"That’d be Right: A Fairly True History of Modern Australia," by William McInnes

"That’d be Right: A Fairly True History of Modern Australia," by William McInnes, (Sydney: Hachette Australia;  2008), 320 pages.


That’d be Right by William McInnes is labeled as “a fairly true history of Australia”, a history viewed through the author’s eyes, with a particular emphasis on sport and politics. The author approaches Australian “history” through recollection, primarily his recollections of various sporting and political events, and what he was doing when those events occurred in Australia from the 1970s through to today. McInnes narrates a series of loosely related political and sporting stories. The only relationship or connection that these political and sporting stories have with each other is the author. He connects them via a chain of recollections, observation and anecdotes, that are at time humorous, to attempt to add color and interest to what many people would ordinarily be a rather thin gruel of politics and sport. For example, he recalls his family and friends’ activities during some of the events of his youth (the 1975 Australian Federal election), a famous cricket match (the 1977 Centenary Test), events he watched was in college in the 1980’s (political rallies and other sporting matches/races) through to political and sporting events and cultural events he attended as a spouse and father.

McInnes should be lauded for writing about sport and politics from the vantage point as an interested opinionated outsider, and the impact and influence of these events on people’s lives. Many books about sport and politics are written from the vantage point of the privileged insider (journalists), participants (politician or sportsman), or historians. McInnes’s departure is that he writes about these events that span a period of at least 35 years from his perspective, while liberally garnishing it with side stories and anecdotes, much in the same way that made his earlier book such an enjoyable read. The effect is to produce humorous insights, emotional events and sentimental recollections of people’s lives during momentous events in Australia’s recent past. Unfortunately, the attempt at a so-called “fairly true history of Australia” (which may just be a marketing ploy) comes across, at times, as half-baked. At times it reads as a quickly cobbled together collection of stories loosely woven around a theme of sport and politics in a way to cash in as a follow-up to his superior first book.

McInnes is a fine storyteller and should be applauded for memorializing his recollections; however, given that McInnes places himself in the center of events (and his recollection of events) in this book, it is surprising that we know so little of our author. He comes across as somewhat two dimensional. Apparently McInnes is a well regarded actor, and has had some success on both the stage and screen (both movie and television). This success is alluded to but never addressed; it’s as though it’s assumed or taken for granted that if you read William McInnes’s books, you know who he is, and of his acting career. Many readers do not, and may even wonder aloud when reading this book, who this author is and why his views are important enough to read, if at all? Maybe it’s modesty that keeps McInnes from writing about his career achievements in his chosen profession. Or maybe it’s a wish for privacy, or a male preference to discuss manly things like politics and sport. It seems odd though that in a book about essentially about his recollections of major sporting and political events of the past 35 years that he fails to tell the reader about his rise from struggling acting student in Western Australia to established and accomplished stage, film and television actor.

Despite these minor quibbles, McInnes has written a fine book that should resonate with every lover of good, fresh stories based on the observations and conversations of ordinary suburban people. The only thing that this book lacks is the story of McInnes’s career. No doubt he could have enhanced this book with the details of how he became an expert in his chosen profession. No doubt it would be a story worth telling, and when told by McInnes, be entertaining and a useful guide as well as an account of lessons he learned in establishing himself in a most competitive profession. I suspect that he is leaving those stories for another book. Let’s hope he takes the time to writes it one, because if it is like this book, and his previous book, it would be a humorous and enjoyable read.

"A Man’s Got to Have a Hobby: Long Summers with My Dad," by William McInnes

A Man’s Got to Have a Hobby: Long Summers with My Dad, by William McInnes, Sydney: Hachette Australia, 2005.

Summary: A humorous and touching recollection of growing up in suburban Australia; a book of recalled memories of a son’s love for his father, a love that he didn’t verbally convey to his father when he was alive.

William McInnes’s A Man’s Got to Have a Hobby: Long Summers with My Dad, is not you run-of-the mill memoir. For a start, it doesn’t follow the expected model of a lot of memoirs and autobiographies where the book is a platform for the author to boast of his achievements – “I did this and I did that” – to foster admiration and respect of the author. McInnes is (apparently) an actor of some merit and relatively well known in Australia. He doesn’t tell us this fact, but are able to work it out from the fact that he is a guest of honor at a fundraiser in his home. McInnes, it seems, could have told us how he got to be successful, but chooses not to; that would be “showboating” as his Dad would call it. McInnis’s purposes is to share with us his memories of the joys and delights of growing up in the 1970s and 1980s in Redcliffe, Australia, and, through that re-telling, sharing his wonderful memories and influence of his Dad during his upbringing.

The book’s narrative is also somewhat unusual. The arrangement is not linear or chronological, but subject oriented in three parts: “A Fine Vessel,” “The Night of Nights”, and “Saying Goodbye.” In “A Fine Vessel,” McInnes recalls the past as he looks around his childhood home. While visiting the old family home, McInnes recalls what is was like to grow up in the house on the battle axe block next to the fire station. His search for the telephone in the office sparks a series of haphazard memories of his Dad’s various “renovations” that sometimes appeared unexpectedly overnight, such as a new doorway or wall. We enjoy the humorous and delightful recollections of Dad’s attempt to play tennis with a bent tennis racquet, the family’s celebrations and parties in the backyard, unusual neighbors, curious family rituals and nicknames for people and food. We learn of Dad’s outside construction projects like the incinerator in the backyard to burn household rubbish, and the brick barbeque that belched so much smoke that they called it Bismarck after the battleship of the same name in the movie “Sink the Bismarck.” We learn of McInnes’s fear of cane toads, and his father’s failed attempts of win a seat in Parliament, and the curious dress habits of members of the Labor party. It was a time when any K-Tel product was a prized possession including the glass cutter and record selector. We learn his Dad’s unique expressions, such as “Jesus wept,” “don’t be a banjo player,” and “for Christ’s sake.” His father’s insults were apparently incandescent, but often punctuated will lessons such as the recollection of his Dad’s unexpected response to McInnes’s verbal baiting by saying “if you ever judge somebody by what they are and not by what they do, then you’re a bloody fool.”

Part two, the “Night of Nights” unfolds during his presence at a fundraising dinner as one of the invited guests. Through a string of recollections stimulated by people he sees and meets, McInnes give us a bit if a history and geography lesson about Redcliffe – it’s a peninsula north of Brisbane on Moreton Bay that used to be a tourist destination for Brisbane residents in the 1940s that caught a steamer to visit that was was the site of the first penal settlement in Queensland until it was abandoned for the site o present-day Brisbane. We learn of McInnes attending Humpybong school, his adventures swimming off the pier, when he first kissed a girl, and how meeting his former football coach in the bathroom brings on some sport related memories. We are told of attending football matches with his Dad in support of the local team the Redcliffe Dolphins. McInnes recalls how he went with his father to local games demonstrates how life has changed since he was a child. In those days activities and entertainments were predominantly local. There were no national football competitions and people supported the local district teams. The team members were people from your local area, as were the supporters. Everyone knew each other. We learn of the family’s likes and dislike of certain players, and how the team had a loyal and dedicated fan base that supported them despite time never winning the competition. They did, however, manage to lose in glorious fashion.

The third part of the book, “Saying Goodbye” recalls the author’s confrontation with the death of his aunt, which in turn revives memories of the earlier death of his father. In this moving, honest, emotional and best part of the book, we learn of the importance of family and the son’s admiration and love for his Dad. McInnes recalls how Dad helped Aunt Rita find some land to build a house. Rita’s illness, suffering and death remind McInnes of his Dad’s death from numerous ailments including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and ultimately cancer. For anyone who has witnessed a loved one suffer from such ailments, the story is familiar and moving, particularly the recollections of the original diagnosis, the decline in health, and ultimately peace through passing.

These stories are a joy. They remind us all about growing up, families and their customs, and peculiarities. It’s a warm and emotional book for its reflections of the past, but it is more than this. This also book appears to be the McInnes’s way of saying that he loves his Dad. He never told him in person – even on his death bead – but he does in this book. In a way, this is also a book about love; a son’s recollections of his father, a man who saw so much suffering in war, but still carried on with life, full of energy and belief that love is the most important thing. McInnes’s book reminds us how men like his Dad are not so common any more. We learn that he was a child of the depression, and a paratrooper in the Second World War. He didn’t talk of his war experiences, but we get a glimpse of a few occasions of how deeply it affected him. On the beach on day while watching a storm, he confided to his son how the storm’s thunder and lightning was just like a barrage, just before they send you in. “Poor bastards” he said, and McInnes knew he was thinking of his friends and the war. On another occasion when visiting Dad in hospital, McInnes recalled how Dad used to say “get some milk for the baby.” One of McInnes’s sisters recalled that as something from the war. Dad was part of the army liberating the concentration camp at Belsen. Upon entering, Dad was approached by a lady with a dead baby in her arms asking him to get some milk for it. Knowing that the baby was dead, and had probably been dead for days, and that there was no milk, he cradled the baby in his arms and said to his colleagues to get some milk for the baby. That’s the sort of person he was.

McInnes’s memoir is compelling and thoroughly enjoyable. It’s both a memoir of growing up in the Brisbane suburbs in the 1970s and 1980s, as well as a tribute to his Dad. Its historical, funny and poignant, a thoroughly enjoyable book that mixes comedy and tragedy, humor and suffering, life and death, but is ultimately a joyful and optimistic celebration of life.