Barry Humphries and I drank together and got sober together
Ross Fitzgerald and Barry Humphries at Sydney’s Catalina restaurant in 2019.
Barry Humphries and I were friends for more than 60 years.
We first met at the Notting Hill Hotel, which was the nearest pub to Melbourne’s Monash University where I was then an often drunk student.
Barry and I drank together and got sober together.
In late 1969 we were both admitted to a suburban Melbourne alcoholic and drug addiction hospital called Delmont. The wonderful lead psychiatrist there, Dr John Moon, was a strong …
GRAFTON EVEREST MEETS THE TRANS-SIBERIAN RAILWAYThe Lowest Depths by Ross Fitzgerald & Ian McFadyenHybrid Publishers, Melbourne 2021RRP: $24.99 (pb)Reviewed by Alan GregoryGraham Green’s term “An Entertainment”, probably best sums up this beautifully produced book.The Lowest Depths is a very good read, with equal elements of a socio-politico farce and of a spy thriller, plus a touch of sci-fi!As with its predecessor, The Dizzying Heights, this book featuring Dr Professor Grafton Everest is written by two Melbourne High School old boys – Ross Fitzgerald and Ian McFadyen. Ross Fitzgerald AM is …
COLD WAR AND ITS SECRETS
THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE FIVE EYES: THE UNTOLD STORY OF THE INTERNATIONAL SPY NETWORK
By Richard Kerbaj.
Blink Publishing
RRP $34.99
Reviewed by Ross Fitzgerald
COLD WAR AND ITS SECRETSThe Sydney Institute Review, 29 March 2023, Issue 25THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE FIVE EYES: THE UNTOLD STORY OF THE INTERNATIONAL SPY NETWORKBy Richard Kerbaj.Blink PublishingRRP $34.99Reviewed by Ross FitzgeraldRecently released in the United Kingdom, Richard Kerbaj’s, ‘The Secret History of The Five Eyes: The untold story of the international spy network’ is a fascinating account of the Western world’s most powerful, …
One does tire of celebrity reprobates. A fast way to attract attention and build a “profile” in our lazy society is to write about one’s appalling behaviour towards others. Its acceptability enables a form of confession and avoidance, and, if properly promoted and garnished with a veneer of bohemianism, it is more like confession and appointment to the firmament of New Idea idolatry. Attention, advertisement, writers’ festivals, prizes, perhaps even honours, await. The best way of avoiding the consequences of victimising others is to become a victim yourself. The people on the …
ROSS FITZGERALD
THE YOUNG MENZIES
Success, Failure, Resilience 1894–1942
edited by Zachary Gorman.
Melbourne University Press, 2022
224 pages, $49.95
After a brilliant career at the Melbourne bar in the 1920s and a period as Victoria’s Attorney-General, Sir Robert Gordon Menzies eventually became the most towering federal parliamentarian ever seen in Australian politics. But up to now, few books, even including Allan Martin’s magisterial two-volume biography, published in 1993 and 1999 respectively, have dealt in any length or clarity with Menzies childhood, personality, and early adulthood.
The Young Menzies: Success, Failure, …
Professor Ross Fitzgerald’s speech at the launch of My Last Drink: 32 Stories of Recovering Alcoholics,$29.95, published by Connor Court in Brisbane. My Last Drink is also available from Amazon and Booktopia.
The Olsen Gallery, Woollahra, Sydney, 6pm Tuesday 21 February 2023.
It’s very good to be here tonight, Tim. Indeed, at my age it’s very good to be anywhere!
My Last Drink: 32 Stories of Recovering Alcoholics is edited by me and my long-term buddy, Neal Price, who is with us from Tasmania. We are 53 and 39 years sober respectively. Our third speaker is Gail …
My Last Drink
Edited by Ross Fitzgerald & Neal Price, Connor Court, $29.95
Reviewed by Steven Carroll
A common thread running through these 32 confessions of recovering alcoholics is that they had to reach rock bottom before taking decisive action in rehab and/or AA. Interestingly, their memories of their last drinks vary from the vivid to the vague.
For Ross Fitzgerald it’s crystal clear – he had his last drink in the Melbourne pub where, as a schoolboy, he’d had his first. For Gail, who hid her drinking from most people (including her young …
Grog bans don’t work but the laissez faire is killing us
A former alcoholic looks at possible solutions for Alice Springs’ devastating surge in violence
ROSS FITZGERALD
The longstanding problems resulting from high-risk drinking by a significant minority of First Nations Australians is now not only extremely important but very urgent. But, as debates about the current acute alcohol problems in crime-ridden Alice Springs and elsewhere in the Northern Territory make clear, it’s also very complex.
People often use mood-altering drugs, including alcohol, to dull the terrible pain of childhood memories or current awful …
ROSS FITZGERALD
After months of delay, NSW Opposition leader, Chris Minns, has finally taken some action on pokies reform.
It is welcome news that the ALP in NSW will ban donations to political parties from all clubs in the state that have poker machines.
Although donations from gambling companies are banned, NSW clubs are currently exempt. This is because they are currently classified as not-for-profit entities.
Minns’ other pokie proposals are very weak, demonstrating the power the gambling industry in Australia has over Labor.
For example, it is clear that, unlike Liberal Premier Dominic Perrottet, …
ROSS FITZGERALD
Despite some opposition to the move in Liberal circles, given the current political situation Tony Abbott would be an excellent replacement for the much-lamented Jim Molan in the Senate.
Previously a fine major general in the Australian Army, Molan was an extremely capable and straight-shooting conservative Liberal senator for NSW.
Molan’s untimely death has created a five-year upper house vacancy for the Liberals in NSW, which has to be filled by a current member of the Liberal Party.
This important political position will be decided by the 750-member Liberal Party state council.
This …
ROSS FITZGERALD. Professor and author.
For decades, it was an entrenched position of most academics that theAustralian Labor Party was the repository of reformand the Liberals and Nationals a source of reaction.
But in Australia, vital reforms often come from the conservative side of politics.
Think John oward and gun control, and Robert Menzies substantially widening the access to higher education via Commonwealth Scholarships.
Now, we have two Liberal premiers promising to introduce pathbreaking reform.
In Tasmania, Liberal premierJeremy Rockliff led all other states in committing to introduce a mandatory cashless gambling card for every club, …
