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Don Watson Don Watson i(A21148 works by) (a.k.a. Donald Ross Watson)
Born: Established: 1949 Korumburra, Korumburra area, South Gippsland, Gippsland, Victoria, ;
Gender: Male
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1 Heroes and Villains Don Watson , 2023 single work column
— Appears in: The Monthly , June 2023; (p. 14-16)
'IF, AS SOMEONE SAID, “No man is a hero to his valet”, it is also true that every man is a valet to his hero. Well, as we make them, we can break them. So, I have cancelled Sir Douglas Bader. Others may choose to follow my example, but for now it is a personal cancellation, not a global one' 

(Introduction)

1 The Day Faith Got Stuck in the Chimney Don Watson , 2022 single work prose
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 24 December 2022; (p. 8)
1 4 y separately published work icon The Passion of Private White Don Watson , Cammeray : Simon and Schuster , 2022 24969723 2022 single work biography

'From the bestselling author of The Bush, the story of a fifty-year relationship between a Vietnam veteran and a remote Aboriginal tribe: a miniature epic of human adaptation, suffering and resilience.

'The Passion of Private White describes the meeting of two worlds: the world of the fiercely driven biologist and anthropologist Neville White, and the world of the hunter-gatherer clans of remote northern Australia he studied and lived with. As White tried to understand the world as it was understood on the other side of the vast cultural divide, he was also trying to transcend the mental scars he suffered on the battlefields of Vietnam. The clans had their own injuries to deal with, as they tried to adapt to modernity, live down their losses and yet hold onto their ancient lands, customs, laws and language.

'Over five decades, White mapped in astonishing detail the culture and history of the Yolgnu clans at Donydji in north-east Arnhem Land. But eventually presence meant involvement, and White became advocate more than anthropologist in the clan’s struggle to survive when everything – from the ambitions of mining companies and a zombie bureaucracy, to feuds, sorcery and magic, despair and dysfunction – conspired to destroy them.

'And the fifty-year endeavour served another purpose for White and the members of his old platoon he took there. Working to help the community at Donydji became a kind of antidote for the psychic wounds of Vietnam. While for the clans, from the old warriors to the children, their fanatical benefactor offered a few rays of meaning and hope. There was no cure in this meeting of two worlds, both suffering their own form of PTSD, but they helped each other survive.

'This is a miniature epic of human adaptation, suffering and resilience, an astonishing window into both our recent and our deep history, the coloniser and colonised – indeed into the human condition itself.'  (Publication summary)

1 y separately published work icon The Story of Australia Don Watson , Melbourne : Black Inc. , 2021 19555926 2021 single work information book children's

'History told so well it gives us a better idea of who we are – and who we are likely to become.

'Don Watson’s The Story of Australia is a modern history of our nation that integrates new understandings about Indigenous Australia and looks to the future, asking: where will we go from here?

'In clear, succinct language that both children and adults will appreciate, Watson guides readers from the ancient lands of Gondwana, through human settlement, colonisation and waves of migration, to the challenges facing our diverse nation today.

'Each era is brought to life in a series of beautifully illustrated spreads that capture a particular event or development – or give a snapshot of ordinary Australians at the time. He covers the familiar and iconic – Burke and Wills, Ned Kelly and the Eureka Stockade – but also the lesser known, such as Daisy Bates and the Coniston massacres. Each chapter ends with a profile of a person, from the oldest Australian ever discovered, Mungo Woman, to pop icon Kylie Minogue.

'The Story of Australia will be treasured by children and families for years to come.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

1 y separately published work icon Live Recording : Margaret Simons on the Murray-Darling Basin Don Watson (interviewer), Melbourne : Readings , 2020 23470189 2020 single work podcast interview

'Margaret Simons chats with author Don Watson about her new Quarterly Essay: Cry Me A River - The Tragedy of the Murray-Darling Basin. This conversation was recorded online during the Covid-19 crisis.'  (Production summary)

1 Sauntering along Don Watson , 2020 single work column
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 14 November 2020; (p. 14)

Don Watson on how he came to be a writer

1 3 y separately published work icon Watsonia: A Writing Life Don Watson , Melbourne : Black Inc. , 2020 19556116 2020 collected work essay

'Watsonia collects the fruits of a writing life. It covers everything from Australian bush humour to America gone berserk; from Don Bradman to Oscar Wilde; from Animal Farm to the Australian parliament. Wherever Watson turns his incisive gaze, the results are as illuminating as they are enjoyable.

'Artfully arranged, Watsonia showcases the many sides of Don Watson: historian, speechwriter, commentator, humourist, nature writer and biographer. It also features several previously unpublished lectures and a wide-ranging introduction by the author. This comprehensive anthology – replete with wit, wisdom and diverse pleasures – is essential reading.'

(Source: publisher's blurb). 

1 John Petrie : Builder to the Queensland Government Don Watson , 2019 single work biography
— Appears in: Queensland History Journal , August vol. 24 no. 2 2019; (p. 147-165)
During the nineteenth century, building in Queensland was often dynastic, with the Petrie family being the most successful of the local building contractors. Unlike their competitors, their business was multi-faceted, with specialist departments for quarrying, masonry and brickmaking, carpentry and joinery. This arrangement was similar to Colonial Architect Charles Tiffin's use of day labour to construct the first stage of Parliament House, with on-site workshops established for masonry, carpentry and joinery, and a quarry leased at Woogaroo. Following the colony's financial crisis of July 1866, construction work on Parliament House slowed and by mid-1867 the unfinished building was moth-balled. The cessation was brief, with preparations made within months to resume work, but this time by contract...' (Introduction)
1 y separately published work icon There It Is Again : Collected Writings Don Watson , Sydney : Vintage Australia , 2018 14050112 2018 selected work essay

'From birds, to love letters, imagined apologies, mind-numbing management-speak, Oscar Wilde, Anzac Day, strange people and racehorses, in this collection of his writing Don Watson brings his distinctive voice and way of seeing to a host of deserving subjects.

'Historian, essayist, speechwriter, humourist, anti-cant crusader; Don Watson has a gift for luring us to the nub of a matter, or at least to a new view of it, there to grin or grind our teeth at the spectacle.

'Over the years Don Watson has written on politics and politicians in Australia and the USA, sport, nature, history, culture, crimes against speech, and military commemorations. Sometimes he writes in celebration of a moment or a creature of beauty; at other times, because something or someone gets on his goat - or up it, as young folk say these days.

'At the heart of all of his work is the belief that, more than just about anything else - more even than free markets or lifestyle choices - in a civilized society words matter.' (Publication summary)

1 3 y separately published work icon A Single Tree : Voices from the Bush Don Watson , Melbourne : Penguin Random House Australia , 2016 9841220 2016 anthology poetry essay correspondence short story

'A Single Tree assembles the raw material underpinning Don Watson’s award-winning The Bush. These diverse and haunting voices span the four centuries since Europeans first set eyes on the continent. Each of these varied contributors – settlers, explorers, anthropologists, naturalists, stockmen, surveyors, itinerants, artists and writers– represents a particular place and time. Men in awe of the landscape or cursing it; aspiring to subdue and exploit it or finding themselves defeated by it. Women reflecting on the land’s harshness and beauty, on the strangeness of their lives, their pleasures and miseries, the character and behaviour of the men. Europeans writing about indigenous Australians, sometimes with intelligent sympathy and curiosity but often with contempt, and often describing acts of startling brutality.

This collection comprises diary extracts, memoirs, journals, letters, histories, poems and fiction, and follows the same loose themes of The Bush. The science of the landscape and climate, and the way we have perceived them. Our deep and sentimental connection to the land, and our equally deep ignorance and abuse of it. The heroic myths and legends. The enchantments. The bush as a formative and defining element in Australian culture, self-image and character. The flora and fauna, the waterways, the colours. The heroic, self-defining stories, the bizarre and terrible, and the ones lost in the deep silences.

There are accounts of journeys, of work and recreation, of religious observance, of creation and destruction. Stories of uncanny events, peculiar and fantastic characters, deep ironies, and of land unlimited. And musings on what might be the future of the bush: as a unique environment, a food bowl, a mine, a wellspring of national identity . . .

From Dampier and Tasman to Tim Flannery and assorted contemporary farmers, environmentalists and grey nomads, these pieces represent a vast array of experiences, perspectives and knowledge. A Single Tree is an essential companion to its brilliant predecessor.

1 y separately published work icon Enemy Within : American Politics in the Time of Trump Don Watson , Carlton : Black Inc. , 2016 11611212 2016 single work criticism

'In Enemy Within, Don Watson takes a memorable journey into the heart of the United States in the year 2016 – and the strangest election campaign that country has seen.

'Travelling in the Midwest, Watson reflects on the rise of Donald Trump and the “thicket of unreality” that is the American media. Behind this he finds a deeply fearful and divided culture. Watson considers the irresistible pull – for Americans – of the Dream of exceptionalism, and asks whether this creed is reaching its limit. He explores alternate futures – from Trump-style fascism to Sanders-style civic renewal – and suggests that a Clinton presidency might see a new American blend of progressivism and militarism. Enemy Within is an eloquent, barbed look at the state of the union and the American malaise.

'“If, as seems likely, Clinton wins, it will not be out of love, or even hope, but rather out of fear. She can win by simply letting her deplorable opponent lose. On the other hand, she’s nothing if not adaptable, and she could yet see the chance to lead the nation’s social and economic regeneration … Call it a New Great Awakening or a New New Deal; it would owe something to both, and to Bernie Sanders as well, but also to her need to be more than the first woman president.” —Don Watson, Enemy Within' (Publication summary)

1 The Words We Loved Charlotte Wood , Geraldine Brooks , Graeme Simsion , Michael Robotham , Chris Wallace-Crabbe , Helen Garner , Favel Parrett , Gregory Day , Fiona Wright , Alexis Wright , Robert Adamson , Debra Adelaide , Lisa Gorton , Abigail Ulman , Christos Tsiolkas , Maxine Beneba Clarke , Susan Johnson , Kristina Olsson , Peter Goldsworthy , Tim Flannery , Malcolm Knox , Shane Maloney , Thomas Keneally , Don Watson , Anita Heiss , Omar Musa , 2015 single work review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 12-13 December 2015; (p. 24-26) The Saturday Age , 12-13 December 2015; (p. 30)
Famous Australian writers pick their favourite reads of 2015
1 My Fellow Australians Don Watson , 2014 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Best Australian Essays 2014 2014; (p. 124-127)
1 This Land Is Our Land The Bush Conquers All Don Watson , 2014 extract prose (The Bush : Travels in the Heart of Australia)
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 20 September 2014; (p. 24-26) The Canberra Times , 20 September 2014; (p. 23)
1 20 y separately published work icon The Bush : Travels in the Heart of Australia Don Watson , Scoresby : Penguin , 2014 7838248 2014 single work prose travel

'Most Australians live in cities and cling to the coastal fringe, yet our sense of what an Australian is – or should be – is drawn from the vast and varied inland called the bush. But what do we mean by 'the bush', and how has it shaped us?

'Starting with his forebears' battle to drive back nature and eke a living from the land, Don Watson explores the bush as it was and as it now is: the triumphs and the ruination, the commonplace and the bizarre, the stories we like to tell about ourselves and the national character, and those we don't. Via mountain ash and mallee, the birds and the beasts, slaughter, fire, flood and drought, swagmen, sheep and their shepherds, the strange and the familiar, the tragedies and the follies, the crimes and the myths and the hope – here is a journey that only our leading writer of non-fiction could take us on.

'At once magisterial in scope and alive with telling, wry detail, The Bush lets us see our landscape and its inhabitants afresh, examining what we have made, what we have destroyed, and what we have become in the process.

'No one who reads it will look at this country the same way again. ' (Publication summary)

1 Lest We Go over the Top Don Watson , 2014 single work essay
— Appears in: The Monthly , February no. 97 2014;
1 Recollections of a Bleeding Heart Don Watson , 2012 extract biography (Recollections of a Bleeding Heart : A Portrait of Paul Keating PM)
— Appears in: The Invisible Thread : One Hundred Years of Words 2012; (p. 214-216)
1 Comment : The Book Show Don Watson , 2011 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Monthly , October no. 72 2011; (p. 8-10)
1 The Good Old Navy Blues - And Others Don Watson , 2010 single work autobiography
— Appears in: Best on Ground 2010; (p. 257-271)
1 Don Watson : The Books That Changed Me Don Watson , 2010 single work column
— Appears in: The Sun-Herald , 17 January 2010; (p. 10-11)
Don Watson nominates five books that changed him. His list includes Steele Rudd's On Our Selection.
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