READINGS OF THE WORK BY PHILIP HARVEY

Today I wrote a 100-word piece on Mirka Mora, whose show is currently on at Heide Gallery. These words reminded me of being with Mirka one time, a memory that follows the 100 words: Table (December) It’s a noisy time at Tolarno, the tables discussing the rich tapestry of life, everyone in stitches. Is this an angel at my table, or another politician? December’s mad enough, but new year’s eve? That one with the ‘Q for Quest’ tee-shirt, how did she get in? Probably one of the family. Perhaps Quest is the answer to the question. That dragon on the far table must be one hundred if she’s a day. And that fellow there’s turning into a wine bottle. Bohemia has its limits and they are ragged around the edges. Who is your favourite French poet? 'Q for Quest' reminds me of the hour or so we spent with Mirka during the anniversary party for the Hill of Content Bookshop, sometime in the nineties. The party was upstairs next door at Florentino. Very

Here are the first ten books found here at home this morning that could only have been purchased in Australia at Collected Works Bookshop: 1. A Far Rockaway of the heart, by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. (New Directions, 1997) 2. Collected essays, by Antoni Tapies. Translated by Josep Miquel Sobrer. (Fundacio Antoni Tapies & Indiana University Press, 2011) 3. The Council of Egypt, by Leonardo Sciascia. Translated by Adrienne Foulke. (Carcanet, 1988) 4. Chemical cart, by Philip Hammial. (Island Press, 1977) 5. Country harbor quiet act around : selected prose, by Larry Eigner. (This Press, 1978) 6. Lost possessions, by Keri Hulme. (Victoria University Press, 1985) 7. The stories and recollections of Umberto Saba. Translated by Estelle Gibson. (Sheep Meadow Press, 1993) 8. Finding the islands, by W.S. Merwin. (North Point Press, 1982) 9. Hotel Lautréamont, by John Ashbery. (Carcanet, 1992) 10. Localities, by Robert Harris. (Seahorse Pu

This review first appeared in the December 2018 issue of The Melbourne Anglican. ‘Books that saved my life : reading for wisdom, solace and pleasure’ by Michael McGirr. Text Publishing, 2018. ISBN 9781925773149 At university, friends of mine circulated lists of books thought necessary for any fully-educated person to read. More recently we’ve seen the phenomenon of the one hundred books we have to read before we die, as though life is a race to get through someone else’s favourite reading. Michael McGirr’s book is not like that. In forty chapters he talks about forty books, and more, that have positively influenced his understanding of himself and the world. Read a chapter a day, it is recommended as a Lenten book with a difference, especially as we find him saying: “Reading will feed your hungry mind and take your heart on a journey. It will help you on the path of one of life’s most elusive and hard-won freedoms, freedom from the ego.” He reads Thomas Merton to “underst