The Godfather: Peter Corris on depression
Listening to Stephen Fry’s autobiography (The Fry Chronicles, 2010) with its accounts of his black depressions, it dawned on me that, at the risk of sounding smug and not sufficiently empathetic towards sufferers, I’ve never experienced anything that could be...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on talents
I remember some years ago seeing a snatch of John Denver in concert. At the end of a song he opened his arms and said to the adoring audience, ‘He sings, he plays, he dances.’ He performed a few steps. ‘But can he juggle?’ Someone offstage threw him three balls and he...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on listening to books
Some time ago I wrote a column about how my defective eyesight had pushed me first to big print books and then to e-books where I could blow up the font on my e-reader. This was a great boon and by 2014 all 40 or so books I read that year were e-books. Unfortunately,...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on keeping a diary
I first began keeping a diary in London in 1970. I was there on a post-doctoral travelling fellowship from the ANU to continue my research into aspects of Pacific history. I rented a room in a flat on Brompton Road in South Kensington. The lessee of the flat, on the...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on beards
I’m growing a beard, again. The first thing I had to do was seek Jean’s agreement. Some women dislike beards. Others prefer them. I’ve known several men who, on shaving off their beards, have their wives or partners request them to grown them again. Jean offered no...The Godfather: Peter Corris on Peter Cook, historian and mate
Smells can powerfully evoke memories. I can’t smell night-blooming jasmine or pipe tobacco smoke without remembering places and people. Music does the same. As a devotee of the popular music of the 1950s to 1970s, I was listening to a ‘best of’ CD from...
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