My second novel

I wrote my first football story when I was eight. It was my second novel.

My first novel was called Wombat because it was about a wombat.

My football novel was about our family driving from Shepparton to VFL Park in our Morris 1100, to see Geelong play Footscray, the second game of VFL footy I’d ever seen. It was sort of Jack Kerouac meets Adventure Island and the principal theme was injustice. Geelong lost by two points when a goal in the dying minutes to Billy Goggin was disallowed, and a free kick given to Gary Dempsey. The story describes the innocent good fortune of our family’s decision to sit with the Geelong cheer squad (“Oh, that looks like a group of Geelong people”) , and being completely drawn into the game – all in Grade 3 language.

I suspect I had good teachers at Gowrie St Primary School in Shep: Miss Jeffries, Miss Phillips, and others. (Writer and Acme Almanac Launcher Anson Cameron was a year ahead of me at Gowrie St – we discovered one night over a beer.) Those teachers read us stories, and they encouraged us to read stories ourselves.

We had stories in our home. Daily. Every Thursday we visited the library. Bill Peat was one of my favourite authors, and as I now try to be a father to my children I realise the Pa in the Bernstein Bears has had a profound effect on me. (Particularly insofar as the selection of picnic sites and the tutoring of bike-riding skills are concerned).

I have continued to love words.

I started my post-uni life as a Maths and Phys Ed teacher, but it wasn’t long and I was teaching History, English and Politics in schools – and Australian Studies and Sports History as a sessional teacher in unis.

I had always written – letters and postcards mainly. And eventually I realised that the academic writing of the varsity was too stifling for me. I liked people and their stories and I loved listening to them. So I started to write stories, and tell stories, which really I had been doing since I first sensed that wombats told us a lot about life.

I have been visiting schools, and speaking at workshops and seminars, since just after my first book came out in 1999.

In schools I try to get kids to write and to realise they have so much to write about, because life is what happens to them, not to someone on TV. Often it’s about getting them to remember their first footy match, or first musical instrument, a holiday, a relative, and so on.

These sessions are good fun, and students will become published writers if they want, as their stories will be published here at www.footyalmanac.com.au

We have a lot of talented and experienced writers, artists, and media types who are involved here at the Almanac. And even a mathematician (Flynny). Beginning now (Term 4, 2012) we are starting a program of school visits, in all of the states.

This program is being administered by Phil Dimitriadis.

Almanackers involved include:

John Harms (national – writer, broadcaster, historian)

Anson Cameron (Victoria – writer, columnist)

Tony Wilson (Victoria – children’s books, feature writer, broadcaster, film-maker)

Cheryl Critchley (Victoria – journalist, writer)

Craig Little (Victoria – writer, spin-doctor)

Michael Hyde (Victoria – writer, academic)

Phil Dimitriadis (Victoria – writer, academic, ESL teacher, multicultural specialist)

Chris Riordon (Victoria – teacher, sportswriter)

Andrew Starkie (Victoria – writer, teacher)

Adam McNicol (Victoria – writer, journalist, TV journalist, boy from Manangatang)

David Bridie (Victoria – musician, composer, writer)

Jim Pavlidis (Victoria – artist, illustrator)

Martin Tighe (Victoria – artist, furniture restorer, teacher)

Peter Flynn (Victoria – mathematician, academic, writer)

Sean Gorman (Western Australia – writer, academic, Indigenous Studies specialist)

Mike Sexton (South Australia – TV journalist, writer)

Bill Ellis (Queensland – zoologist, writer)

 

In the coming weeks a Footy Almanac School Visits page will be established, which will include details of the participating Almanackers.

 

Each visit will be tailored individually, to suit the requirements of the group.

 

To invite one of our contributors to your school, contact me in the first instance [email protected] or on 0417635030.