Review by Peter Beattie, Former Premier of Queensland, Australia
The raw honesty of “My name is Ross: An Alcoholics Journey is compelling, confrontational and breathtaking . To reveal so much of himself in such candor show Professor Fitzgerald was deadly serious in his stated aim to help and encourage other alcoholics in their struggle with the demon drink.
Few well-known authors would have had the guts to write such a book .
By a third of the way through this painful journey I felt compelled to offer a silent prayer of thanks …

Alcohol must stop being such an intrinsic part of Australian life if the wave of alcohol-fuelled violence is to be stopped, a leading expert in the field said yesterday.
Griffith University Emeritus Professor Ross Fitzgerald, a member of the NSW Government Expert Advisory Committee on Alcohol and other Drugs, has battled with alcohol addiction for most of his life.
Professor Fitzgerald has been sober for 40 years, with his last drink on Australia Day 1970.
“That means I’ve had 40 more years on the planet than I otherwise would have had,” he told …

Speech in response to Gerard Henderson’s launch of Ross Fitzgerald, My Name is Ross – An Alcoholic’s Journey (New South Books) 6pm Tuesday February 2, 2010, Clayton Utz Seminar Room, Level 30, 1 O’Connell Street Sydney.
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Thank you Gerard for a friendship that has lasted many, many years.
I remember once telling Gerard that I thought I was becoming more neurotic. To which Gerard replied. “That’s scarcely possible!”
I’d especially like to thank Nigel Marsh who suggested that I write a memoir with my alcoholism at its core; my Brisbane-based agent …

HERE I am, stretched out straight and still, enclosed in a tunnel, having an MRI brain scan at St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney to find out why I’m bleeding from the brain in four places.
The only way I can survive the 25-minute claustrophobic ordeal is to wear a sleeping mask and recite, like a mantra, the Serenity Prayer: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.”
My situation brings back deeply buried memories of …

MANY great writers were alcoholics. F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Dorothy Parker, James Joyce and Henry Lawson are but a few from a very long list. Shakespeare’s drinking habits are not known, but several of his most memorable characters put away plenty of grog. The Porter in Macbeth, severely hungover, pronounces to his aristocratic betters that drink is a great provoker of three things . . . nosepainting, sleep and urine.
For Ross Fitzgerald, those three afflictions must have seemed relatively trivial. Starting at the age of 15, he drank for …

IT would be easy to fill every shelf in a bookshop with books published on, for, about and by alcoholics. A quick search online reveals thousands of books on alcoholism, from self-help to the confessional, and everything in between.
Australia is a nation whose identity, for better or worse, rests squarely on the consumption of alcohol. It is part of our social fabric and always has been. Captain James Cook took beer with him on the Endeavour and the first settlers brought beer with them in 1788. Our first prime minister …

WITH a political lightweight, Kristina Keneally, shoehorned in as NSW Labor Premier, it seems that in next year’s election the conservatives will come to power in Australia’s most populous state.
This is despite the fact that NSW Liberal Party leader Barry O’Farrell is a conspicuous underachiever and a lacklustre media and parliamentary performer.
The fact is the NSW Labor government has well and truly lost its way. It is clearly on the nose and is widely perceived as divided and incompetent. It’s simply not listening to the concerns of voters and not …

WITH the rise of Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott federally and Kristina Keneally in NSW, religion is re-encroaching on politics.
The biggest influence is in NSW. When Catholic World Youth Day descended on that state in July last year, many taxpayers resented being forced to pay $20 million in security charges for the event and $40m for the use of Randwick racecourse. The reason that atheists, agnostics, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Anglicans and even a few Catholics were being forced to go along with this was essentially because then premier Morris …

TONY Abbott should not be underestimated. His direct approach to politics will have a powerful appeal to regional Australia. Abbott may have a Sydney seat in federal parliament but his greatest appeal may be outside NSW.
Too often much of Australia’s daily media coverage is Canberra-centric and political mood changes in states such as Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania are not likely to be detected in Canberra until a Newspoll or election result has highlighted them.
The reality is the new federal Opposition Leader’s direct, knockabout, open style will be …

From his first drink at the age of fourteen Ross Fitzgerald has struggled with alcoholism. His story is one of despair, courage and hope – and living to see another day.
He writes about growing up in Melbourne, drinking his way through university in Australia and the US, being incarcerated and subjected to electric shock therapy and reaching rock bottom before being saved by Alcoholics Anonymous.

One of Australia’s most widely-published historians, his story is truly inspiring. Insightful and brutally honest, “My Name is Ross” is his account of life as an …

More than half a century ago, the Catholic Church set out to take over Australian political life. The Church set up an underground organization to infiltrate political parties, to control their agenda, and to assume the leadership of their personnel. With church money, church facilities, and church authority, the organization had some noticeable successes. By 1952 it felt able to report that within a few years, Australian governments, federal and state, would be legislating its policies.
If this sounds shocking today, one should reflect that in a democracy it is legitimate …