Frank Amongst The Corn

It’s hard to say that there is exactly an engaging freshness about the orn Australian author Frank Clune can produce, but at least the sheer olume of it fascinates as well as flattens.

-IERE aren’t many writers in Aus tralia who could wring 262 es out of a journey from Goul n to Mt. Kosciusko via Canberra; , thank God, there are few who ild want to. But in his 54th book, oss the Snowy Mountains, he lages to do this, and to supply r 50 pictures as well (Many in ie Clune—“Frank Clune with the q. Arthur Calwell”; or “Frank me with artist, William Dobell”, Ve imagine that Frank started out h the idea of telling the world and ow citizens something about Aus ia’s Snowy Mountains Scheme—a ry well-worth telling—but owing bis habit of running up every lane I by-way in pursuit of ancient numents, descendants of pioneers, -ends of history and bushrangers’ mping grounds, it is page 194 be e you get within coo-ee of it. He n begins: “Let’s tell the world! stralia’s Snowy Mountains Hydro :ctric Scheme is the biggest engin ing construction in progress to f”

By this time he has already used ;ry cliche in the English language, t this fact doesn’t leave him speech s for the remaining 70-odd pages. )t a bit of it—he just uses them all er again.

The book abounds in inverted commas, quotes from everything from Childe Harold to the Wild Colonial Boy; capital letters; rhyming Aus tralianisms and Names. (“Bill Dobell stays at my home when he visits Sydney.” Bill also painted a portrait of “my wife”; he said she was “the Rubens type”.) Everyone, according to Frank, loves Frank; they welcome him with open arms and he puts them in a book.

In the course of his literary journey he discusses art, politics, the trans portation of convicts, history, geo graphy and— always—the business of being an Australian. (“When I was in London recently I was asked what makes an Australian. I told them. ) If you can sift the wheat from the quotation marks, capital letters and italics of Frank’s death-defying prose, he has in this book, as well as in his other 53, a lot of fact and history that few others bother to record and for this he no doubt should be given his own unique niche in Australian writing.

What’s more —as Frank himself would no doubt point out— people buy what he writes and that, in the ultimate analysis, is the best possible reason for publishing a book.

(Across The Snowy Mountains.

Angus and Robertson Ltd. 27/6.)

Book launching is quite something in Sydney these days. At left, Mrs. Charles Walton (known to most people as Nancy Bird) with her "Born to Fly", and Colin Simpson with his latest, "Show Me a Mountain" —both books were reviewed here last month. Above is Mr W J. Lahore, chief manager of the Australia and New Zealand Bank in NSW, with the bank's 100th anniversary volume, just published. Jim Lahore is well known in Suva, where he was first manager of the Suva branch in 1951.