WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

00:00:06.190 --> 00:00:09.720
I always knew I was going to be a writer;
I never thought I would make a living of it.

00:00:09.720 --> 00:00:14.260
I didn't think there was such a thing as a
career writer. I went to university and did

00:00:14.260 --> 00:00:19.039
Arts, majoring in English. I did an Honours
in English. And I was very lucky I got a job

00:00:19.039 --> 00:00:25.920
at Film Australia which made documentary films.
And I became a not particularly good film

00:00:25.920 --> 00:00:31.100
editor. And because they made documentaries
it meant that it was unscripted. So basically

00:00:31.100 --> 00:00:34.579
somebody would go out and shoot miles and
miles of footage, and you would have to find

00:00:34.579 --> 00:00:38.570
the story in the footage. In learning how
to be an editor, I actually learned how to

00:00:38.570 --> 00:00:43.239
be a storyteller. And I learnt to trust, that
if you produce enough fragments, and if those

00:00:43.239 --> 00:00:48.550
fragments are interesting in themselves, eventually,
by jigsawing them together, in a hundred different

00:00:48.550 --> 00:00:53.479
ways, you wil arrive at a story. That was
how I learned to write, by being a film editor.

00:00:53.479 --> 00:00:56.419
And I thank those people immensely.

00:01:00.050 --> 00:01:04.860
I usually begin with something I don't understand.
And so it's much more interesting to start

00:01:04.870 --> 00:01:09.030
with a question, than to start with an answer.
Because that fuels the writing. Writing is

00:01:09.030 --> 00:01:15.070
a long, hard, often kind of boring process.
There has to be a very powerful engine to

00:01:15.070 --> 00:01:19.550
get you to that desk every day. And one of
the most powerful engines is curiosity: the

00:01:19.550 --> 00:01:23.730
need to understand something that you don't
understand. And so what I ended up with at

00:01:23.730 --> 00:01:28.290
the end of a couple of years was a mass of
research and a lot of bits and pieces of writing,

00:01:28.290 --> 00:01:33.780
not unlike making a documentary film. And
that's basically how I write most of my books,

00:01:33.780 --> 00:01:38.340
in ignorance, fear and – often – despair.

00:01:42.080 --> 00:01:49.060
When I met Jenny Sages I realised immediately
that we were on the same wavelength as creators.

00:01:49.060 --> 00:01:55.030
Because she had no preconceptions; like me,
she starts with a question, insofar as a painter

00:01:55.030 --> 00:01:59.500
can start with a question, and she allows
the material to guide her. Which is exactly

00:01:59.500 --> 00:02:03.960
how I make art,

00:02:03.960 --> 00:02:09.060
so we had some wonderful conversations,
which people who don't make art often find

00:02:09.060 --> 00:02:13.530
hard to understand, because they think it's
a more sensible, process, and a more efficient

00:02:13.530 --> 00:02:17.750
process, than it actually is. It's a terrible
muddle. You fling yourself in and you kind

00:02:17.750 --> 00:02:22.069
of swim for your life and you hope at the
end of it you emerge with something.

00:02:22.069 --> 00:02:27.110
So we sat together and had several sessions
where she drew me, and took photographs. We

00:02:27.110 --> 00:02:32.110
went up to the Hawkesbury together, which
is of course where the portrait is set, and

00:02:32.110 --> 00:02:38.130
when we found that spot by the river, and
the little jetty, we both knew straight away

00:02:38.130 --> 00:02:43.370
that that was it. I took off my shoes, because
I very much wanted to have that feeling of

00:02:43.370 --> 00:02:48.660
being barefoot on the land. And I felt wonderfully
relaxed. And she drew me, and photographed

00:02:48.660 --> 00:02:53.450
me, and then went away and produced this wonderful
portrait. I'm really pleased with it.