Monday, October 22, 2007
Wallaman Falls, Far North Queensland
Wallaman Falls, visited June 2006 Second video is the cassowary we were lucky enough to see on the way back from the falls viewing area. If you see a cassowary stay in your car, they are quite dangerous.
Honeyeaters at Ivy Cottage video
Once again these are white cheeked and macleay's honeyeaters. They are tucking into leftovers. In the second video the light is just terrible but at least it gives you a feel for the numbers of birds that come in. The reference to "vicious rainforest birds" is a long standing family joke. It refers to a sign that was outside an aquarium on Magnetic Island many years ago encouraging passers by to come in and see "the feeding frenzy of the vicious reef sharks". When you went in, you found the sharks they were referring to were all little baby black tip reef sharks, mostly about 12 inches long. Tiny and not what I expected at all. LOL.
Ivy Cottage Paluma
These photos are of birds at Ivy Cottage at Paluma in far north Queensland, which is to the north of Townsville. The Victoria's Riflebirds (top)were hard to capture on film, and even these don't do them justice. Magnificent birds. The lower photo is a white cheeked honeyeater and numerous Macleay's honeyeaters. I didn't get photos of the bowerbirds unfortunately.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Waltzing Matilda - lyrics and meaning a la Snodge
Waltzing Matilda was written by Andrew Barton “Banjo” Patterson.
The following notes are provided to help people understand the song and what it is about.
See below for lyrics.
Swagman: more usually referred to as a “swaggie”. Commonest translation of “swagman” is tramp or hobo, but that’s not quite the same. It’s someone who walks the tracks of the bush/outback looking for work, or subsistence. Rural Australia relied heavily on such itinerant workers for a very long time and it was the custom that landholders would assist swaggies when they turned up by issue of food perhaps tea/tobacco/sugar/meat/flour. The swagman is a man who carries a swag.
Jolly: in Australia in times gone by, certainly it was still the case when I was very small, "jolly" was used as an all purpose expletive. I don't believe it is intended only to infer that the swagman was jolly in the sense of happy and good humoured. A double meaning fits the context very well... here's a jolly swagman - inoffensive and doing noone any harm.
Swag: is usually translated as “bedroll”. Can be a blanket inside of which you carefully secure your essential belongings. You might put your belongings on the blanket then roll it up and tie it either at either end with a rope which is then used like a handle. You sling the swag across your shoulder by the rope and off you go. The iconic image has a “billy” attached on the outside.
A swag is also known as a “matilda”. A “matilda” was also a term for a common law wife which may have influenced the use of the term for the swag. It would have been consistent with Australian humour if this was the case. Afterall, a common law wife is someone you sleep with consistently without being married, as you do your swag. So your swag is your matilda.
Waltzing matilda. If you’re walking along with your swag on your back, the swag moves with your body as you walk and you’re said to be “waltzing matilda”. Some suggest that the German word “waltzen” which has been translated as “to tramp or hike” or wander about was also an influence. Again you see the play on the words which is a very typical sort of witty word play style of humour Australians have long been fond of.
Billabong: a backwater off a river. A billabong fills when there is a flood, then as the water recedes it gets isolated from the flow. Australia has an endless cycle of drought and flood. Billabongs are where bunyips reside. A bunyip is a sort of scary monster creature. Reputedly incredibly ugly but it usually appears in children’s stories as a poor gentle misunderstood creature that everyone is scared of but deserving of sympathy. Though in the case of this story, I guess the ghost of the swaggie has reign at this billabong.
Coolabah tree: a type of native tree of the species eucalyptus. The shade of a coolabah tree isn’t very deep. The canopy is quite light, so it’s dappled shade. You find coolabah trees in the outback, so you know that the events of the song take place in a very remote area. No shops, no services.
Billy: a small tin pail (maybe 1 litre capacity) with a handle. It is used like a universal cooking pot and kettle. To “boil the billy” means to make tea ie the drink.
Jumbuck: a term for sheep.
Tucker: food
Squatter: the landholder. There’s a fair bit of history behind how the landholders came by their land. The squatters would simply go and occupy vast areas of land. Over time and various changes to the laws they came to have tenure. It was an inequitable process that heavily favoured the wealthy and lead to a range of interesting historical events we don’t need to discuss here. The fact that the squatter in the song is described as being mounted on his thoroughbred is a reference to the wealth of the landowner and the great divide between the landholders and the workers. There is a bit of a sub-text of “the bastard could surely spare one bloody sheep for a poor swaggie”. The song was written just after a very bitter shearers strike in the 1890s which was about the time of a severe drought and economic depression. The government (and police) backed the landholders against the striking shearers. There was violence and political upheaval. The union movement really got going. Shortly after these events the Australian Labor party was formed.
Trooper: the police of their day. It is significant that the troopers are there backing up the wealthy squatter. This is a reference to the system being stacked against the workers. There’s a thread weaving through many Australian historical events of power corrupted and the law being used to protect the interests of the wealthy.
“Where’s that jolly jumbuck you’ve got in your tucker bag” = hand over that sheep
“You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me” at the end of the this stanza means “you’re under arrest”.
“You’ll never take me alive” = “I’ll see you in hell”. This is an echo of some Australian bushrangers ie outlaws the most famous of whom were driven to bushranging through the actions of corrupt police and associated injustices. In particular one named Ben Hall is famous for this phrase. Ned Kelly, another great Australian icon, is also deeply associated with this sort of tragic result of police corruption and social injustice. "You'll never take me alive" can be seen as an Australian statement of "liberty or death".
So there you have it. Waltzing Matilda is the story of a poor Aussie “battler” driven to suicide by the selfishness of the wealthy and the impacts of a system in which the only way to survive is to take what you have to. It is a story that speaks to the deep commitment of Australians to the concept of a “fair go”.
Waltzing Matilda is more than a folk song. This is the national song of Australia and will stir national pride far more than the official anthem. You know they’re really going for patriotic feeling when they roll out Waltzing Matilda at a sporting event. It is so effective at rousing the crowd some opposition teams have tried to ban the crowd singing it.
Waltzing Matilda (modern commonly known version). Follow the link to the youtube listing of the late great Slim Dusty singing Waltzing Matilda.
Once a jolly swagman camped by a billabong
Under the shade of a coolabah tree
And he sang as he watched and waited till his billy boiled
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
Waltzing matilda, waltzing matilda
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
And he sang as he watched and waited till his billy boiled
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
Down came a jumbuck to drink at the billabong
Up jumped the swagman and grabbed him with glee
And he sang as he shoved that jumbuck in his tucker bag
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
Waltzing matilda, waltzing matilda
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
And he sang as he shoved that jumbuck in his tucker bag
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
Down came the squatter, mounted on his thoroughbred
Up came the troopers, one two three
Where’s that jolly jumbuck you’ve got in your tuckerbag
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
Waltzing matilda, waltzing matilda
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
Where’s that jolly jumbuck you’ve got in your tucker bag
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
Up jumped the swagman and sprang into the billabong
“You’ll never take me alive” said he
And his ghost may be heard as you pass by the billabong
“You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me”
[sing softly now…]
Waltzing matilda, waltzing matilda
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
And his ghost may be heard as you pass by the billabong
You’ll come a waltzing matilda with me
Weary Dunlop Memorial
Here is a photo of the Weary Dunlop Memorial in Benalla, Victoria. Just in case you can't read it, the words around the plinth are Friendship, Courage, Forgiveness. Weary is the big bloke at the back supporting the emaciated POW. Despite the dreadful things he witnessed in the prisoner of war camps on the Burma railroad, on his repatriation Weary was a shining light of leadership, encouraging forgiveness for the events of the war, supporting veterans and leading humanitarian aid projects in Asia. A very great Australian.
Could this possibly be one of the best speeches ever?
This is a speech by John Gorton, delivered April 1946 when as a veteran he addressed a welcome home celebration for returned servicemen in his home town in Victoria. Bob Davey was a local man who was killed. What a shame it isn't better known. The message is eternal.
There has been a good deal of confusion of thought as to why we went to war, and as to what we can reasonably expect as the result of our military victory. We did not go to war to make a new and better world as the result of the exercise of brute military force. We can only expect to achieve the kind of world we want by the use of brains and effort during peace. We fought only to preserve, for ourselves and our children, that conception of political freedom and justice which was being attacked by a tyrannous power. We succeeded in that defence. Yet, I have heard not only civilians but returned soldiers say that because the world is not better, but worse, therefore the war was fought in vain. That is was a futile thing without reason or result, and that all the suffering which was entailed was wasted.
It was not wasted. We retained a system of government in which we, the people, choose our governors, dismiss them when we wish, and have a voice in our own destiny. We retained a conception of justice in which the humblest one amongst us has equal rights before the law with the head of the state. We believed that those principles were worth defending, not because in themselves they provided all that could be desired for human happiness, but because we believed that we could only advance to a full and satisfying life for all if we retained the freedom on which to build.
But it is now, in the peace, that we must make our advances. I believe that the returned serviceman wishes us to secure for all men that economic freedom which we have never had, and to which all who are willing to work are surely entitled. We must remove from the minds of men the fear of poverty as the result of illness, or accident, or old age. We must turn our schools into institutions which will produce young men and women avid for further education and increased knowledge. We must raise the material standard of living so that all children can grow up with sufficient space and light and proper nourishment; so that women may be freed from domestic drudgery; and so that those scientific inventions which are conducive to a more gracious life may be brought within the means of all. We must raise the spiritual standard of living so that we may get a spirit of service to the community and so that we may live together without hate, even though we may differ on the best road to reach our objectives. And we must do all this without losing that political freedom which has cost us so dearly, and without which these tasks cannot be accomplished.
Outside Australia peace has set us tasks as hard. All around us we see a world living in the gloom of half-peace, in the immediate agony of starvation and disease, and in the shadow of a future atomic world, whether we like it or not. And what affects the world will affect us. We must do our utmost to alleviate the immediate suffering, and we must take our place in the world, not as a self-sufficient, sealed-off unit, but as a member of a family, the members of which are dependent the one upon the other. We must do this. For no person of susceptibility, no soldier who has seen his comrades killed, no Christian, above all no mother with growing children can stand idly by and see the chance which we have once more won, once more wasted.
That is why I demand of you, in the name of the dead and the returned, that you do not consider this war as a task finished; that you not regard this celebration as the last chapter in the book. Look on it rather as half-time! A joyful occasion certainly, but only a break in the continuous task. For tomorrow we must carry on again, and the tasks which lie in front of us are immense and urgent as never before.
What can we do? Individually, it may not be much. But we can at least all think on the problems which are in front of us and be ready to act on our thoughts if the opportunity arises. We can try to reason out how we may best take our place in the family of nations, and how we may best provide a full and satisfactory life for all our citizens. We can practice tolerance and understanding. And we can be ready always to defend against attacks, either from within or without, the political freedom, the measure of freedom which we already have.
It will be hard. Without the spur and urgency of a war, it will mean a constant effort from all of us. But I am going to call on your imaginations. I want you to forget it is I who am standing here. And I want you to see instead Bob Davey. And behind I want you to see an army; regiment on regiment of young men, dead. They say to you, burning in tanks and aeroplanes, drowning in submarines, shattered and broken by high explosive shells, we gave the last full measure of devotion. We have bought your freedom with our lives. So take this freedom. Guard it as we have guarded it, use it as we can no longer use it, and with it as a foundation, build. Build a world in which meanness and poverty, tyranny and hate, have no existence. If you see and hear these men behind me – do not fail them.
There has been a good deal of confusion of thought as to why we went to war, and as to what we can reasonably expect as the result of our military victory. We did not go to war to make a new and better world as the result of the exercise of brute military force. We can only expect to achieve the kind of world we want by the use of brains and effort during peace. We fought only to preserve, for ourselves and our children, that conception of political freedom and justice which was being attacked by a tyrannous power. We succeeded in that defence. Yet, I have heard not only civilians but returned soldiers say that because the world is not better, but worse, therefore the war was fought in vain. That is was a futile thing without reason or result, and that all the suffering which was entailed was wasted.
It was not wasted. We retained a system of government in which we, the people, choose our governors, dismiss them when we wish, and have a voice in our own destiny. We retained a conception of justice in which the humblest one amongst us has equal rights before the law with the head of the state. We believed that those principles were worth defending, not because in themselves they provided all that could be desired for human happiness, but because we believed that we could only advance to a full and satisfying life for all if we retained the freedom on which to build.
But it is now, in the peace, that we must make our advances. I believe that the returned serviceman wishes us to secure for all men that economic freedom which we have never had, and to which all who are willing to work are surely entitled. We must remove from the minds of men the fear of poverty as the result of illness, or accident, or old age. We must turn our schools into institutions which will produce young men and women avid for further education and increased knowledge. We must raise the material standard of living so that all children can grow up with sufficient space and light and proper nourishment; so that women may be freed from domestic drudgery; and so that those scientific inventions which are conducive to a more gracious life may be brought within the means of all. We must raise the spiritual standard of living so that we may get a spirit of service to the community and so that we may live together without hate, even though we may differ on the best road to reach our objectives. And we must do all this without losing that political freedom which has cost us so dearly, and without which these tasks cannot be accomplished.
Outside Australia peace has set us tasks as hard. All around us we see a world living in the gloom of half-peace, in the immediate agony of starvation and disease, and in the shadow of a future atomic world, whether we like it or not. And what affects the world will affect us. We must do our utmost to alleviate the immediate suffering, and we must take our place in the world, not as a self-sufficient, sealed-off unit, but as a member of a family, the members of which are dependent the one upon the other. We must do this. For no person of susceptibility, no soldier who has seen his comrades killed, no Christian, above all no mother with growing children can stand idly by and see the chance which we have once more won, once more wasted.
That is why I demand of you, in the name of the dead and the returned, that you do not consider this war as a task finished; that you not regard this celebration as the last chapter in the book. Look on it rather as half-time! A joyful occasion certainly, but only a break in the continuous task. For tomorrow we must carry on again, and the tasks which lie in front of us are immense and urgent as never before.
What can we do? Individually, it may not be much. But we can at least all think on the problems which are in front of us and be ready to act on our thoughts if the opportunity arises. We can try to reason out how we may best take our place in the family of nations, and how we may best provide a full and satisfactory life for all our citizens. We can practice tolerance and understanding. And we can be ready always to defend against attacks, either from within or without, the political freedom, the measure of freedom which we already have.
It will be hard. Without the spur and urgency of a war, it will mean a constant effort from all of us. But I am going to call on your imaginations. I want you to forget it is I who am standing here. And I want you to see instead Bob Davey. And behind I want you to see an army; regiment on regiment of young men, dead. They say to you, burning in tanks and aeroplanes, drowning in submarines, shattered and broken by high explosive shells, we gave the last full measure of devotion. We have bought your freedom with our lives. So take this freedom. Guard it as we have guarded it, use it as we can no longer use it, and with it as a foundation, build. Build a world in which meanness and poverty, tyranny and hate, have no existence. If you see and hear these men behind me – do not fail them.
Monday, October 15, 2007
the quintessential explanation of Waltzing Matilda
I have just had the privilege of reading Prime Minister Paul Keating's address at the celebrations for the 100th anniversary of the first performance of Waltzing Matilda. The address was a gift to the nation delivered on 6 April 1995. As such I am sure that Mr Keating would not object to my reproducing it in full in this blog for the benefit of others. It is quite long, but it is worth the read. I hope you also enjoy it. It moved me to tears.
This is a great honour. It is one to tell our grandchildren about: we were in the North Gregory Hotel when Australia celebrated the first performance of Waltzing Matilda 100 years ago. And we were all in evening dress. Which is something the swagman would have found amusing – but maybe the squatter, the troopers and Banjo Paterson would have appreciated it. I’m sure they all would have liked the irony in it.
[These celebrations] are reminding us of the spirit of the bush and commemorating a song which has lifted our spirits for 100 years. There are no limits to the power of a good song. I read on the way up here that 10,000 people would be in Winton this weekend: so this has to be a very considerable boost to Winton as it struggles through the drought. You see, music has more than charms – it has profound economic effects. In times like this it is not as good as rain, but it may well be the next best thing.
Waltzing Matilda was born in a drought era of course, and it is not hard to imagine that this might have had some effect on the melancholy theme of the song. And there is equally no doubt that in all the varieties of hard times Waltzing Matilda has galvanised the spirit of countless Australians. If culture is that which defines a people, if it is the expression of their collective sentiment, Waltzing Matilda sits at the centre of our culture – it’s a well spring of the national sentiment, a pool, a billabong.
I suspect that there is no one here who has not at some time, somewhere in the world, heard or remembered the tune and felt deeply affected by it. I’m sure it has brought Australians home before they intended to, and given others the strength to stay away a bit longer. For a century it has caused Australian hearts to beat faster. I venture to say it has caused more smiles and tears, more hairs to stand up on the backs of Australian necks than any other thing of three minutes duration in Australia’s history. It has long been our unofficial national song. Not our anthem - one can’t sing too solemnly about a jumbuck. But Waltzing Matilda is Australia’s song and it always will be.
Think what it has withstood down the years. Wave after wave of American and British popular music. The cultural cringe and all that post-colonial posturing. The urbanisation of Australia which might have been expected to dilute the old bush sentiments. Mass immigration and multicultural Australia which changed the face and the fabric of our society. Waltzing Matilda has endured them all. It has endured through wars and depressions, good years and bad. It has endured some terrible renditions – by both local and overseas performers.
I don’t think we should make it official and issue some kind of decree; but I think we all know that Waltzing Matilda is at least as beloved as the anthem. It is to we Australians what Land of Hope and Glory is to the British, or America the Beautiful and God Bless America are to the people of the United States. And, entirely without prejudice to the status of Advance Australia Fair, we might sing Waltzing Matilda at a lot more public occasions than we presently do. I hope these celebrations serve as a bit of a trigger for this.
I have no doubt that all through these celebrations people will be talking about why Waltzing Matilda endures. Why it means so much to us. I know some will also be asking who the swagman was and what, therefore, the song was meant to signify. I won’t be buying into the historical debate, but I suppose every Australian is entitled to say – even obliged to say- what the song means to him or her. I don’t think I was the only Australian kid who wondered when he learned the words at school – what sort of swagman is this? Jolly one minute, drowning himself the next?
These questions about the psychology of the swagman have never had the weight of the social and political interpretations – the ideological interpretations. Paterson’s words describe a class struggle, and if ever there was a class struggle in Australia it was in the 1890s. It’s not hard to see the song as an affirmation of the fair go, which still strikes a powerful chord in Australians. And may it always do so.
It is also about freedom. The swagman is a free spirit. We can interpret Waltzing Matilda as a celebration of our rebellious nature, as part of the tradition which began with the convict rebellion at Castle Hill and runs all the way through Frank the Poet, the Eureka Stockade and Ned Kelly. We can think of the swagman’s jump into the billabong as an Australian statement of liberty or death.
But, the truth is, none of these things come into my mind when I hear it sung. They didn’t come into my mind when the entire crowd gathered in Croke Park in Dublin sang it before the Gaelic football final when I was there two years ago. I don’t know what came into my mind then – I think the experience emptied it of all rational thought. But afterwards I was aware of the extraordinary power of this song on an Australian’s senses. All sorts of music can move us, but to hear Waltzing Matilda sung so fervently and beautifully by the people of another country 12,000 miles from home is to know that nothing can move us like our own song. It is to know that a national song is not something to be interpreted intellectually. When you hear it, you don’t think about a political position, or social or psychological issues. You don’t think about the historical context.
What Waltzing Matilda tells us in an entirely uncomplicated way is that we are Australian. And it tells us in a way that I think is equally Australian in character – it tells us without beating drums or waving flags, or pounding our chests. It tells us with a simple melody and a story, and a whimsical and ironic story at that. There is no national song l know of quite like it in the world.
I’m sure what happened with Banjo Paterson and Waltzing Matilda happened in the realm of the spirit. I think he wrote a story to a tune which quite mysteriously – in ways we’ll never know – picked up the spirit of the place as it was then; and, like the ghost of the swagman, it never died. And it touches us as a ghost might. As the spirit of the bush might.
When we were kids the other line I think we used to wonder about was the one which says that “his ghost may be heard as you pass by the billabong”. I confess to wondering what you would hear. What sort of noise would the old swagman make – what does it sound like when you stuff a jumbuck in a tucker bag? It took me ages to realise that this was Banjo Paterson’s whole trick – the song is the ghost of the swagman, and a hundred years later we are hearing it as loud as ever.
This is a great honour. It is one to tell our grandchildren about: we were in the North Gregory Hotel when Australia celebrated the first performance of Waltzing Matilda 100 years ago. And we were all in evening dress. Which is something the swagman would have found amusing – but maybe the squatter, the troopers and Banjo Paterson would have appreciated it. I’m sure they all would have liked the irony in it.
[These celebrations] are reminding us of the spirit of the bush and commemorating a song which has lifted our spirits for 100 years. There are no limits to the power of a good song. I read on the way up here that 10,000 people would be in Winton this weekend: so this has to be a very considerable boost to Winton as it struggles through the drought. You see, music has more than charms – it has profound economic effects. In times like this it is not as good as rain, but it may well be the next best thing.
Waltzing Matilda was born in a drought era of course, and it is not hard to imagine that this might have had some effect on the melancholy theme of the song. And there is equally no doubt that in all the varieties of hard times Waltzing Matilda has galvanised the spirit of countless Australians. If culture is that which defines a people, if it is the expression of their collective sentiment, Waltzing Matilda sits at the centre of our culture – it’s a well spring of the national sentiment, a pool, a billabong.
I suspect that there is no one here who has not at some time, somewhere in the world, heard or remembered the tune and felt deeply affected by it. I’m sure it has brought Australians home before they intended to, and given others the strength to stay away a bit longer. For a century it has caused Australian hearts to beat faster. I venture to say it has caused more smiles and tears, more hairs to stand up on the backs of Australian necks than any other thing of three minutes duration in Australia’s history. It has long been our unofficial national song. Not our anthem - one can’t sing too solemnly about a jumbuck. But Waltzing Matilda is Australia’s song and it always will be.
Think what it has withstood down the years. Wave after wave of American and British popular music. The cultural cringe and all that post-colonial posturing. The urbanisation of Australia which might have been expected to dilute the old bush sentiments. Mass immigration and multicultural Australia which changed the face and the fabric of our society. Waltzing Matilda has endured them all. It has endured through wars and depressions, good years and bad. It has endured some terrible renditions – by both local and overseas performers.
I don’t think we should make it official and issue some kind of decree; but I think we all know that Waltzing Matilda is at least as beloved as the anthem. It is to we Australians what Land of Hope and Glory is to the British, or America the Beautiful and God Bless America are to the people of the United States. And, entirely without prejudice to the status of Advance Australia Fair, we might sing Waltzing Matilda at a lot more public occasions than we presently do. I hope these celebrations serve as a bit of a trigger for this.
I have no doubt that all through these celebrations people will be talking about why Waltzing Matilda endures. Why it means so much to us. I know some will also be asking who the swagman was and what, therefore, the song was meant to signify. I won’t be buying into the historical debate, but I suppose every Australian is entitled to say – even obliged to say- what the song means to him or her. I don’t think I was the only Australian kid who wondered when he learned the words at school – what sort of swagman is this? Jolly one minute, drowning himself the next?
These questions about the psychology of the swagman have never had the weight of the social and political interpretations – the ideological interpretations. Paterson’s words describe a class struggle, and if ever there was a class struggle in Australia it was in the 1890s. It’s not hard to see the song as an affirmation of the fair go, which still strikes a powerful chord in Australians. And may it always do so.
It is also about freedom. The swagman is a free spirit. We can interpret Waltzing Matilda as a celebration of our rebellious nature, as part of the tradition which began with the convict rebellion at Castle Hill and runs all the way through Frank the Poet, the Eureka Stockade and Ned Kelly. We can think of the swagman’s jump into the billabong as an Australian statement of liberty or death.
But, the truth is, none of these things come into my mind when I hear it sung. They didn’t come into my mind when the entire crowd gathered in Croke Park in Dublin sang it before the Gaelic football final when I was there two years ago. I don’t know what came into my mind then – I think the experience emptied it of all rational thought. But afterwards I was aware of the extraordinary power of this song on an Australian’s senses. All sorts of music can move us, but to hear Waltzing Matilda sung so fervently and beautifully by the people of another country 12,000 miles from home is to know that nothing can move us like our own song. It is to know that a national song is not something to be interpreted intellectually. When you hear it, you don’t think about a political position, or social or psychological issues. You don’t think about the historical context.
What Waltzing Matilda tells us in an entirely uncomplicated way is that we are Australian. And it tells us in a way that I think is equally Australian in character – it tells us without beating drums or waving flags, or pounding our chests. It tells us with a simple melody and a story, and a whimsical and ironic story at that. There is no national song l know of quite like it in the world.
I’m sure what happened with Banjo Paterson and Waltzing Matilda happened in the realm of the spirit. I think he wrote a story to a tune which quite mysteriously – in ways we’ll never know – picked up the spirit of the place as it was then; and, like the ghost of the swagman, it never died. And it touches us as a ghost might. As the spirit of the bush might.
When we were kids the other line I think we used to wonder about was the one which says that “his ghost may be heard as you pass by the billabong”. I confess to wondering what you would hear. What sort of noise would the old swagman make – what does it sound like when you stuff a jumbuck in a tucker bag? It took me ages to realise that this was Banjo Paterson’s whole trick – the song is the ghost of the swagman, and a hundred years later we are hearing it as loud as ever.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)