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John Welford
John Welford:
He remembers his mother teaching him to read at the age of four. Ever since then he has loved to read. As a boy, on holiday from school he would lie in bed reading ...view moreJohn Welford:
He remembers his mother teaching him to read at the age of four. Ever since then he has loved to read. As a boy, on holiday from school he would lie in bed reading a book until late in the mornings. At school, boarding school, he would read under the blankets by the light of a torch, after lights-out. Writing, however, was a different thing. English composition was hard, though not as hard as comprehension exercises - they were boring. Of course, he understood what he read. Why bother to answer questions about that?
It wasnt until he wrote a history essay on the causes of the First World War when he was sixteen that he found out that writing could be fun. he scored 19/20, but believes his handwriting lost him the one mark.
He didnt immediately take up writing screeds and screeds far from it he wrote only when he had to and only as much as was absolutely necessary. Typical schoolboy! Later, studying for a degree in England meant more scribbling, mostly notes in lectures, but that was hard work and far from what he really wanted to be doing: sailing.
Meanwhile, somewhere at the back of his mind was the thought that he would like to be able to write a book - about what he didnt know, just a book any book. He never found the time during his working life to write one.
When he retired, suddenly, he found himself making a little essay that he wrote for a boy he was tutoring, into a novel.
In 2006, he won a Macquarie Longlines Fellowship to Varuna House, the writers House and used that time to write much of this novel and to make a start on a biography of his parents.view less