“Sod the wine, I want to suck on the writing. This man White is an instinctive writer, bloody rare to find one who actually pulls it off, as in still gets a meaning across with concision. Sharp arbitrage of speed and risk, closest thing I can think of to Cicero’s ‘motus continuum animi.’

Probably takes a drink or two to connect like that: he literally paints his senses on the page.”


DBC Pierre (Vernon God Little, Ludmila’s Broken English, Lights Out In Wonderland ... Winner: Booker prize; Whitbread prize; Bollinger Wodehouse Everyman prize; James Joyce Award from the Literary & Historical Society of University College Dublin)


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12 January 2017

OZ WINER BLOKES STOP TITANIC FOR ICE

Driven by the raw sexuality of the The Yearlings, James Halliday has a bit of a look at Nick Ryan at the 150th birthday of Olivers' Taranga in October 2011. Since Max Allen left The Australian, Nick seems to have his space in the front. So it's now the James and Nick Show.

The ebullient Max, who seems to prefer being regarded as a mandolin picker, has never been slow to step forward for a solo. So he starts his occupation of what was Tim White's column in The Australian Financial Review when that hits the fizz in about two hours.

Which means he's followed both me and Tim into privileged positions, me in the news pages of The Oz; Tim in The Fin, where it seems Max expects to reach a more discerning and spendy clientele. Let's see if he can come up with any new ideas.

That's Max on Bill Monroe's veranda; me and Tim below, with Peter John in the middle. This was his family's A. P. John Cooperage 125th party.


Too many white blokes for my liking. All photos supplied.

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