Here are some snaps and snippets from my recent trip home. Home? To the city where I was born, where I grew up, that I made a conscious choice to leave many years ago. London is home now. Melbourne is family, a few friends, home-but-not-home. What's that line from a Gang of Four song? 'At …
Author: Hilaire
I am a writer of poetry and prose. I was born and brought up in Melbourne but have lived in London most of my adult life.
difficult reading
A few thoughts on two recent reads that deal with difficult subject matter. I've just finished The Watch Tower by Elizabeth Harrower. Set in Sydney in the 1940s, it's a compelling psychological novel centring on a manipulative and abusive relationship. The novel begins as sisters Laura and Clare Vaizey are withdrawn from boarding school by …
bye bye LRB
Yesterday I cancelled my subscription to the London Review of Books. I'd been considering this for a while, ever since For Books' Sake raised the issue of the completely skewed gender imbalance in the LRB's pages, both in terms of the percentage of books by men reviewed compared to books by women (74% male authors …
Loose Muse feature
Wednesday night was blowing a gale in London, but the threatened tube strike had been suspended, and the day's lashing rain finally dried up. So, given the circumstances, there was a good turn out for Loose Muse at the Poetry Café, where I was billed as one of the two featured writers. Unfortunately, Sally Spedding, …
freesias
Once upon a time my family owned a house on a block of land in Anglesea, on the southern Victorian coast. We spent most school holidays there, the long holidays over the summer, when we'd swim and bushwalk and sometimes sail the dinghy my father built - if I remember correctly - with help from …
first Tuesday, second Wednesday
So my new year's not-quite-resolution to do less, to go out less, got off to a flying start this week when I went to two poetry events on successive nights. It was my second visit to Beyond Words in Gipsy Hill, which takes place on the first Tuesday of every month. January's star attraction was …
adieu, 2013
Paris for New Year's Eve. Et pourquoi pas? This was our incentive and reward for sticking with the French courses we'd signed up for in September. So, on 31st December we arrived in Paris early afternoon and booked into our modest 2 star hotel for a 3 night break. I'm not a huge fan of …
I blame John Hegley
Moi, je ne regrette rien. Well, I don't have many big regrets, but I do regret never having learnt to speak another language fluently. I learnt French and Russian at school; did a year of French at university before chucking in my degree; six months intensive German when I wintered, physically and emotionally, in Berlin …
dot dot dot
I am struggling to articulate my response to the Australia exhibition at the Royal Academy, which ends next Sunday. I've visited three times now. It's a big show. Each time I've spent around two hours in there. It definitely has the sense of a journey. There are some interesting echoes or counterpoints as you wander …
Curlew River
Thursday 14th November. A cold clear night. A three quarters full moon rising above the city of London. We cross from the brutalist Barbican Centre along a raised concrete walkway, down some steps and join the short queue waiting outside St Giles Cripplegate. We're here for Benjamin Britten's chamber opera Curlew River - A Parable for …
Hilaire 