in a bowl of spiced up red wine for the adults or red cordial for les enfants. … [Read more…]
This Charming Man ‘If people turn to look at you in the street, you are not well dressed, but either too stiff, too tight, or too fashionable.’ Beau Brummell (George Bryan Brummell 1778-1840) 2020 is a year where fashion was sidelined. As the pandemic seized control of the globe, fashion was … [Read more…]
Book Dreaming I’ve often been asked – what are the books that meant a lot to me growing up. This is a difficult question because there are so many books I love. And I often revisit books, usually classics, I already know are going to transport me. In winter there’s pleasure to be had in … [Read more…]
Freud’s Cigar ‘Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.’ Dr Sigmund Freud 1856 -1939. In my novel The Scandalous Life Of Sasha Torte, Sasha is introduced to the famous Austrian neurologist Dr Sigmund Freud, at The Sperl Café in Vienna. Sasha Torte – world famous Tasmanian pastry chef – is very taken with … [Read more…]
My Life as a Nightclub Cocktail Girl When I was a child, my mother used to play vintage movie songs and the lyrics to Gigi were: The night they invented champagne It’s plain as it can be They thought of you and me The night they invented champagne They absolutely knew That all … [Read more…]
The Problem With Henry ‘I swear again, I would not be a queen For all the world.’ Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII’s second wife. Shakespeare, The Life of King Henry the Eighth. King Henry VIII has been receiving bad press for centuries. Shakespeare, along with later writers and playwrights, got in … [Read more…]
There Goes the Neighbourhood Dogs ‘A lover tries to stand in well with the pet dog of the house.’ Molière (Jean-Baptiste Poquelin) French playwright, actor & poet. In my bayside suburb dogs are everywhere you go. There may well be a pandemic rampaging across the globe but for our local dogs, it’s … [Read more…]
Shakespeare’s Lascivious Lutes ‘Grim-visaged war hath smooth’d his wrinkled front; And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds To fright the souls of fearful adversaries, He capers nimbly in a lady’s chamber To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.’ Richard III by William Shakespeare. I went to a girl’s high school in … [Read more…]
La Dolce Vita Italy is easing back on restrictions in line with its COVID-19 emergency plans. Border controls are changing and gyms, swimming pools and sports centres recently reopened. Theatres and cinemas are reopening. In a country dedicated to the fine arts this is important. After all, Italians understand style and the art … [Read more…]
Dorian Gray’s Devilish Desires ‘The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.’ The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde In Oscar Wilde’s novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray the characters throw themselves around dramatically and rarely ever sit quietly. They fling themselves at the furniture with … [Read more…]
Hello Sailor As the Water Rat in Wind in the Willows, advises the mole, ‘Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing – absolutely nothing – half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.’ I messed around in boats when I learned to sail on a lake. It was comedic right … [Read more…]
Beach Dogs Bayside Melbourne is dog heaven. During shutdown I’ve been walking the beach promenade every day. It provides a complete brain clean. Many mongrels and pedigree hounds are out there on the beach before first light. I chat to the owners outside the Guilty Moose café, as I pick up my morning takeout … [Read more…]
I Want That Cake ‘Let there be no shame on me tonight!’ Prince Wenzel von Metternich 1832 The narrator of my novel, The Scandalous Life of Sasha Torte, was named in honour of a famous cake. Sasha Torte is a world-class Tasmanian pastry chef and she establishes her magnificent cake emporium in Wolfftown, a fictional … [Read more…]