Category: Life Experiences

Witter-time and dissertations

personby Gillian Polack
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For the next few weeks everything’s going to be a bit rushed and my mind may be a tad wayward. I have, you see, put in my notice to submit my thesis. This is my least favourite part of doing a PhD, normally, and a bit worried because right now I am kinda enjoying it. What’s wrong with me? I don’t sleep at all well, and I want it finished, but right now, the revision and thought is rather fun. When it stops being fun, then I’ll know I’m nearly finished.

While our dissertations are not that different to US or UK or European dissertations, the Australian examination process is its own thing. This is because it was set up at a time when distance and cost prevented committees from meeting in person and before modern technology allowed online meetings. Because of this, most Australian PhD examinations are still done through three examiners evaluating the written text. That’s it. I’ve been an examiner, and you are sent the document (it used to be a printed and bound document, but these days printing and binding mostly happen later) and read it and fill in a form and that’s that.

I enjoy examining others’ theses, but do not at all enjoy mine being examined. You sit and wait and sit and wait and sit and wait. Mostly, everything is done within three months… except for my first PhD examination, which took three years. It was also fraught. It left emotional scars and also cost me my first career. It’s very hard to get job interviews when your PhD has been under examination for about as long as it would take to do a whole new PhD.

I have maybe two weeks to finish writing the thesis, then a few more weeks for all the various other stages to be complete. Ticking boxes and jumping hoops.

It’s very good training for fiction writers, actually. I am much pickier about sending manuscripts to publishers because of this training. I don’t wait for an editor to sort my grammar and check for typos and ensure that the house style is met: I do it myself. I’m not as good at these things as I used to be, however. I miss the days of more energy and better eyesight and being really annoyed at stray split infinitives or commas. My thesis still has to have all these things sorted, along with proper citations and formatting. Several of the weeks before I submit, then, are to allow a copy editor to take a look. It’s part of the system right now, and good for me… but I’m determined to see how little work I can leave for the copy edit: it’s a matter of pride.

This leads to some odd moments. I was supposed to rewrite a paragraph yesterday, and instead I spent ten minutes analysing the text and seeing if I really needed my second footnote. This is not a document with many footnotes, unlike my History PhD. Different disciplines have quite different requirements. I used to have so many footnotes that I wrote 103 footnotes into my first novel. The editor had me take some out…. But it is still a footnoted novel. Back then, we had to assess the space for footnotes on each page: it wasn’t automatic. It’s ironic that now the word processor does this, I only have very occasional footnotes.

My first PhD was formatted by me, myself and I on a MacSE. Two floppy drives and much blue screen of death. That machine cost me 25% of a year’s scholarship. It was that long ago. I would print my drafts out on a dot matrix printer, and took discs into the university printer to print the final and photocopy it. The printed copies were then bound and sent to examiners, one of whom was in Canada. My then-thesis contained a vast amount of Old French and a little Latin, which totally thwarted any spellcheck by anyone who was not me.

Everyone was so impressed I was working on the computer all by myself back then. That’s how long ago it was. Desktop computers were exciting and new and I was able to do all the things myself. I typed other people’s theses in the last year of my undergraduate life. Not many theses, but I was a fast typist and accurate and now… I’m neither.

I wish I could claim age for this loss of skill, since I was an undergraduate over forty years ago, but the sad reality is that when I joined the public service it was at a time when there was much mistreatment of young women with typing skills. So many of us developed RSI. In my case, my supervisor was really annoyed that I had a PhD and he didn’t, even though I was still waiting for the examination results. He would give me pages of typing at 5 pm. “It’s urgent,” he claimed, which is how he skipped sending it to the typing pool. I was a policy analyst, not a typist but he would give me the work and then go home. A small sliver of his personality helped make up the composite boss-from-hell in one of my novels. So, so many people who read that novel tell me that they had that boss.

I am wittering, aren’t I? This is avoidance. I need to finish editing the Introduction and Literature Review. By the end of today, I have to apply one set of comments to the whole thesis. Then I have marked up text to sort out. Then another set of notes. I have until the weekend to have done all of this and I am, right now, procrastinating. Most of my Monday was spent clearing urgent stuff so that I could immerse myself in sorting out the thesis. That was also procrastinating. I’m nervous of Chapters Two and Three and Four, you see. Very nervous.

personby Gillian Polack
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The changes in the US are reaching out over the world. Added to the increase in antisemitism and many more people are looking through a red veil and seeing hate or despite when the reality is we’re not communicating clearly. Whether I’m right or wrong or entirely evil in whatever I say, I feel like a mouse with cats both visible and invisible, just waiting to pounce. Some of my friends have gone quiet, which is sensible. I am sometimes not so quiet and a random cat pounces. The cat might be pouncing because I’m vermin or because they’re hyper-aware and see me as vermin, but either way…. they pounce.

And I need to think of nicer things. Not the cyclone. It was not, as cyclones go, a very big one. In fact, it was hardly a cyclone at all. The parts of SE Queensland and NE NSW it hit, though, included much flat land that was easily saturated with water. People talk about the hills of Brisbane, and yes, they are pretty. But Brisbane airport is 3m above sea level and it’s not the only part that’s so close to sea level. When there’s too much rain, the land becomes saturated quickly and Brisbane floods and the floods do not roll down the mountains to the sea… because a large part of the city has low elevation. On the Gold Coast, there is very little beach left, but beach can be restored. So far, all my friends and family in that region are fine, which is something.

You need some good news, right?

The first bit of good news has to do with water… from the opposite end to floods. There is a new book (ebook right now, and I’ll make a formal announcement when the paperback comes out) that talks about water and that intends to raise money to help people in very dry areas (Sahel-dry) manage water. I have an alternate history sarcastic little piece in it. You can find the ebook here:  Yemoja’s Tears

The second bit of good news is that later this week is Purim (the feast of Esther) and it’s obligatory for me to get drunk. This year I think I need it.

Seeing things Jewishly

personby Gillian Polack
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So many strangers are telling me right now that I’m not Australian and that none of my relatives are Australian and… my mind keeps returning to what this means for the Arts in Australia. Certainly it’s much more difficult for anyone Jewish to earn money in the Arts here: there are some places I won’t even fill in the forms until I see that things have changed. I don’t have much physical capacity and when something is obviously a waste of my time, I do something else with that precious time. However… it struck me that I see the world through my upbringing. I talk about books from non-Jewish Australia a great deal, but my own view of the world is shaped by my family and their friends and the stories I was told as a child.

We all see the world from our own eyes. If someone were to ask me how I see the arts in Jewish Australia, I’d only give a partial answer, because there is so much stuff I forget. The first thing I think of, in fact, is what has impacted me and when and why. I thought, this week, then, I’d give you a little list. The list is little but it contains many words, because I annotated it. Welcome to the Arts in Australia seen Jewishly, through my life.

Let me begin with family and friends.

My mother’s family arrived in Australia before World War II or died in that war (save one person, who is not part of today’s story because he was not an artist, musician or writer). Mum’s immediate family was all here by 1918. It was a big family in Europe and is not the smallest family in Australia. Of all my mother’s cousins there are two who were well-known as writers. Very well-known, in fact.

Morris Lurie was Naomi’s brother. Naomi was so much a forever part of my life that even now she’s gone, I still think of one of Australia’s better known writers of plays through the fact that his sister was Naomi. Every time Naomi was in Melbourne, she’d shout “Sonya,” across the street to my mother, because they were very close. Mum hates loud voices and Naomi thought that Mum hating the noise and the laughter was hilarious.

I know about Morrie, and I collected his plays when I was a teenager. One of the lesser known facts of Gillian’s life is that, for twenty years, she collected plays. I still have my collection, but most of it needs a new home. I never met Morrie. He wasn’t much into meeting our side of the family. Even if we had met, I suspect we wouldn’t have had a lot in common. Naomi, on the other hand, was someone I would spend any amount of time with. She was my bridge to the Yiddish-speaking side of the family, and is the main reason why I don’t use that in my fiction: it’s her culture, not mine. My cultural self is from my father’s family. Loving Naomi, though, sent me to understand klezmer and Sholom Aleichem and so much else. I need to re-read Morrie’s plays. Maybe now I’m no longer a teenager I’ll like them more. Maybe not. I’ll see.

Arnold Zable is, as my mother explains, a family connection. His refugee cousin married Mum’s refugee cousin. Arnold is Victoria’s great storyteller. He also wrote an amazing book about the family left behind: Jewels and Ashes.

My father’s side of the family is so very musical. One of my father’s best friends was an extraordinarily well-known performer… but that’s another story. This is one of the days when stories lead to stories and those stories lead to more stories. Between family and friends, I grew up with music the way I grew up with rocks. Science and music and Doctor Who kept our family together for a very long while.

The most famous musician/composer/music critic in the family (she was never just one thing, nor was she a simple person) influenced me a great deal in my youth. Linda was my father’s first cousin, and spent time with me when I was very uncertain of where I fitted and who I was. She accompanied my sister on the piano when that sister was doing more advanced music. She told me some of the stories of her life, but never the really private ones.

Linda was Linda Phillips She described her own music as “light classics.” We played them on the piano at home… but never well. Her music was a lot more than ‘light classics’ as was Linda herself. Her daughter, Bettine, also wore her talents lightly. I knew that she had acted on stage with Barry Humphreys as an undergraduate, but I had no idea that she was a famous radio actor back when radio was the centre of so many people’s entertainment. They were both quiet about their achievements.

Here I need to explain that, not only were they modest and exceptionally fun to be with, but they were nothing close to my age. Linda was my father’s first cousin, to be sure, but she was born in the nineteenth century: she was sixty years older than me. Linda lived until the twenty-first century, and we lost Bettine to COVID. They were part of an enormous change in the Arts in Australia, beginning with Linda’s early career as a pianist over a century ago. I grew up with this, taking it for granted that there was a life in the Arts and a world and so much enjoyment… but seldom enough money to live on.

There is a third family musician, my own first cousin, Jon Snyder. His life is another story. He was in a very popular band (Captain Matchbox) and became a music teacher. His professional life began in the sixties, so the age differences are still there, but not as great. So many of the friends of my schooldays also became musicians, and three of them play in the same band, in Melbourne. That’s another story, however. I am no musician. I had some talent, but words were always more fun and, to be honest, I used to be tone deaf. I love music and the artists who create and perform it, though, because until I left home, it was part of my everyday. In fact, even when I left home, music crept up on me. I kept running into friends of Linda’s. They would send messages to Linda through me. Stories breed stories…

Also, this stopped being a list almost as early as it began being a list. I’ve only talked about a third of the writing side of the family. But this post is long enough. The rest can wait.

PS I have not at all forgotten the questions I promised to answer. There are only two questions, but the answers require a lot of thought. My everyday is a bit over the top at the moment. When things calm down, I will answer those questions. I promise.

Intermission

personby Gillian Polack
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I am barely in the US Monday as I type. By the time this post goes up, it will be your Tuesday. I meant to write something 24 hours ago, but everything became too complicated, and I needed to breathe. I took medicine and I breathed, then I went to sleep.

This morning, my body told me to go back to sleep. It does this from time to time. I’m chronically ill, and there are times when bedrest prevents a whole host of problems. I listened and I slept. Since then, I’ve been catching up with everything and finally, finally in the early evening of my Tuesday and the cusp of Monday and Tuesday in the US, I can write my post. In that intervening time, I have left the questions my readers asked in such a safe place that I can’t find them… and I don’t want to talk about which bits of my body hurt and why, or the fact that this summer is never-ending.

Summer is always never-ending in February in my part of Australia. Then autumn hits with storms and leaves and arbitrary weather and it is as if summer never was. Only some parts of Canberra have the leaves, and there is a moment when pretty colours seem very exotic and Canberrans go driving around admiring these foreign trees and watch them shed their leaves. Last year I took some spectacular photographs from a local park. It’s too early this year for spectacular photographs. We’re still at the period of spectacular fatigue.

That we actively have to look for leaves in certain suburbs is why so many Australians subdue a chuckle when someone from the US talks about Fall. Not only is our autumn at a different time of year, but you need to be in very particular parts of Australia for there to be autumn leaves at all.

This moment of perpetual summer is when school has gone back after the long break, it’s when the heat is more likely to bite, and when university begins. Everything starts up, and so many of us just want to sleep until the more comfortable weather comes. It’s one of those times when all kinds of work deadlines present and many demands are made and those of us who are sensitive to the heat suddenly dream of the northern hemisphere.

Why do I call it an intermission? I’ve been writing about Todorov and that moment he describes as a hesitation, when you don’t know what the world of the novel will bring you. Anything’s possible. There could be horses, or unicorns, or fast cars, or slow bicycles. I often stop at that point in a novel and dream my own story, the plunge in and see where the real story will take me. That’s what life feels like now. As if it could go in a thousand different directions. Only I haven’t stopped to dream my own story (it’s tempting) because it’s too darn hot.

Defiantly Acting Free

personby Nancy Jane Moore
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My partner and I are making our way through The Ultimate Hidden Truth of the World …, a posthumous book of essays by David Graeber, with one of us reading it aloud while the other is cooking. Thursday night, Jim was reading an essay called “On the Phenomenology of Giant Puppets,” a piece about the late 20th and early 21st century global justice movement.

He read these words:

Direct action is a form of resistance that, in its structure, is meant to prefigure the genuinely free society one wishes to create. Revolutionary action is not a form of self-sacrifice, a grim dedication to doing whatever it takes to achieve a future world of freedom. It is the defiant insistence on acting as if one is already free. [emphasis added]

And I exclaimed “Yes” and would have thrust my fist in the air if I hadn’t been stirring a pot.

Now this is in part because I am inspired, as I wrote a couple of weeks ago, by the likes of the Zen Monk Takuan Soho, who did not cower before the powerful or mistreat those who lacked power.

I want to move through the world as a free person, to treat all with respect so long as they do the same to me, and to stand up to bullies and Nazis. That this may be a perilous time for such an attitude does not keep it from resonating deeply with me.

I have a friend who refers to the rich and powerful as our “owners.” It drives me crazy, though I understand what she means and can even see some merit in the usage when I think of organizing unions of workers and tenants and others.

But I do not acknowledge that anyone has that kind of right over me. That certainly includes the broligarch in chief who is orchestrating the destruction of our government right now.

This is also driven by my feminism, because so much of what is going on right now is aimed at making women into second-class citizens again – people with limited rights but still bound by the law – and I am damned if I am willing to go along with that.

I didn’t think I was inferior back when the law treated me as such – I am old enough to remember when the minimum wage for women was lower than that for men, just as an example – and I have no intention of recognizing anyone’s right to reinstate that kind of misogynistic discrimination.

Some of it is rooted in the current of American Exceptionalism in which I was raised. In my childhood, it was not uncommon to hear a dispute on the playground that ended in the words “It’s a free country.” Continue reading “Defiantly Acting Free”…

Different places, different troubles, same times

personby Gillian Polack
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On Sunday, I put up a Facebook post. The reaction to it was a lot more positive to the one I was expecting, so I’m sharing it here… with an update.

I’ve been trying to find words to say this all day. I’ve given up trying to find decent words and I hope that what I say is clear. This post may get me a lot of people arguing, but it’s important, so it’s public. Be kind, please. None of this stuff is easy, for anyone.

For the past little while, so many people around me have blamed everyone Jewish for even the smallest thing someone else Jewish or Israeli might have done. They’ve translated antisemitism into false flags and are full of spite and opinions. I don’t know if 75% of Jewish Australians are Zionist, because I don’t know what definition of Zionism those who claim it use and I’ve never been asked as part of a survey… and nor have most Jewish Australians I know. I know I don’t worship Satan. I certainly know I’ve not killed 30,000 children. That sort of thing. Life has been… rather difficult.

Lots of folks on the left demand a shibboleth, that I publicly denounce or deny this thing or that thing before they will talk to me. I’ve just accepted that I don’t get to talk with them, and I’m sorry, but saying “OK” and giving them what they demand is adding to the bigotry around by playing the games that let people determine good Jews and bad Jews and I try not to play those games.

You know about some of this because I speak about it when I can.

This week, it has taken a turn, or even a twist. Not an unexpected twist, but one that saddens me. The sort of bigotry I’ve just described is infectious, and this is the moment I can choose to not be part of spreading that infection to other Australians. (And the medical metaphor may alert some of you of what’s to come.)

Right now, Australia’s facing the case of two nurses who I, personally, never, ever want to meet. I am not going to make the same assumptions about Muslim Australians from the example of these two, that people make about Jews from whatever examples they use. I would like the hospital at Bankstown to look closely into things and, if there is a pattern of bigotry embedded, to do something about it. I would like both nurses to be tried, fairly, with all the evidence laid out. I will not ask any Muslim Australian (whether they’re a friend or complete stranger) to give a particular opinion on what the nurses said or did before I am willing to talk to them about anything.

Things are going to be very difficult for Muslim Australians for the next few weeks and not a single one of them needs my demands on top of everything else. They don’t need any of our demands. Any questions or needs should be sent, courteously, to whichever governing body is responsible for the specific thing you need to know. If it’s a religious opinion, ask religious experts. If it’s a medical opinion relating to Bankstown Hospital, then Bankstown Hospital would have the right people to talk to. Your local dentist or wifi expert is not responsible for what those nurses said and should not be put on the spot about it. The only organisations I want to hear from, myself, are the ones linked to the two nurses and who moderate the ethical behaviour within their communities and professions. Some of them have already spoken out. I can wait for the others.

Yes, as a Jew, I will try to avoid the hospital in question … because these sorts of attitudes often belong to a community in a location and because I’ve heard other rumours. I hope they’re only rumours. Even if they’re true, the vast, vast, vast majority of Muslim Australians wouldn’t even know those two nurses. Many of them don’t even come from similar backgrounds to the two nurses.

I will not let my personal fear turn me into someone who hates a bunch of other Australians just because they share a religion with two people I do not ever want to meet. My favourite local grocer is still my favourite grocer (and owned by a Muslim family) and my favourite local butcher is still the halal butcher in Mawson, just next door.

Update:

Organisations linked to the nurses are beginning to speak up. One public statement in particular is worrying. I looked into the organisation that issued the announcement, and the announcement appears to reflect their identity (and may make them part of the same community as the nurses, with some of the same views as the nurses), in which case, they would not like me at all. They still comprise only a tiny fraction of Muslim Australia and give absolutely no excuse for treating anyone else badly.

It does mean that there are places that anyone Jewish may have to be careful (more places, I mean) and this is bad, however, I will continue to check out all the statements, and continue to not judge anyone who has not done anything in need of judging. My friends are still my friends and I am deeply disappointed that I have far too much coffee and don’t need mincemeat and my pantry is full and therefore no excuse to go to Mawson and buy favourite things. I go for coffee and mincemeat and emerge with three bags of food I love.

I often talk about food when I’m distressed, and the nurses thing has riled up even more hate than other events and… I am still determined not to hate just because others have fallen into that hole.

I am the Red Queen

personby Gillian Polack
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I am so the Red Queen this week. I am running so very hard and would love to be able to feel that I’m on top of anything. I still can’t do long posts answering questions, but I have such good reason.  Six things have happened and any one of them would be enough to demand I re-order my day and drink much coffee.

Let me explain the things in random order. All of this has happened since Friday.

  1. I can see! Because I have unusually problematic eyes, new glasses are not so easy. I needed 3 pairs. Two pairs came last year and it took me about a week to get used to them. The third arrived on Friday and it took until today for my eyes to be able to interpret the world without dizziness. The new specs are very smart and I like them a lot, but, for me, buying glasses is always a bit of a gamble. If I have someone with me with good taste (as I had for the first two pairs) their good taste makes me look respectable. I cannot see things for myself, and for some reason, taking pictures of my in empty frames and then looking at the pictures on the screen just makes me want to walk away. I don’t know how I look, in other words, until I have the new glasses.
    Some of my friends hear the news and say, “New glasses!” They show me their reading glasses and tell me which chemist one can buy the best $10 pair at or that they were only $3.  Mine cost a lot, lot more than this. All three of mine together, in fact, added up to $1,000, which, given my eyesight, was a bargain. When I buy in Australia, I have to go to a specialist shop. It takes about two weeks once I’ve ordered, because the lenses have to be cut in Japan. Occasionally the optometrist loses my order (this happened last year, for the first two pairs) and I have to start from scratch. The new glasses are from France, and the same price as the Australian… but the glasses are lighter and easier to wear.
  2. My computer was dying.  On a bad day, it took eight hours to boot up. I have a new computer and it’s lovely. It arrived just before lunch yesterday and… I’m still sorting things out. Because I don’t like buying new computers, the technology changes a lot in between computers. I’m still adjusting to the new one. This may take a while.
  3. This is the week of my literary review. I sent 9,000 words to my supervisor and get comments on Thursday and then have to complete it. By Monday I also have to change a bunch of other things, and the Monday after (if I’ve got the dates right) then 65,000 words ought to be ready to go. In normal times, this is not a big deal. My normal self is seriously good at this kind of thinking and writing. This month is not normal times.
  4. My email didn’t transfer over properly from my old machine. All the saved categories mysteriously disappeared. Most of the deleted mail re-appeared. I found myself with well over 90,000 emails from just one account… and they included things that need to be done this week. I’m working on it.
  5. I have had a health blip recently. Since about November, in fact. On Sunday, my body announced that it may be deciding to recover from the blip, but it’s not certain. I feel a lot better than I have been. but I need to rest… a lot. Also, I lost 3 kg on Sunday, all inflammation deciding it didn’t like me (which is a good thing). It’s a bit too exciting. Blood tests are tomorrow, which is also a bit too exciting.
  6. I now know the shape of left wing antisemitism in Australia. I made a simple statement in public and received some very interesting and mostly vile responses and matched them to a bunch of previous knowledge. If anyone needs to understand the new antisemitism better, I can now explain it. That’s the good thing. The bad thing is that most of its purveyors want to tell Jews what we are and how we think and do not stop to listen. This is where the “All Jews murder children” stuff comes from, and I can now  explain how it begins in simply not listening, to not respecting, to bullying, to turning individuals invisible, to outright hate. If anyone wants to understand how the Left does this, ask me. I already knew about the right wing stuff, and have reached the stage where I can talk sensibly with many people on the right and we can come to a bit of an understanding given time and space. The irony is, of course, that I’m of the left.
    The reason I am the historian I am is because I refuse to dismiss all bigots out of hand. Most of them are really fine human beings who can’t see where their ideas and their hero-worshipping leads them. Right now, though, we’re at an odd point and it’s rather difficult to get past the hate and talk to the fine human being. This is the moment when violence is about to begin. This is also the moment when most people who are developing this problematic stuff are both moving into self-defensive mode and into a place where their ideas are consolidating into passionate beliefs. I’m seeing more theology of hate than I’ve seen in such a long time.
    I so miss being allowed to teach these things so that people can understand themselves and their friends and make their own decisions about which direction they’re going to travel in and why. Dumping people like me from teaching is, of course, a small factor in what’s happening. None of this is cheerful… but at least I understand more.

Is this enough cause to be late in the Treehouse and still not answering my readers’ questions?

Summer and Eggs

personby Gillian Polack
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My little bit of Australia has a heat wave. This is not unexpected, given it’s summer. It does, however, mean my brain is fried. It didn’t reach 100 degrees (using US temperatures) today, so, in the measurements of my childhood, it was hot enough to fry an egg on a car bonnet, but not hot enough for the pavement to melt. In my childhood, I would have said that this is a day when I can’t go running, but I can still play and read. Alas, I am no longer a child. Also, alas, this week is full of work that has unchangeable deadlines. If I had the energy, I would sing you (badly), “Too darn hot.” I do not. Also I have 3,000 words of deathless academic prose to write before I can sleep tonight.

I had better start writing.

Maybe next week will be cooler. Maybe the week after. We’re in our last month of summer. Schools have gone back, and universities will begin again soon and life will pick up pace. Maybe then I’ll have the inner-oomph to write those answers to the serious and interesting questions my readers sent me. I hope so. Then I can complain about storms and blowsy autumn leaves. I’ll have more energy for complaint and far less interest in dreaming of frying eggs on car bonnets.

One last note to leave you with: if it were ten degrees hotter, then I could fry an egg on the pavement. I tested this when I was a child. My parents did not let me eat the egg, alas, which is why the car bonnet is now my theoretical place of choice. It’s still only theoretical because none of my friends are willing to let me destroy their car enamel. Which is just as well, because my US friends have egg problems and if I had wasted eggs in testing the heat outdoors it would be rather rude.

Why is there no Jewish Australian culture or art?

personby Gillian Polack
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I meant to return to answering questions today. Next week. Today I have other things on my mind.

Yesterday, I was caught up in trying to work out why it’s so important to so many people to not let Jews mourn loss. I saw Irish Jews forced to leave a Holocaust Memorial ceremony. I saw people told “What about others who have died?” when they tried to mourn families murdered during the Holocaust. I saw so much more than this that I lost words and avoided writing.

Even political leaders who gave official statements about the Holocaust toned it down this year, left off the dangerous word ‘Jews’ and generally faffed around. Someone on my timeline suggested that we should mourn all lives not focus on specific lives even for one day, and I wondered if it were possible to make all anniversaries about the death of a parent about all parents without hurting those who had lost their parents. We all need time to mourn because we all need to heal when we’re hurt. Each and every one of us at an appropriate time. Not all of us for just one shared minute.

This mood carried over into all kinds of other things. One of them left me incoherent until this morning. Please understand that I am not yet over my incoherence. This may not be the best post I’ve ever done, but my heart is in it.

Someone on social media said, “Think of all the colour, art, theatre, celebration and other cultural value that immigrants and different cultures have brought to Australia. Hmm just remind me what the Jews have brought us, a bit of theatre and film maybe?”

The first Australian opera was written by someone Jewish: Isaac Nathan. The famous story of Fisher’s ghost, the story that led to a Fisher’s ghost festival every single year in the Sydney region… it was written by someone Jewish. The writer who brought English folktales into the international fold and who is still read as the classic purveyor of English folk tales was Jewish and from Australia.

Jewish Australia was such a strong part of Australia’s nineteenth century culture.

We couldn’t stand out and be different very often, because that was not safe. This doesn’t mean that we didn’t contribute. Jews have been part of Australian culture since modern Australia began, just as Jews have lived in Australia since 1788. One of the first free settlers in Australia was a Jewish baby who arrived on the First Fleet, and many of the early arts and early printing in colonial Australia were by Jews or done with Jews.

This particular history shows why some of us create art and celebrate culture that is similar to mainstream culture: religious difference does not imply complete cultural difference.

More than that, though: many Jewish cultural mavens don’t have the same access to the wider community because it’s not safe or because they/we are too Jewish.

Still more, this means is that Jews in Australia are left aside by others who share culture, because of histories past and shameful. Let me give you an example. When I first came to Canberra I met the people in charge at our Polish club and they told me I was welcome to join, since I had ancestors from Bialystock and from around Warsaw and we spoke very similar cultural languages. Then they discovered I was Jewish and they said “We do not accept Jews.” At the cultural festivals in Canberra, there used to be Jewish and Israeli foodstalls and singing and dancing, but these days it’s not safe and very few Jewish culture-bearers from any background are on programs and everyone asks me “Why don’t we have a Jewish food fair any more?” The food fair is a specific thing. It covered many different Jewish food cultures, and was a delight. It was run to make money for children’s education, but the insurance premiums the Jewish community had to pay were so high after the Molotov cocktails 20+ years ago, that the community would not only not raise money with a food fair… it would go into debt.

One of the wonders of modern Australian history is the great change that made us a nation with so many writers and musicians and actors and… an immensely artistic country. This development of the arts into something of international note (including that enviable coffee culture) was spearheaded by Holocaust survivors. And yet there is not Jewish contribution to culture and the arts?

When I was in my teens I asked many Shoah survivors, including writers, “Why Melbourne? What made you choose to come to Melbourne?” I was told they wanted to get as far from Europe as they could. These people were mostly honorary aunties and uncles who went to school, university or shared a social group with one of my parents.

We were the older Australian Jews. They still shared their art with the rest of Australia. Much of Australia simply pretended my branch of Australian Jewish weren’t Jewish at all, or were pretenders, or did not have and specific cultural background they presented. My father’s first cousin, Linda, has had any indication of her Jewishness removed from her Wikipedia page, except for the title of one of her most popular song series.

We are not really permitted to show off the folk culture or the national culture the way other Australians are able.

There is the bigotry, which I’ve mentioned. Add to this the need to be safe, which is related to the bigotry.

There is another related factor. Many non-Jewish Australians pretend we don’t exist. This is why almost no-one in Australia knows who the author is of the first Australian Jewish fantasy novel. How do I know almost no-one knows? Because I am that author.

Another aspect is whether others who share our ancestral cultures are willing to share. The Polish Club fits in here. Just as the Polish club did not want me, few mainstream Australian culture experts see Jewish Australian writers unless we write about the Holocaust, about rebellion against Ultra-Orthodoxy… in other words, unless we create what they feel we ought to create. Our own culture is far less important than their view of it.

Also, for some of us, our culture is Anglo-Australia. My cultural foodways include challah and lamingtons and meat pies. We’re entirely allowed to publicly celebrate the lamingtons and meat pies, but most Australians don’t see how challah fits into the picture.

Add to all this that we can’t appear too different and still be safe. There are days and times I cannot walk in a given place and guarantee my safety. When I’m in Melbourne on a day where pro-Palestinians march, I cannot use the State Library without walking around the long, long way and entering by the back, for instance. I cannot walk that far, so I cannot use the State Library on those days.

Jews in Australia have never been permitted to be too different from majority culture and so we have our own culture, that is similar to that of the majority. This doesn’t mean we bring nothing, because our ancestors were part of that majority culture before we even came to Australia. It means that some people look and don’t see something they think of as distinctive or exotic and so think we have brought nothing. Take Jewish composers out of Australian history and the whole modern development of international level music would be jeopardised. The folk music scene in Melbourne would lose its best violinist.  Dame Edna Everage would not have worn those glasses. Eliot Goblet and John Safran and Elle McFeast would not be part of our world. There is so much culture Australia would not have.

We cannot appear too different in public. I can be publicly Jewish because I have an Anglo-Australian culture, but local bookshops do not stock my books – not even the ones used in universities in the US and Germany – and I am not sufficiently distinctively Jewish  because when anyone assesses Jewish culture in Australia, the whole of the Anglo side of things tends to be ignored. This is why I wrote The Wizardry of Jewish Women – I am trying to redress that balance.

Let me ask that question from social media again:

“Think of all the colour, art, theatre, celebration and other cultural value that immigrants and different cultures have brought to Australia. Hmm just remind me what the Jews have brought us, a bit of theatre and film maybe?”

What does most of Australia bring to understanding and even encouraging Jewish Australian cultures? Not much at all. It’s not a lack of culture. It’s a lack of knowledge and a lack of community.

Update: I always tangle certain writers. There was more than one John Lang. The one who wrote Fisher’s Ghost was Australian-born, and famous for it. He was not the brother of Andrew Lang, of the many-coloured fairy books. The Fisher’s Ghost Lang’s maternal grandfather was one of the Jews who arrived here on the First Fleet, so Lang himself was not actually Jewish.  I always, always get the many Langs confused. I wrote articles to make sure I didn’t, but I still do. John Lang still fits here, but as someone with Jewish heritage, not as a practising Jew.

Your Questions Answered: candles and music

personby Gillian Polack
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I used to answer questions on Livejournal. Most of the time, people wanted to know about matters historical, especially concerning the Middle Ages. When I moved to a blog on my own website, that interaction lessened somewhat and I stopped asking if anyone had questions they wanted me to answer.

I discovered this summer (for yes, it’s still summer in Australia) that I missed that interaction with readers. I asked on Facebook if anyone had any questions they’d like me to answer here. The people of Facebook answered. There were several simple questions (or questions with simple answers) and I’ll reply to them today, but there were two questions that demand more complex answers, so they’ll be posts of their own.

Before I answer those two questions, I would be delighted if anyone reading this have questions of your own. Ask them in the comments.

I’m happy to take questions about Australia and our history, my family history, Australian Jews, Judaism in general, the Middle Ages in Western Europe, medieval magic, food history, my favourite anime, Doctor Who, my writing, my current projects, dealing with many illnesses at once, any of the subjects linked to any of my doctorates, and… to be honest… anything else I have an interest in except certain current issues.

I don’t answer questions about Israel partly because there are others who know a lot more but mostly because I don’t like bullies and there are a lot of people demanding right now “Deny any links to Israel in your family and your Jewish heritage and religion and then we might speak to you.” This is bullying. Also, the fact that I spell out the demand in this particular way says a bunch about my views, so now you don’t need to ask those questions!

Also, I am not going to answer questions at this time (maybe other places and times) about family physically hurt and even killed due to antisemitism and related hate. I don’t have the spoons. I do have such family and the pain I feel for them never stops. And no, this does not mean I don’t care about anyone outside my family. I’m capable of caring for family and for a whole bunch of other people also, oddly. I don’t want to answer questions about them because most of the people who ask such questions have particular platforms and… I do not want the questions to play with emotions and safety. Besides, aren’t my regular subjects sufficiently interesting?

Today I’ll be answering two questions, and they’re quite different from each other. Even if the readers are also friends, I won’t use their names. Privacy matters. If you want to identify yourself, feel free to in the comments.

A reader said, “Oh, I do have a question! It just occurred to me when I was looking at pictures of beautiful menorahs on Bluesky last week. If someone can’t physically light their menorah because of illness or disability, can they use one with battery operated candles. And more generally, how do the rules around not working or using modern technology on the Sabbath work for disabled Jews who want to observe that but need technology to be independent, and don’t have outside support?”

The answer is both simple and complex. Judaism is not a one-size-fits-all religion. We’re taught a bunch of questions we can ask ourselves and make our own decisions about such things, and we can also ask rabbis. Health and well-being matter to us, so if we need a mechanical help then we are not encouraged to forgo it during Shabbat. The decision comes down to the person whose body it is, or, in the case of lighting candles for Chanukah, whose chanukiya it is.

I was taught from my childhood that we’re responsible for our own decisions and that it’s always better if those decisions are informed. For any Jew brought up as I was, there are choices on how to become informed. Some people rely heavily on the views of rabbis. Some read up a lot. Some simply make up their mind what to do and when.

Most of the time, for something like lighting candles, pragmatism rules, I suspect. I can’t speak on behalf of others and tell you what choices they make. Because our understanding of the world and of Judaism matters, decisions on these matters can be hugely varied. Some Jews are so enormously religious that every choice in life requires immense thought and respect paid to both the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. Some are casual about the religious side and may not light the candles at all, because they have other things to do with limited capacity. Most of us are somewhere in between.

Even for those of us who fall into the in-between land, the can be huge differences. One of the wonderful things about Judaism is these differences. When I talk to other Jews I find out their traditions and we chat about the reasons behind this choice or that. Learning is part of the Jewish soul and so learning about choices, whether they be choices for how to remain a good human being or choices about the lighting of candlesticks will always throw up interesting insights.

Let me leave you with one of my favourite candle-lighting insights from my childhood. There is a perpetual light inside synagogues. This light reminds us of the holy light that was always kept lit in the Temple. That original light is the reason for the miracle needed on the original days of Chanukah, when that light had to be kept going even when there was no clean oil to keep it going with because so much had been defiled by the worship of a different religion entirely within our holiest of holies. Lo, the oil lasted eights days. Celebrating that light from the Temple before its destruction led eventually to the candles we light for Chanukah. The original light was in an oil lamp, and for a very long time oil and wicks gave us our Chanukah lights. Now, most of us use candles for Chanukah (as you know) and electricity for the memory of the Ner Tamid.

 

The other question I’ll answer this week is quite, quite different. “So, I know you have some extremely talented, but – it’s fair to say – vastly different, musicians in your family history. What is your favourite musical memory from one of your family members?”

Normally I’d give a story about my father’s first cousin, Linda Phillips. Not only was she the per-eminent musician in the family, but she had great stories. Or I’d tell you about my own first cousin, Jon Snyder, who played in Captain Matchbox. My most favourite of all the music stories in my family is all about my father.

My father was a dentist. He claimed he loved going to orchestral concerts because the music gave him a good nap. He was also tone deaf. The first and third sentences are the critical ones in this story.

My sisters and I helped out at the dental practice when we were old enough. We were called “Assistant Dental Nurses.” I was the one responsible for patients who found going to the dentist difficult. I was that person long before I was old enough to be an Assistant Dental Nurse. I was expected to go into the waiting room and chat with people. I was, when I did this, the first stage of my father’s very distinctive version of an anesthetic system. Also, when a patient hurt too much and panicked in the dental chair, I was sent to the waiting room to explain what was happening. A few lucky indivuals react, for instance, to nitrous oxide by making noises that sound as if aliens were burrowing into their skull. Dad always took these patients out from under the nitrous oxide and checked to see if they were fine.

With one patient in particular, she was perfectly fine, both times he checked. She had been telling Dad how fine she was, the first time, and the second, she was singing. She simply had no vocal chord control and she wasn’t listening to what she sounded like and… everyone in the waiting room was freaked out.

I was a teenager and very literal. I still am very literal. My explanation of what was happening, including the warning that this filling might take a little longer than we expected, didn’t just calm people down, they chuckled.

When each of those patients reached the dental chair, they were perfectly relaxed. Then Dad gave his list of choices for anesthesia.

1. No anesthetic at all. Quite a few people opted for this. I did, myself, when I could. These days I am weak as a kitten and need help.

2. Nitrous oxide, or laughing gas. It relaxes me, and no undue and unexpected screaming has ever resulted from me taking it. It’s what I accepted on bad days or if the filling was deep and my teeth sensitive.

3. An injection.

4. A series of jokes by Dad. No-one ever chose this option, because everyone knew my father’s sense of humour. His favourite photocopy jokes were all on display in the waiting room.

5. A rap over the head with a hammer. No-one ever chose this, either.

6. Dad singing them to sleep. Some people chose this. When they realised that Dad sang in many keys, but only used two notes, they stopped him and said “How about we try an injection?”

To be honest, Dad’s list changed according to his mood. Once it reached 9 items, but I can’t remember them.

I do remember the time he decided to sing “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” and the patient asked him if he had an invisible hand, holding the hammer, because he hurt so much from the singing that death might be preferable. From then, when I was Assistant Dental Nurse, I warned people in the waiting room about the list and said, “No matter what you do, don’t let Dad sing.”