THOSE of us born in the mid-sixties are a generation without a pigeon-hole. Too young to be baby boomers, too old to be Gen X. All of us floating about in a nameless sea of nonidentity.
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It came to mind again last week while I was sitting in a packed Capital Theatre, listening to one of the defining thinkers of my generation, Michael Leunig. A national living treasure, this humble soul is quick to point out that his best work comes from a place of “not knowing”. What he describes so familiarly as, “a constant state of bewilderment”.
So, to all my 60s-born compadres, I say it’s time we formed a breakaway group – one that defines our unique state of being in this world. Gen B – the bewildered generation.
Local author, Robyn Annear, who did such a wonderful job of interviewing Leunig in Bendigo, introduced him as “the tuning fork for a generation”. A startling metaphor, and one that struck a particular chord with me.
When I was a young man, tentatively making my way in the world, wondering where the hell I fitted in, Leunig’s cartoons and poems were like a creative backbone to my lostness. In the early 80s, every fridge door and toilet wall in sharehouses across inner-suburban Melbourne was a private gallery to his unique take on humanity. He made it okay to be confused in the face of modernity, offering the gentle solace of a direction-finding duck.
Leunig has always been much more than a cartoonist. Never just a voice of dissent for the sake of it. As he told the audience at The Capital, “A lot of people don’t understand my work, and I’m one of them… It’s not about trying to make a definitive statement – to say this is right and that is wrong. I’m interested in the deeper humanity in us all, that sense of reverie and wonder we had as children.”
I remember seeing George Negus interview Leunig a few years back. “Why the ducks? The dogs? The magpies?” he asked. “Because they’re musical. They’re true. They don’t lie,” Leunig replied. “The scholars, the journalists, the captains of industry, they dismiss them as minor things... But they’re not. They reveal a lot about our own nature.”
He echoed this in Bendigo. “The deeper you go into yourself, the more you find the rest of humanity. We have to dare to point out truth... In the face of the ‘big’ people.”
Leunig has always been my gauge for connecting with like-minded people. Those with “a Leunig” above their computer, or a book of his poetry in their glove box, always have a healthy respect for the absurd and understand that there are few simple answers in this life. As one of my besties said to me the other day over a bowl of soup, “The whole world is mad except for you and me – and even you’re a little strange.”
We need the Leunigs of this world to remind us that it’s okay to feel overwhelmed; that some days we’ll be as bewildered as a man sitting in his own fireplace while his armchair burns. Other days, as euphoric as the magnificent all-powerful Neville Smith, breaking triumphantly through a crepe paper banner at his front gate, lunchbox in hand.
Both are valid responses to a world that can feel so “awfulised” – to use a Leunigism.
Monday night’s session ended with a uniquely Bendigo moment – one that will stay with me. A question from the audience, about Leunig’s words being put to music, prompted a spontaneous performance from our own Gorgeous Voices choir.
“Let it go, let it out, let it all unravel…” they sang, moving as one to the centre of the auditorium. “Let it free, and it will be, a path on which to travel.”
I wasn’t the only person in the room with welling eyes. It was a moving launch to the 2013 Bendigo Writers Festival, and as Artistic Director Rosemary Sorenson announced, it’s just the tip of the iceberg. The second weekend in August is going to be one to remember.
• Find the program at www.bendigowritersfestival.com.au
