Senate Inquiry into Proposed Arts Changes.

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Neville Briggs
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Re: Senate Inquiry into Proposed Arts Changes.

Post by Neville Briggs » Mon Nov 23, 2015 6:34 pm

Gary Harding wrote:The contempt with which supposedly brother poets (free verse kind) hold balladry
Just for clarification Gaz, how does that compere with the contempt with which supposedly brother poets ( balladry kind ) hold for free verse.
I ask that because I notice that you wrote
Gary Harding wrote:It also shows their junk poetry up for what it is.
Gary Harding wrote:The majority of these people are merely persuing their arts-related fun hobbies to no particular public benefit
Thank goodness the Real Poetry practitioners don't do that.
Neville
" Prose is description, poetry is presence " Les Murray.

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Gary Harding
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Re: Senate Inquiry into Proposed Arts Changes.

Post by Gary Harding » Tue Nov 24, 2015 8:26 am

Nev, no doubt before asking your question and wanting me to take the time to answer it in depth you did your own research and went through Hansard and found the part where the witness touched on bush poetry ...so you would know what I mean.

Admittedly hearing it (as I did) gives it far more impact because you hear the interaction with the audience and Senators, voice intonations and asides which can give words a totally different meaning to what is reported...but the message was there. I was very surprised hearing the harsh divide between Balladry and Free Verse verbalised at a Senate Inquiry... and I used the word contempt and not patronising because that was more accurate. This event was started by George Brandis daring to read Bush Poetry in Estimates which was a big slap in the face to those guys. How dare he do that when they are working so hard to push Lawson and Paterson to the sidelines!! Again as I said, it brought interesting stuff, Truth if you like, into the open.

OK.. so these guys had a go at us, and traditional poets were unsurprisingly not there (uninvited) to even have the opportunity to put our case and thus be able (if we were so inclined) to have a go back at them. I regret that enormously, but it's history now.

However, justice was actually done because of my Submission 1219 (Nev, take some time to read it if you haven't done so already).

If they figured they had won the day, then they were in for an absolutely gigantic shock a few weeks later on the second last day of the Inquiry when it was published.

It must have been noticed because some of it formed the core of questions asked of the Australia Council next day. Amazing.

It would all be of little consequence if these "free verse" types did not control Poetry totally and the huge amounts of money that are funneled into it. After all, the government has to be seen to be "supporting" Poetry and not ignoring it... and as long as nobody (like myself) looks too closely or rocks the boat then everyone is happy, including government, and the public stay ignorant of it all.

Money. THEY control who gets what money and what "style" is supported. That is what I have put under the microscope on two occasions in writing, no doubt to the extreme discomfort of some. Who knows.... at some point they may turn on me personally and play the man (as they did with George) because I threaten a very very Cosy arrangement, A Club, but that's another story...

So the first point is that anyone who thinks that hugely publicly funded organisations claiming to represent Australian poetry in toto treat all styles equally can forget it. Also those, including any bush poets, who are too terrified to speak their mind about Free Verse because they do not want to offend them need have no worries on that score now.

By all means believe that literary Brotherly love exists between poets of all persuasions.. Ballad and free verse .. because you want to. You believe what appeals to you most.. that everyone goes tripping happily through the poetic meadow holding hands. It is much nicer and feels good. However if the Truth is of more interest to you, then study the exchanges of this Inquiry.. or don't(!) if it might mess up what you want to believe!

Nev, there is room in the world of Poetry for all "styles"... of course. There has to be. It is money and power that need to be watched closely though... just as power corrupts, money is worse.

Why did they not accept that it was George's right to read Bush Poetry if that is his taste. Isn't that his democratic right??? Why did they try and suppress through mockery.. as they did? Why try and shout him down, as is their demonstrated and may I say cowardly style? Why?? Are they afraid that the smooth, skilled, musical and rigorous popular technique of good balladry (vis ABPA folk) simply shows their work up as chopped up sentences, hotch-potches of nice sounding words that are simply prose by another name... Ern Malley in full flight.. that has no appeal to 99.9% of Australians...or in other words... JUNK!!

But after this Inquiry and how George was treated by Free Verse types for daring to read Bush Poetry... it puts things in correct perspective.

Bush Poetry is attempted to be sidelined... Lawson, Paterson, Dennis are out, they try and convince everyone... as the money flows. Not if I have any say in it....

Your second point : If you take the time to read submissions you may also reach the conclusion that public money is being demanded by people who are merely persuing their hobby that is sort of arts-related. Writers mainly. Also people who, in the case of poetry, want to be publicly funded to be professional "modern" poets, on the public payroll.... to write about mushroom growing on the moon.
I object to that.. others may not of course.. but I do.

Thanks for your interest again Nev, and I have tried to keep it short... well it is short for me... but with 1400 views it must be an interesting ABPA subject.

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Gary Harding
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Re: Senate Inquiry into Proposed Arts Changes.

Post by Gary Harding » Thu Dec 03, 2015 10:59 am

The Final Report of the Senate Arts Inquiry has now been issued.

http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Bus ... ing/Report

.. but especially this part.. which is great stuff.

http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Bus ... Report/d01

That change is about to happen, there can be no doubt.

Importantly, change may very well include a better deal for Traditional poetry now, something that has been totally ignored in the past. It should be welcomed by ABPA members.
It has been very satisfying being able to participate and actively contribute to the exercise even although the Inquiry, as pointed out in the Government's dissenting report above, was a farce and merely an attempt at vote-getting by the Opposition parties by fanning up the anger of dumb, manipulatable Arties.

My submission/correspondence has been for Traditional/Bush Poetry on behalf of myself. The ABPA has never been mentioned. It has been nothing to do with the ABPA as an organisation because I would never presume to speak for others.

Where some cordiality at least existed before, I expect that those groups and individuals that slammed "Brandis" in writing may find the previous easy path to money somehow is not so smooth now. Views tabled in submissions written in anger, the easy way of the keyboard warrior and from the protection of a mob have a way of coming back and biting you.

If it was not for the fact that so much fascinating and revealing material has been trotted out that previously was publicly unknown, the Inquiry exercise would have been yet another total waste of taxpayer money. Now the Arties have obligingly provided an easy roadmap to revamp the whole thing, make savings and ensure that taxpayers (as compared to narrow interest groups and individuals) gain a benefit. Such a test can now be applied whereas before it was not.

That it was all stage-managed to be one-sided was a shame because the whole thing degenerated into a complaints session rather than a reasoned and lively democratic debate on the merits or otherwise of the proposed NPEA plan.

Senator Macdonald in his Senate presentation stated that people who held a contrary view (like myself) and supported NPEA were simply not invited to present to the Senate Inquiry. As early as end-July I wrote to the Committee stating that my submission stood out as a lone voice that supported the government's NPEA, and in the event that they had an interest in presenting to the public the other side of the argument well.... And I foolishly thought I was uninvited to the inquiry party because I was a bit of a rough bloke who usually got thrown out of parties. Not so. Apparently dissenting submissions were suppressed. It seems that corruption can take many forms other than backhanders...

It certainly can never be said to reflect positively in any way on the Arties.

The Government's well written Dissention document tears right into them, takes them apart and thoroughly discredits the whole thing and all those involved. Excellent. Well done. A victory of sorts. In a way I suppose that I am glad that I did not attend as a witness (for bush poetry) as some of the bad odour may have rubbed off on me.. heaven forbid. It was a bad scene.
Opposition Senators have nothing to be proud of.

The Australia Council for the Arts is being dismembered bit by bit.. control over the public's own money in Arts is being transferred progressively in a manageable way back to them. That is a good thing.

Tactically the first step is to get in-principle change in and whether you take $1m or $20m from the Australia Council in year one is irrelevant. Softly, softly, catchee monkey. Tactics.
Arties are pretty stupid and cannot see beyond themselves and thus cannot appreciate that stuff... easily out-manoeuvred and out-witted.

So for ABPA members.... what's in it?

OK... for just one example, at a personal level only, if you write well enough and want to enshrine your (good) tight work in a book or CD for the benefit of future generations, then I am anticipating that the cost of this will be modestly subsidised. Perhaps in a distant future when there is no bush left and Australian kids want to know about it and its lifestyle and values, then it is folk like ABPA members who write that can present some of it in powerful rhyme for them. The payback is a public subsidy right now. Fair enough too.

A lot more to come I think... so an OUTWARD looking approach is required. How can we as individuals and Bush Poets promote Bush Poetry, or our favourite poets like Lawson/Paterson/Dennis for the sake of ALL Australians and not just promote our own personal work?? Magazines like TAT make their contribution... as an example. Great! Promotion. It is the way to go. Money should be no object if the public literary benefit can be established. No more saying "great idea but no money to do it...". Nope.

Good times ahead I am thinking ... but it will need input from talented and motivated writers like so many people here at ABPA!! People with Vision, Imagination and Fire in the Belly for their craft ..... where are you??

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