Do Go On - 466 - The Ern Malley Mystery (with Wil Anderson)

Episode Date: September 25, 2024

Ern Malley has become one of Australia's most famous and enduring poets. Celebrated by the Angry Penguins literature movement of the 1940s, it soon came to light that there was a small problem with modernism's new hero... the poet didn't actually exist and the whole thing was an elaborate hoax. Joining us to hear about the Ern Malley Affair is Wil Anderson.This is a comedy/history podcast, the report begins at approximately 13:00 (though as always, we go off on tangents throughout the report).Support the show and get rewards like bonus episodes: patreon.com/DoGoOnPodSupport the show on Apple podcasts and get bonus episodes in the app: http://apple.co/dogoon Live show tickets: https://dogoonpod.com/live-shows/ Submit a topic idea directly to the hat: dogoonpod.com/suggest-a-topic/Check out our other podcasts:Book Cheat: https://play.acast.com/s/book-cheatPrime Mates: https://play.acast.com/s/prime-mates/Listen Now: https://play.acast.com/s/listen-now/Who Knew It with Matt Stewart: https://play.acast.com/s/who-knew-it-with-matt-stewart/ Our awesome theme song by Evan Munro-Smith and logo by Peader ThomasDo Go On acknowledges the traditional owners of the land we record on, the Wurundjeri people, in the Kulin nation. We pay our respects to elders, past and present. REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING:https://www.ernmalley.net/new-pagehttps://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/harris-maxwell-henley-max-29615https://theconversation.com/the-greatest-poet-who-never-lived-ern-malley-at-80-234905https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-08-29/ern-malley-literary-hoax-angry-penguins-1944/100412208https://www.abc.net.au/archives/80days/stories/2011/10/27/3367929.htmMcauley and Harris statement:http://jacketmagazine.com/17/fact2.html Ern Malley’s poems:http://jacketmagazine.com/17/ern-poems.html  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serenji Amana, 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there.

Canada, we are visiting you in September this year. If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. Hello and welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Dev Warnacky and as always I'm here with Matt Stewart.

Hello Matt. Hey Dave. So good to be here. So good to be alive. I agree. Not positing in question this week. No, no. You didn't hear the upward inflection at the end.

How good is it to be alive? Also the how else. I might have missed. And joining us this week to speak about how good it is to be alive. It's Will Anderson. It is so good to be alive. I don't know why you're. asked me to say that before the podcast and to stress that it was really good to be alive.

We need that on tape. Yeah, he said that, which I thought was a weird way to start the podcast, but they said to me beforehand, if you could just read this statement in front of me, it is good to be alive. There's a little accent on it, which I don't know if that's... Yeah, yeah, no, you nailed it. Yeah, that's it. Right. Well, it's pretty important for us to have that, that, we've been missing that Jess energy for a while. So that's why we've got you in. Thank you.

Yeah, to make up for that. What aspect of the Jess energy do I bring to the table? Well, just your... Jaudevieve. No, absolutely not. And I think he knew that you weren't. I think it was... It didn't even take long before I knew as well.

It was the very first syllable. I've gotten off to the wrong start here. But yeah, that sort of stuff. Yeah, okay. And I think you bring that in spades. Thank you. calling out Matt's bullshit's what we need to do and you've already done it. So thank you. Yeah, you did that very comfortably, actually.

Well, it's nice to be here. I appreciate it very much. Oh, it's so good to have you here. And is it true that you're getting the old band back together? As much as if you've ever had a band, Adam and Will. Yes, that is true. How exciting is that? I mean, it genuinely is exciting. So 20 years ago, we stopped doing the Triple J Breakfast show. And I'm the sentimental one in these relationships. So I'm one of those people who takes note of when anniversaries of things are late,

the passing of time. And so I messaged Adam and it's rare that when you worked with somebody so closely, and look, this is an insight into your future, just something for you. It's rare that people who worked in these intense environments still talk to each other 20 years after you. Talking to each other. And the fact that we still do, I thought was worth noting. And I thought, you know what?

Our final show was at Manning Bar at Sydney University. I thought, why don't we do a little show to, I guess, just commemorate the final show. Well, as it turns out, we started mentioning this to people. And the more people we mentioned it to, the more people were interested in, well, why don't you do some actual live shows? When we finished doing the radio, we did a little tour called The Last Time. And so I thought that's pretty funny. That's great.

Again, it's already pretty funny. So we have a new tour. It's called The First Time in a long time. And it's been incredible because we've just been putting it together. And we just, it's one of those things that is one of the more organic projects that I've ever been involved in because it wasn't meant to be a tour. It wasn't meant to be a show. And then suddenly it's a thing that you didn't realize people were. were as interested in as they are.

So we've had so many people who were involved in the show, calls to the show. We went on Dylan Lewis's radio show and literally had, there was this kid called Shannon from Cockatoo who, when we were doing the show was like 12, 13, 14, 14, 15. And he used to review punk rock. So weekly, you would have a segment and he'd tell us what it was like to be 12 and what punk rock song he liked. We talked to him the other day on Dylan Lewis's show. He's like in his mid-30s now.

Like he's a grown-up man, still loves punk rock, which I always. That was good. But so there's all this community that we used to have doing the show that is suddenly this is an excuse for everybody to get back in touch. One of our old producers is currently working in Africa for the UN. And so she's contacted us from the middle of Africa going, I think I can make it back for the Adelaide show. Oh, that's amazing. So we always thought there was no archival evidence of our show because we're in that magic time where like the ABC wasn't really archiving things and it wasn't in this era where it's all, you know, on disc or digital.

Yeah. And so somebody has illegally recorded the last three weeks of the show, like songs and all. So there is a link on the internet where you can listen to the last three weeks of the show. And that is the only evidence that we ever did the show that it exists. So most of what we're putting together, like is only just coming from our memories and our memories of the time are not that good. So if anybody else has any. memories that they're like to share, we're happy to hear them. So what was the, when was the run?

It was, how long did you? 2000 to 2004, inclusive basically is when we were. It's amazing. Four years as well. Five years in total. So yeah. And I mean, that's another reason why you're a good feeling for Jess. She probably did about four or five years on Triple J as well.

I spoke to Jess about this when she did my Velosophy podcast, which is, I think Triple J is a place that you should pass through. It's, I mean, it's probably. to this day the most fun job I've ever had in my entire life. And when I left, there was definitely a part of me that was like, why would I leave the best fun? I even knew then that probably nothing else was ever going to live up to the fun that you can have at a radio station like that, particularly for me as a person who was so passionate about music. So for me, this was just the greatest experience of all time. I got to do comedy all over the place, find these audiences,

but also I got to go to the big day out. I mean, I went to, 35 big days out or something. You know? Just going to the whole tour. Yeah. I mean, I played music festivals. Like, there was a music festival in Brisbane where one time I was on before the lemon heads. Like, it was, it was, so the me and then the lemon head on this stage on the same day.

So Adam and I, there used to be this band called Sonic Animation. They were like a big, like, sort of dance. Something in Bells. What was the song? It was like a, it was like a, oh, was it an Aussie band, right? Yeah, Ozzy band. It's like a symphony of vows or something of vows or something. Oh, that might be true.

So they had these two, they had these true two mascots called Robert Rolie and. Anyway, that's from that song, Robert Rolly rolls around the roll. Yeah. So they had these two giant mascots who danced on stage with them. Oh, yeah, I'm looking at the time. Yeah, I remember them now, yes. Right. And so at the Perth, big day. out in front of, it would have been 6,000 people, I reckon, on stage at the Perth big day

out while Sonic Animation were playing in the, like, the rave tent there. Adam and I were those two characters on stage. Oh, that's awesome. Like, for the entire set. Like, so literally have been on stage, like, for an entire set of dance music at a music festival and a big costume. I mean, the things that we got to do were, like, I just love them. And it's only 20 years on that you fully appreciate it.

Yeah, because when you're in the middle of it, it is the way you're living your life. It's only when you get to look back on it later that you realize, oh, that was a pretty cool time. At the time, it's just one of 35 big days out. And they look like, oh, I wish I could do that again, yeah. Well, I mean, we went on stage at the Sydney big day out to announce to Powder Finger that they had won the hottest 100. That's awesome. Like the first time Powder Finger ever played my happiness was at a live OB we were doing at the breakfast show across from the, under the Sydney Harbour Bridge across from the opera house.

And Powder Finger played my happiness for the first time as the sun came up over Sydney Harbour and I was at work. Yeah. No other job has been as good as that. Yeah, that's wild. You were in, you were a part of history probably so many times. Is it frustrating that it's not all recorded? Like, there's no footage of that? People remember it so fondly, and I think that the way they remember it is so much better

than what it would be if they could listen back to me. I just don't think there is a, where the last, it's the last of the myths, right? Because, you know, people's memories fade and they only remember the best bits. I think if they remembered all of it or if you were able to listen to all of it, you'd be like, I don't really see what the show was. It lives better in people's memories than in actuality, I think. So we're hoping to destroy those memories. getting the old band back together.

Live in front of their very eyes. Now, I'm looking at the dates. You're already selling them out. Brisbane sold out, Sydney, added extra shows. So you're playing Melbourne to comedy theatre, selling fast. Yeah, look, I mean, by the time people hear this, that one will be sold out. But I think we're going to add one more Melbourne show.

So there may be tickets still available. Oh, that's awesome. You're getting, you're just playing old tracks, or are you getting any bands to play or is this all sort of surprise? Well, it'll be surprised because we don't know yet either. What we wanted to do is make sure that if people wanted to come and see more than one, that they will see different things, that we didn't want to condense the whole experience just down into one show that we then repeated.

So instead, what the idea would be is like, we've got so many great stories about bands that we interviewed, for example. So at each show, we might tell a couple of those band stories, but you tell a couple of different band stories at the next show, a couple of different interview stories. at the next show, a couple of different guest stories. So one of the things we want to do, because people are so, oh, what happened to this person or what happened to this? So I think we'll have an aspect of, here are the people who were involved in the show, this is what they're up to now, and then in each place, try to pick one or two guests, musical artists, whoever

it might be. Missy Higgins. Who are associated with that part of the world. Who. Yeah. Yeah. I saw a clip. You were, Missy Higgins was saying how much she loved your show, but she, she. With Matt. Yeah, she couldn't remember Adam's name. Will and Mac, could not remember Adam's name. I mean, certainly I'll be bringing that up. If nothing else, that will come up. Quite a lot.

I'll probably play Missy Higgins to come on stage. But yeah, that's the idea. When we go to these places, like, it would be nice to go, oh, he's this artist or he's this guest who's from here that we'll have as part of the show that night. So, yeah, it's going to be really fun, I think. I'm pumped. I'm going to have to go to that extra Melbourne show.

Well, you can I mean, you can just call me I'll get you to whatever show you want to go to. Oh, God, I'll come to the whole tour. I'll come to all 35. See if I was really true when I said that it'll all be different.

Hey, we got it on tape. And I've heard it. I'll be in the back. I heard it. Hey, Dave, do you want to explain to Will how this show works? Will, what we do here on do go on is we are taking it in turn.

Oh, no, hang on. Will says he's listened a few times. I really think we should get Will to explain what the show is. It does blow my mind if you ever say you've listened to an episode or you do a retweet or something. Oh my God, Will Anderson listens to the show. But does Will Anderson really listen to the show?

Will from Matt. From Will and Matt. So every week, one of the three of you, and that today I am Jess for the purposes with this, but one of the three of you will go away and you will prepare a report on this, on a subject that you would then bring back to the group and then the others will essentially derail that for comedians. purposes. Yeah, that's basically how the show works.

Maybe you have listened. Maybe it's probably the best has ever been described. That was succinct. Yeah, very succinct. We put a lot of superfluous. Can't even speak in there. Now, we always start with the question, Will.

And I'm doing the report this week. You guys don't know what I'm going to talk about. So to get us on a topic, I'm going to ask you a question. And the question is, the following people are all examples of famous what. Oh. And now I'm going to list. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. Deny that. I'll read out this name. You've got to tell me what are they known for, what are they known for? And you can buzz in it any time or jump in any time. We've got Emily Dickinson, T.S. Eliot. Poets?

Poets is correct. After two. Well done. I felt like it was going to be deeper than that. You know? Yeah, I'm like, this light of color. We'll burn this one and then. No, no, no.

They are all, I was going to say, Myangelo, John Keats, Sylvia, Plath, William Wordsworth, Pablin Neruda, Lankston Hughes and William Shakespeare, they're all poets, but I didn't mention any Australian poets there. But today I'm going to tell you about one of Australia's most famous and enduring poets, Earn Malley. Oh. Do you know Earn Malley or the Earn Malley story? No. No.

Perfect. I'm going to talk about Earn Malley today. Yeah, hopefully you do that. I've been looking to it all week. The only reason I know T. T.S. Eliot is because Tism had a song called T.S. Eliot is a wanker or T. Yeah. And he was a poet.

He was like, T.S. Eliot is a poet. That's how you knew it. But yeah, T.S. Eliot. I think he was like, he was, wrote about wars or something. And Alex, Ashley Dickinson. Emily Dickinson. Emily Dickinson, yeah. Ashley Dickinson is a listener of this show, I think.

May also be a poet. Maybe a poet. Yeah, I hope so. Yeah, so it was really just, yeah, like everything I know about, um, uh, sort of high flute and stuff, that's a tism lyric. You got any, uh, um, um, um, uh, wiser lyric. You got any William Wordsworth trivia? No, he's a poet?

Yeah. I mean, what a name for... One of the ones that Dave just mentioned. He was on the list. I mean, the name, that's a perfect name. That's a bit of, what do you call it? Nomitive determinism. He's famous for, I wandered lonely as a cloud.

Oh, yeah, he's another sad. I said T.S. Eliot, it was a bit sad, but they're probably all a bit sad. A happy poet. Come on. Happy poets are like a comedian. Yeah, that's right. People say, stop lying to yourself. This isn't poetry.

So this topic's been suggested by a few people and thank you to Paul Sharp from Hobart, Rachel Johnson from Melbourne, Tom Badger Hill from Sheffield in England, and Lena Rosenthal, also in the UK, in Brighton. Interesting. So Australian poets, but known outside of Australia. Internationally. Hobart, England. Yeah.

Overseas. Earn Malley. It's a great name. Yeah. So let me tell you about it. It all starts with a guy called Max Harris, born in April 1921 at Henley Beach in Adelaide. A very smart young man,

he won a scholarship that allowed him to board at the collegiate school of St. Peter in Adelaide. According to one of our favorite sources, the ADB, the Australian Dictionary of Biography, which is the clungiest name. I love it so much. Max Harris had a rough time at school, feeling like an outcast and being regularly bullied

until recognising that sporting achievements were highly valued he approved himself as a first-rate footballer and runner. I had that same realisation, but then I didn't have the talent to become a footballer or a runner. I mean, it's not like we're keeping it a secret that that's... Like, I mean, our entire culture in Australia is built on the idea that the way not to be bullied is to be good at sport.

He looked around and went, hang on the second. I can see a pattern. So he was good at sport as well. In his classroom, his English teacher, John Padman, introduced him to the modernist poets and writers, including Dylan Thomas and Matt's favorite, T.S. Eliot. Yeah, I know him. I've ever told you how I know his name. I didn't even get the Tism song name right, which is fine. I don't, do you know T.S. Eliot?

Personally? Personally. Personally, yeah. Will, obviously, you interviewed a lot of people on your previous radio show back in the day. He was actually really really. great. Like, everything in rhyming couplets, the entire interview. He's always on.

He was able to do it off the top of his head. I was like, man, do you ever stop rhyming? Because the tism song's called T.S. Elliot, he wanker. And I assume that's a reference to T.S. Eliot somehow. But I never thought to look it up. I mean, I could.

I mean, at the very first, the first half would be, minimum. Yeah. The bit where it says T.S. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Anyway, I'm derailing. You said for comedic effect. I forgot that bit.

I'm just derailing at the moment. So what are you going to know? Max Harris, he started at a young kid, he's reading TSA. He's getting inspired. He then started writing his own poetry and some were published

in the school magazine. Oh my God. He excelled academically and went on to win over 20 prizes at school. 20? Which is too... I think that's got to be all of them, right? Academic as well as sporty.

Yeah. 20 prizes. Couldn't believe it. I mean, that's too many prizes. Yeah. Like I know they always... Everyone complains these days that kids get too many prizes at school. What era was this?

Sorry, 19 of them were participating in. It's wild 20. Did you win awards at school? I mean, what sort of, what does that mean? I don't know. Yeah, that was just a real general question. Yeah. I mean, I won like, I remember, you know, you'd get a weekly award because I guess that's why I'm a soft millennial or whatever.

Because they would give you, like, I reckon they just rotated through everyone and get a certificate at the assembly. They do that at your school? Oh, right, yeah. It's like you're like a student of the week or something like that. Yeah, but I never won any proper awards. Like, you know, I can't even, I wouldn't even be able to tell you. Yeah, I don't think my school even gave out awards.

Yeah. I was the Victorian Lions youth of the year. Okay. Really? That's a big one. That's a proper one. Yeah. They are the ones who sell, uh, watch over.

That's right. And did you get it? Did you get it from his breath? Was it? Did you sell the most minutes? It was non-minute related. What did you? What did you do?

done to earn that? So it's actually a nationwide competition, the Lions Youth of the Year, open to all students at school. And there is like a few components to it. One of them is public service. One is academia. So it's like they get your results and your sort of public service. There is an interview aspect, like almost like a job interview where they talk to you about like your life and aspirations and blah, blah, blah. And then there is a series of public speaking events at the Lions Club where you do a prepared speech and then an improvised speech

as part of this like competition. So that was the bit I was mostly... Yeah, right. You got four marks in that and it just really brought you up. I got some real M&M 8 Mile attitude when it came to that aspect of the competition. Were you getting laughs? Yeah, I mean, particularly.

Because like, think about this. Like, this is the local Lions Club. It's just a collection of people who do community service. They're trying to like help out the next generation of kids. They're sitting through, like eight speeches about Nelson Mandela.

You know, it's basically it's just like a bunch of mini episodes of do go on. None of the fun comedic interruptions as someone tells you their report on whatever it is that they've come up with. So you're standing out in a big way. Yes.

And so up until the, so I won the Victorian but didn't win the national. I lost the national final. But yeah, it was the reigning Victorian Lions use of the end. Oh, yeah, there go. They're kind of crowd like a wedding speech.

You know, they want to laugh, unless you're offensive or something. They want to. Or the tennis crowd, isn't that the, you know, the tennis players can get the biggest laughs from pretending to drop the ball. So the prize, this is where it comes in, okay, so the prize was a six-week trip around Australia. Oh. Right.

So all the state winners went on a, like, tour around Australia together. And in each state, the Lions clubs arranged, you know, statewide sort of adventures for you. And the price you paid were that you would do like a speech at the Lions Club. So basically, we were just on tour. Like, it was essentially just road show. It's an early roadshow. And as we were just going. And like, but the funny thing is, like, you know, I'm from like regional Victoria.

So we're taking them in a middle of, like some, you know, hay baling festival. or whatever. And then when we went to Sydney, they took her to see Billy Joel. You know. Felt like we'd really let down the side. Well, it feels like yours is a little more accurate.

Like, what's Billy Joel say about Sydney, you know? I think really they should have been taking a seat more at Kappa or, you know. It's true. But hay baling,

that is, where we, well, what town is from? Is that Hayfield is the name of the town? Exactly. And what do you do that? I had to get that name.

Okay, so this is literally a bit that I did in my show this year, but it's true, which is the town of Hayfield. Now, you would think that, you know, it's pretty obvious how it got its name. Yeah. Yeah, you would think so. The quote from the early settler, and this is on the Wikipedia page, like, I've looked this up to make sure I'm not just like false memory this. The quote that we were taught at primary school about how the town of Hayfield got its name is an early settler. came through in the 1800s, it was farmland. And he described the area as a waving field of corn.

Okay. So, and then no follow-up questions and expected us to get on with the rest of our lives, not understand any why we didn't live in cornfield. Cornfield. Cornfield's kind of cool. Yeah? Cornfield's better, I think, than Hayfield. Hayfield sounds like nothing.

Cornfield sounds like something. Yeah. Yes. And that was also what I did. thought. So a young Max Harris is very much like a young Will Anderson, getting out there, winning all the prizes. Sport as well?

You were, were you running? This guy, I'm starting to wonder if it's not one and the same. Were you born in 1920s, Adelaide? Yeah. And despite being a prefect and school captain, Max Harris's scholarship was only for three years, and when it ran out, his family couldn't afford to keep him at the school, so he was forced to drop out. Okay.

Which is so brutal. You've been like the best student the school has. You're the prefect, you're a school captain, and they're like, what about the money? You've got to go. So he started working as a news copy boy by day and studying by night to get his school certificate. And despite these non-educationally conducive conditions, he won the Tennyson Medal for Best English Literature Scholar in the state. So he's like studying at night and he's still better than all the other, the private school. Tennyson's another one I've heard of.

He's a poet, right? Yeah, an English poet. Gary, what's his first name? Johnny. Is it Alfred? Alfred. Alfred, that sounds right. They just call him Lord Alfred Tennyson.

They say Lord Tennyson. Yeah, Lord Tennyson, that's right. There's like a lot of streets in Melbourne named after Tennyson for some reason. But he's not Australian. No, I think he was like the English poet laureate. Right. Yeah, I don't know. At the time when people were naming stuff after England.

There's an area near like St. Kilda where every street, it's like there's baron street, Tennyson Street. It's like, yeah, I don't know what they're expecting it to be, but they had big ideas for the area. Yeah, trying to buy a bit of class there. Max Harris went on to study at the University of Adelaide, and in his first year he published poems in the university's literature journal called Phoenix. He published his first book of poetry, The Gift of Blood.

So he's a real young achiever this guy. Okay. Sounds like he knows about a lot of things, but gift-giving, maybe not. mate. Like blood. Blood. And how are you using a bag? Yeah.

How are you giving a... Happy birthday. That's for you. I bled for you. Such a like good gift if you need it. Yeah, you're right. Otherwise, real. Thank you.

It's 100% depends on whether you need blood. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. It's either the best gift or the worst gift. Yeah. There's no in between. Yeah. Oh, thanks.

I'll go put this with all the others. That's really weird This is a quote again from the ADB To describe the guy He worked as a cadet in the university library Was obsessed with modern literature and poetry And was keen to share his knowledge with others Yet he was also ambitious and made enemies

Through his precociousness and cocky manner So I get the feeling you either love him or hate him Kind of guy I get it Yeah He's super smart, super talented Yeah And he knows it

And he knows it And he knows it And what's this guy's name again? Max Harris. And what's this episode about again? It's not about him, yeah. Earn Malley. He's another poet.

Okay. But we've got to go, we've got to start with Harris to get to Malley. Got to send up the pins. Exactly. Normally, I feel like we would have heard about the person we're talking about by now. I just feel like Max Harris is so impressive. The day's like we just need a little bit of. We've got to talk about this guy.

He's amazing. Like, Max, it's short for maximum Harris. Because it's the most Harris. You couldn't get that. There's actually, he's got a twin Min Harris. who is underwhelming in his achievements. Whereas, yeah, I think I relate more to median Harris. So he made enemies and they would come into play throughout his life.

That is important to the story. Great, okay, yes. In his first couple of years at uni, he had been a member of the Jindy Waraback Club, which is an early literary movement devoted to emancipating an Australian identity in literature, trying to carve out our own sort of thing. The group, mostly poets, attempted to contribute to a uniquely Australian culture through the integration of Indigenous Australian subjects, language and mythology, and also found inspiration in earlier Australian bush ballads.

But the movement, that sounds all right, but the movement was made up exclusively of white people and has been criticised for being culturally, culturally insular, overtly nationalist and racist in appropriating Indigenous culture without consent or understanding. But they were kind of like, yeah, this is Australia, I guess, yeah. Let's write poetry about this stuff.

It does feel like you're judging it a bit on today's standards. It was probably super progressive at the time that they even talked about it like it would be worthy to take on board some indigenous culture. Yeah, I mean, and things have changed. Like these days, you know, three white guys wouldn't get in a room and try to... Oh, no.

But basically the Gindi Warwick, they faced a lot of criticism. at the time for being quite a nationalist group and a lot of people didn't like them for that. That was what they were criticised for at the time. But these people thought Australian poetry should reflect an Australian identity and the outback was a central

theme that they wrote about. But others pushed for poetry to remain more traditional and European in influence. And then there's another group which Maggie Nolan who wrote for the conversations a great article on this whole story that I'll link to in the show notes. She speaks of another group saying then there was the Marxist

school of social realism advocating leveraging Australia's convict history and Soviet notions of class struggle to build an authentic left-wing Australianness. We're drinking coffees right now made by a Marxist. Deborah Rist of the first time I went in there. She was talking about Marxism to another customer. And Doug Deppard, she's more specifically a Trotskyist. But anyway, just something to think about as you're sipping on that flat water.

You paid for that though, didn't you? I did, yeah. Yeah, that's true. There's some conflicts in ideology. Hang on a second. Yeah, actually, I'm going to head back now. So then there's Max. He's in the middle of all of this,

deciding what he wants to be. He tried being a member of the Gindy Waraback group, which are writing about the outback. He tried being a member of the Communist Party, but at the end of the day, he found he was more of a fan of the avant-garde and a proponent of modernist poetry and writing.

And for a little background here, modernism was an artistic movement that shaped many different art forms in the early 20th century. And to zone in on a bit more, I went to Poetry Foundation.org. Oh, yeah. Which gave me a bit of a background.

They said, with the inventions of everything from the automobile to the airplane, the vacuum cleaner to the incandescent light bulb, people's lives were changing with unprecedented speed. Many English language artists, including poets, thought a new approach was needed to capture and comment on this new era, requiring innovation in their own work, the result was called modernism, the largest, most significant movement of the early 20th century.

And it's, in terms of literary form and expression, it's often exemplified the quote that people associate it with it, is that the American poet Ezra Pound, whose maxim was, Make it New. Ezra Pound's mentioned in the Tism Song-Tay. Oh, really? I'm glad. What do they say about the? old pound.

Someone about the modernist achievement is mentioned, but like, to me it sounds like gibberish. I really should look into what it means. I'm like, this is great. It's real catchy, but I'm sure they're also saying some. Yeah, you're like somebody listening to We Didn't Start the Fire, but you've never read it out of history. Yeah, yeah. Just love this beat. Yeah, they made up these names that rhymes so well.

Joe DiMaggio? Yeah. How is that? That's fantastic. The way his mind works. It's fantastic. He's a quintessential Sydney guy, Billy Joel. And how was it on the Lions Club trip?

We didn't start the fire. Was it fantastic? I mean, I think here's the, I mean, what people of, you know, the modern generation will never appreciate is hearing we didn't start the fire as the new material at the gig. Because that's, this was the era, you know, like, you had all these classics. But this was, we didn't start the fire was the one he was most passionate about at the time because it was off the album that he was touring. He was getting out from behind the piano.

Really working the crowd sort of thing. I mean, the banter that Billy Joel had in between those songs had the crowd in the palm of his hand, you know? They're like that. Yeah. And then just, you know, like hearing we didn't start the fire when some of those events were actually, you know, closer to the happening. I mean, you, you younger people, you hear it as a historical document. You're like these names, these places. Yeah, they're all in black and white in my mind.

Right. Whereas like, I was living through. I lived through not starting the fire. Was he, he was doing a concert every day and he'd wake up, read the headlines and chuck a new name in there. It's like, built it night by night. It was fire, man. And the one person I knew who didn't start it was Billy Joel. Because he kept telling me.

I thought he was protesting too much, to be honest. Oh, no, they investigated. I don't know. That sounds like one of those firefighters who lights their own fires. Wrote a whole song about it. Yeah, very sucks. Come on, Billy. You're coming with us.

What modernist is. is a term that I think is short-sighted. Like, they're looking at themselves in their place in time and everything. They must just realize that that was going to be confusing to people in a hundred years later. And then there's post-modernism from the 70s onwards. And now we're post-post-that. Everything from now on is going to be post-modernism. Yeah.

And where does post-Malone fit into that? Post-malonism. I think that's what the kids are doing now. Yeah. It's something to do with, yeah, face tats. Is that right? Am I talking about it? I'm still cool

I'm still cool So a bit more about modernism It's hard to exactly define an art movement That had many subgroups and stylistic offshoots But give it a crack I'll transform I will give you a shot And also over different decades

Different countries they have their own Sort of offstutes But as a very general rule for modernist poetry It's characterized by its free verse And subject matter that often made a statement About society And realistically trying to convey everyday life

So it didn't rhyme. It didn't rhyme. They were like, I don't want to rhyme. Yeah. And they worked backwards from that, didn't they? I've written a really good one. Doesn't rhyme. Doesn't rhyme.

Doesn't write that into the rules. That's on purpose. Yeah. That's better than the ones that rhyme. Yeah. They're trying to. Yeah. Yeah.

Whatever. Like, dumb. Next you want like what jokes at the end of year, like punchlines at the end of your jokes? No, thank you. Yeah. Postmodernist anti-comedy is what I'm telling you that I'm doing. It's better than comedy that makes you laugh. And this is meta poetry than poetry that rhymes.

People hate it when words rhyme. It's easy to make an audience laugh. What I'm doing is art. And what you've got to remember, this is the time before rhymezone.com existed. So these people... I mean, that's why they didn't rhyme, which was difficult. Yeah. They, you know, they were still looking for a word that rhymed with orange.

They didn't know what we know now. What do we know now? Rhymezone.com, the orange, it's blank. Oh, yeah. There's nothing in there. Yeah, right. But they assume they could be. Yeah, they assume that could be.

Yeah. But they avoided it anyway. So modernism, it'd been prominent for, it's funny, Australia was so behind in this. It had been prominent for decades. This is the 1940s in Australia, but it's been since the start of the century. But it never at the time hadn't fully taken off in Australian literary circles. And because a lot of people did not like it. Modernism, wait.

Yeah. Seriously. That's good. Yeah. In England, they're like, oh, you're still doing that thing, huh? Yeah. Okay. My grandpa did that.

Weird. But everyone, a lot of people here, the critics did not like. modernism as a style. One critic described it as utterly worthless. So there was this schism in the Australian poetry scene with multiple groups. I know it's so lame to look back. Fighting to emerge as the victorious Australian poetry art form. And if you're thinking, surely there's room for all manner of artistic expression that can easily coexist. Well, you're wrong. There can only be one. That is obviously what I was thinking. And everything else sucks. We, because of course, we know how it plays out,

ostentatious wins this battle. Yeah. That's right. So the one type that combines into Australia. Yeah. That's right. Yeah.

Oh, go Anna. Took Deca. Do go Anna. It's like Austin's in the room with us. Yeah. So some more conservative poets took a special umbrage with a new modernist style taking shape.

But our main man, Max Harris knew what he liked, and that was poetry and modernism and passion. for these two subjects were the driving forces behind his decision in 1940 to found his own literary journal called Angry Penguins. Yes, that's great. It's a great title. That is a great title.

This guy is an overachiever. Yeah, he's like, he's like not even 21 at this time. Ridiculous. Angry Penguins would be a great football team name. That's what Tazzi. I thought Tadji was a bit dull, new team and they've gone with devils. Why not go for something that hasn't been done before? Tasmanian angry penguins.

Now that you've heard it out loud, do you want to revisit what you just said? Yeah, it sounds like a euphemism for a heart on. Is it? Oh man, I've got a rotten angry penguin right now. Do you want to visit Philip Islands tonight? Tasmanian angry penguins. Can't tap.

Can't tap. The march of the angry penguins. The worst thing is he's got happy feet, but he's angry. No, you're right. Yeah, probably not the best. But, I mean, you know, it could be some... I think of the Wombats is a great football team name. Yeah, that's wasted.

Maybe better for rugby. Just nuggets running. Yeah, nuggety. Yeah. Picking up pace. So, Angry Penguins, he co-founded the journal with fellow poet and student Donald D.B. Kerr. And according to Earnmalley.net, we're getting closer to Malley.

Oh, my God. Oh, yes. This is another great source on Earnmalley.net. writes, their quest was a boldly rebellious one. to liberate Australian literature and art seeking, as Harris put it to quote, put a mythic sense of geographical and cultural identity back.

End quote there. And then, Ehrmellie continues, no less than a change in the Australian national self-perception. This is a poetry journal. It's a big goal. I'm loving it.

It's a big goal. And the first issue was funded by Max's mom. Oh, that's great. You're going to change the world. Mom, can I have ten bucks? And so if you hadn't said, just moments ago, he was 21. I would have assumed he was in his 40s or something by now. He's done. The amount of stuff he's done. So much, yeah. But yeah, I love that the mom

backed. So this is Angry Penguins. Yeah, Angry Penguins. Volume 1 backed by his mom. Yeah. The opening page would have been to this is for Mum. Yeah, thank you, Mom. Thanks, Mom. I'll pay you back. A letter from the benefactor. Max was the co-editor, and his own writing was included, and the name Angry Penguins actually comes from his own poem called MythPretemines. Theoridum of despair. I reckon a better name for that poem would have been Angry Penguins. What would be?

What about the Tasmanian angry dendums? No, what was the word you said? That wasn't even closer. Mithridatum? Mithridatum. Jeez. The rhythm was similar. I'm going to give you a bit of mythridatum of despair here.

Oh, great. Now, in mythridatim, I had to look it up. It's a remedy used as an antidote for poisoning. sometimes seemed as a mythical remedy. Max Harris' own poem goes, We know no mythridatum of despair as drunks the angry penguins of the night, straddling the cobblestones of the square,

tying a shoelace by fogged lamplight. Oh, that rhymes. Yeah, it was an A-B-A-B structure there. And also the imagery of the drunken, angry penguin. I can see it. Yeah, this guy, you know what, give him a price. You're another prize. 21st prize, yeah.

And they're wearing their suits or whatever, the tuxedos. Right? Stung around like Angry Penguins. This is good stuff. And Charles Jury, who was a poet and literary professor, who assisted the general to get going, a bit of a sort of an influence that they looked to.

He agreed. He thought the description of Angry Penguins suited the young poets on their revolutionary literary quest. Oh, nice. You are the. Angry Penguins. Yeah. And that's a jury decision.

So that's, sorry. I'm so sorry. Charles. So, sorry. 12 Angry Penguins. Yeah. We're getting somewhere here. Okay.

More step. And I think we're going to go. One more step. We won't ask this section. We edited out. I'm already making notes of my head, Connor. Can you edit out everything I've said so far? This is really nice to be.

here for one of those moments where you say that and then it does not get edited out. He does not. Always one of my favorite things about listening to this show is your delusion about what gets edited that out of the show. I listen back and I go, he didn't edit that out at at all. The other times you're like, they probably edited that out. No, I just listen to it. 45% of the show is Matt begging to have it edited out.

Please look after me. Otherwise, I'm not free to take these swings. If I'm afraid that every mist stays in. He needs to think that it's going to go. Oh, yeah, no, no, that's right. Okay, edit that out. No, don't. Charles Dury commented also, this is their guy that look up to.

He commented there was a sense of genius about the place. Okay. So there's a bit of buzz about this, about this mag. And the first edition of Angry Penguins came out in February 1941. The Second World War was raging at this point, and his co-editor, D.B. Kerr was soon killed in action in New Guinea the year later in 1942. Sadly, he wasn't the... the last of Harris's contributors to go to war and never return home.

So that's sort of the cultural context of the time. The first issue was a hit and caught the attention of Melbourne lawyer John Reed, who went to Adelaide to meet the person behind the journal, who was quickly making a reputation for himself. John Reed was an arts patron who in the early 1930s, with his wife Sunday Reid, bought a house on the former dairy farm that they named Heidi. Now, are they the couple who came up with the context? concept of a Sunday read?

Yeah. I love a Sunday read. Is that named after? Yeah, that's right. And they name a Sunday drive. I also had some, a lot of stuff going on. You never combine the two.

That's very dangerous. So it's John and Sunday read. They're married and they founded the Heidi house that was soon to become the epicenter for the Heidi circle of artists, which we've talked about before Matt on the show, because for our artie facts, our little spin-off web series and podcast where we spoke about the history of art.

Which no one watched. Yeah, no one watched, but it was so much fun making it. That was fun, yeah. We went out to Heidi Will, which is now like his gallery and,

what's it? Technically bullying, but it was near Hardenberg. That's what's called Heidi. And we spoke about Joy Hester. And I think they bought it for like a, it was like a hundred bucks or something. Yeah.

It's something wild. And they're driving past and just went, Oh, they're going on on a Sunday drive and they went. They put a bid on it. It was like farmlands. But now it's, you know, relatively in a city, Melbourne. Yeah, that's right. Yeah.

I forgot about that. That was cool. Yeah, during lockdown we did. Was it during lockdown? They've had this idea that we'd do a series where we'd go to bits of art. Yeah, galleries and installations. Around Melbourne and record us telling the story. story of the art in front of the art and then putting it out so people could see the art

while everyone was locked down here. And yeah, we went there, went to the Young and Jackson, did one about, you know, the Chloe one and went to NGV and. Did you do the, whatever the yellow perils called? We did, vault, yes, yes, we did go out to that, yeah, absolutely. And yeah, what's the street art guy? Oh, and then there's a Keith Haring out in Collingwood, big, big mural that we Yeah, that was fun. I forgot when we'd done that. That was great. And that is available still on YouTube?

Yeah, on YouTube, yeah. Yeah, because it did not catch the imagination of our audience. Yet. Yet, that's right. Because I was thinking it could be this whole thing like, no, we do a series on architecture or whatever when we go, you know, sit in front of the opera house and talk about that history and we find other things. Yeah, and we talk to an expert each episode as well.

Yeah, it was fun. Maybe it's just an idea that time wasn't right. Yeah, that's right. Like, it sits there for a while and then people are like, maybe through this episode, Maybe through us talking about it right now, people are like, actually, you know what, that does sound like a pretty cool idea. In the lockdown, I didn't enjoy it because it was too, I couldn't go to the scene. Yeah, it was cruel. We were hanging over you.

He was rubbing it in my face. But now I'm ready. Yeah, I'm going to go to the yellow peril with my phone. And then watch it. That's how I prefer to enjoy it. Get the full ambiance. So, yeah, why don't you start with the Joy Hester episode? because she was one of the artists,

part of this Heidi circle. But backtracking a little bit, in July 1938, the Reads, that's John Sunday, were active in the formation of the contemporary art society. And over the years, many different artists took up residents at Heidi

and they'd sort of feed them and buy their artwork and give them a space just to create stuff. And that included Joy Hester, that I spoke about, her husband, Albert Tucker, Danila Vesilef, Grace Smith,

and the famous Sydney Nolan, who was one of Australia's most famous painters. He painted all of his most famous series on Ned Kelly in the living room at Heidi, which is cool. That's cool. Or 37 or something of them. And it was all a bit Fleetwood Mac with many of the artists and patrons all sleeping with each other.

John, Sunday and Sydney were a thruple for many years. Thruple. So good. It's so good. I love to hear that word. Yeah, it's great. All the articles described as a minagetre, but Thruple is so much better.

Yeah. I just, like... They didn't even know that was a throu. Yeah, they didn't know. Menager Tuar's very European, you know, I think Thruppel's more of a modernist kind of. Yeah, Australian modernists. Yeah, they would have appreciated the modernist take on their, on their preism. Until they had a spectacular falling out.

Oh. And it's actually worth its own report. So maybe I'll leave it there and we can talk about it a bit later. The falling out. Oh, just that, just their, their whole, all of the goings on at Heidi is worth its own report. Surely in three artists that, should be called a triptych. Yeah.

Yeah. That's a word Dave taught me. Almost taught you. Triptych. And then he, so he stormed out and then they went back to being a diptick and it was a bit sad. Okay. But before that in 1941, John Reid offered his support to young Max Harris and helped him publish further editions of the Angry Penguins. Through Reid, Max actually met Sidney Nolan, which inspired him to link the two.

movements of writing and visual art, and from then on the journal also included visual art. And the second edition featured an early Sydney Nolan work, who himself was also only in his early 20s. So there's these young, creative, hip-apt happening people making stuff together. It sounds great. So it's really taking off for Max Harris, but again, not everyone was happy, including some of his fellow students at the University of Adelaide, remembering this is peak World War II, and in 1941, a sense of nationalism was swirling an umbrage, was taken with the first issue of angry penguins, and its perceived anarchistic sentiments.

Anachistic sentiments. Urnmalley.net describes the wild scenes. A campus meeting was called in which Harris and angry penguins were condemned, and the students called for punishment by throwing Harris and three other anarchist students into the nearby river Torrens. Harris leapt onto a table and volunteered to throw himself into the river

if the students would take up a collection for the war effort and the Red Cross, the students chose the dunking. They're like, nah, I'd rather throw you in. That's it. So they're anti-annicus and they're going to show that by throwing people in a river. That's what order it looks like to me. Exactly. And there's a photo of the dunking that was published in the local newspaper.

It's wild. Okay. That's so, isn't it, feels sort of, I'm getting secondhand embarrassment of these like 20-year-old students being like, Stop being so anarchisty. But you know when you're in everything, you're like, that's the only way. That's the right way. And there's all the different socialist alternative groups and they don't all agree. There's a bloody war on.

It's not the time for your bloody poetry and books. There's a bloody war to fight. No. Okay. But isn't that what we're fighting for so I can write some nonsense? Yeah, that's what a bloody coward did say. Get a gun and go and kill somebody. Well, actually, my new poem is called I'm a coward.

Please don't make me go. So in 1943, after his degree was finished, Max Harris took up John Reed's invitation to come and live at Heidi in Melbourne. So he's listening to all those other artists that are all having a great time together. Together, the pair formed the publishing house Reed and Harris, releasing numerous Australian books in addition to Angry Penguins. An intent on publicising the work of emerging artists, they incorporated art images and articles on the artists in the artists.

journal, including many of the Heidi Circle artists I mentioned before. And now that's become its own acclaimed artistic movement. And historically, the whole movement is referred to as the Angry Penguins. Ah. So they're called like the Angry Penguins artists. Like Sydney Nolan is an Angry Penguin. I'm starting to feel like I should know some of this. I feel like none of this ringing bells at all.

But how many poets do you know of? Yes, Ellie. He wanker. Ezra Pound. Yeah, good one. I think there's another Tism song maybe called Ezra Pound Ax King. Does that make it, does that mean anything? I'm assuming that's some sort of a play on some sort of...

Is there an axe brand that sounds like Esra Pound? I don't know. And I regret bringing it up, to be honest. These are things I could quietly Google. They're one of your favourite bands ever and you've never understood a single lyric. Very few of them. But then they did a song about Shane Crawford. I'm like, okay.

Okay. This is more my speed. Now, this river called Phoenix. What's that mean? Where is that river? Arizona, I suppose. The Angry Penguins journals also published and exposed their

Australian readership to modernist writers from overseas. And it's so funny to me that people were pushing back against this because they published authors that are now universally acclaimed. But when they were young and cool, people were like, what is this shit?

Including Nobel laureate, Gabrielle Garcia-Marquez, legendary Welsh poet Dylan Thomas and James Dickey and they're like Who is this Dickie? 25 years later He would be named

the poet laureate of the United States So you know Acclaimed and mainstream enough for that But at the time they're like What is this bullshit? Dylan Thomas is ringing a bell But that is Daisy Thomas's real name Isn't it?

Or no. No What's his real name? Dale Thomas. Is Dylan Thomas another person or is that another? Dylan Thomas is a very famous poet Yeah, Welsh poet Yeah

I'm going, Why would I know that name? Is it a football? No. From him being really famous. It's just him. His most famous poem is, do not go gentle into that good night.

Yeah, I've heard that line at least. I think I've done her a book cheat before, actually. Is that what you've heard? Yeah, probably, yeah. I learn everything from either you autism, Dave. Who do you understand more? That's pretty similar to be honest. And again, not everyone was happy.

with these overseas artists and poets being published, Earnmelly.net again. The conservative literary world lived in simmering resentment of the political and aesthetic passions emerging in angry penguins, not to mention the exuberant intellectual instigations of young Max Harris, which they describe in quotes as the en font terrible. So they were really anti-Max Harris.

He's like painting a bull's eye on himself. He's seen as the poster boy that people want to take down a pig. You'd assume now they'd be like, it's so great that anyone's talking about poetry at all. But back then they're like, that's the wrong kind of poetry. Yes. You didn't they don't have to do the poetry right. Yeah, it's wrong. It should be A, A.A. B.A. Rhy.

A couplets. Does that make sense? Yeah, I guess we can do an A.A.B.A. if you want to. I mean, it's kind of more limerick style. Yeah, yeah. Baudy limericks. That's the real stuff. That's the happy poet is.

Did we get to the boy on the burning bridge? And have they been to Nantucket reason? Australian poet and critic A.D. Hope has been described as an extreme opponent to Max Harris and the other angry penguins. Okay. Which is so funny to say. I hate those angry penguins. And he described the journal as, quote, an arrogant and stupid literary magazine. A.D. Hope was to become an acclaimed poet himself, but he was. very old school and I love this

complimentary put down. He was referred to in an American journal as quote, the 20th century's greatest 18th century poet. That's awesome. Bravo. Yeah, yeah, that's really good. Yeah, you're really good at that stuff they did 200 years ago.

That's kind of, it's, I mean, it was, I think it was more of a compliment, but it kind of reminds me of Tim Rogers called even, one of Aven's albums is the best. Beatles album They Never wrote or something like that Right, yeah

And it's from the 90s So you can take it both ways I think he meant it as a compliment But because the Beatles are pretty handy band In the end but Yeah, nice to be compared to it But also does sound a bit like Yeah, you ripped them off

Yeah, yeah But that is good The 20th century's best 18th century So on October 28th, 19th century So on October 28th, 1943, Max Harris received a handwritten letter That would change his life addressed to the editor of Angry Penguins, it says,

Dear Sir, I was going through my brother's things after his death. I found some poetry he had written. I am no judge of it myself, but a friend, who I showed it to, thinks it's very good and told me it should be published. On his advice, I am sending you some of the poems for an opinion. It would be a kindness if you could let me know whether you think there is anything in them. I am not a literary person myself, and I feel I do not understand what he wrote, but I feel that I ought to do something about them.

Is he going to say he's not a literary person again? He's really laying it on things. He's protesting a lot of not being a literary person. I don't know what I'm talking about. Are these even words that I'm writing? I don't know. I can't read. Just scribbles to me.

It says, Earn kept himself very much to himself and lived on his own of late and never said anything about writing poetry. He was very ill in the months before his death, last July, and it may have affected his outlook. I enclose a stamp for a reply and oblige.

Your sincerely, Ethel Malley. And Harris read the two enclosed poems, and he fell in love. Oh, hell I. The first poem was Dura Innsbruck 1495. Now, Elbrecht, Dura was a German painter, and Innsbruck is an Austrian city that he painted in 1495. There's a series of paintings. And I'm going to read you,

Dura, Innsbruck, 1495. tell me what you think of this poetry. From Earnmalley, from Ethel's now dead brother. I had often cowled in the slumberous heavy air, closed my inanimate lids to find it real, as I knew it would be, the colourful spires and painted roofs, the high snow glimpsed at the back, all reversed in the quiet, reflecting waters,

not knowing then that Dura perceived it too. Now I find that once more I have shrunk to an interloper, robber of dead men's dreams. I had read in books that art is not easy, but no one warned that the mind repeats in its ignorance the vision of others. I am still the black swan of trespass on alien waters. Yeah, not a single rhyme in that.

No rhymes. I mean, it feels like, you know, artistic to me in that it's obsessed with the idea of art. Yeah, art about art. Hard about art, the best kind of art. Well, I'll just talk about art and how hard art is. Particularly, I would say, in light of the fact that there was a world war taking place at the time, I think the one thing we have to ruminate on is how hard it is to actually make art.

Yeah, to make original art that people have been doing for 500 years already. Yeah, so that's what I mostly got from that was your great will. That's what I got. Because I was like, you've dedicated your life to making art. Yep. And I feel reinforced by that position. That was a pat on the back. Yeah.

For all the great artists. It also makes me feel good about not going on any of those like entertain the troops, you know, things. I didn't, you know, I just stayed at home and made art. If you thought about art. Yeah, they should be entertaining you. Yeah, that's right. If anyone's a hero here. Come back here and entertain me.

That's more of the... So that's one of the two poems. Max loved it and he wrote back to Ethel and excitedly inquired if there were any more poems. And she sent back more as well as the short, detailed biography of her brother, Earn. This is what it said. Ernst Lela Malley was born in Liverpool, England 14th of March 1918. His father died in 1920 and Malley's mother migrated to Peterson and Sydney with a two children, Earn and his older sister Ethel. After his mother's death in August 1933, Earnmellie left school to work as an auto mechanic. Shortly after his 17th birthday, he then moved to Melbourne,

where he lived alone and worked as an insurance salesman and later as a watch repairman. diagnosed with Graves disease, which is an autoimmune disease that affects the thyroid, Mali refused treatment. He returned to Sydney, moving in with his sister in March, 1943, where he became increasingly ill, as well as temperamental and difficult, until his death at the age of 25 on the 23rd of July that same year. And the poems were found after his death and had no preface or description, but appeared to have been written over a five-year period.

And in total, Ethel sent 17 poems, none of them longer than a page. and Max couldn't believe the poetry he was reading. The author appeared to be on par with the great Dylan Thomas, who was contemporary at the time. He played for Collingwood and Carl. What a guy. I think that's the one. And with great excitement, Max showed them to his literary friends

who agreed of their brilliance. A completely unknown, modernist poet of great importance had been discovered living in suburban Australia, sadly too late. It was an incredible story. Yeah, living in suburban Australia. That's not quite right. It is an incredible story.

But it's not one that's uncommon when it comes to art. You know, Van Gogh's paintings are only appreciated in death. John Keats' poetry was received with indifference when he died at just 25 as well. Emily Dickinson and us that we spoke about earlier, only 10 of her 1800 poems were published while she lived and now she's considered one of the great American poets. But also, I guess you look back at something like this suit through such modern, distrustful eyes. Like, you know, it's like every email or message I get from somebody going,

like, hey, you've got like a fine or whatever. I'm like, that's probably like a scam. Yeah, yeah. Even though maybe occasionally it probably is the truth. Yes. And you're just like, I just reckon that's a scam. Like, when you say this, I'm like, prove you had a brother. Yeah, prove it.

Prove some evidence. Where is the evidence that this guy existed? Or is this just you trying to write some poems and get them in this magazine? Yes. And it's always a little bit more interesting if they're dead. Yeah. Oh, yeah. But he's totally known the story because he felt like he's on the verge of breaking

another like another artist finally ready to be appreciated posthumously. And this one's Australian. That's what he's fighting for an Australian modernist. Born in Liverpool. Yes, but that's true. Was his sister Ethel, right? Yes, Ethel. Is this, is there any chance that she's writing him and was it at a time where women

weren't sort of respected in poetry or is that, could that be the motivation? I mean, most of the names that I read that the Angry Penguins published were male names, I'll say. Yeah. So it's possible that she's pretend. The Ethel's just pretend, right. She's, oh, I discovered another one actually today. Yeah.

It's like a real two-pack's mom situation where suddenly there's just like, Oh, yeah. Yeah. What's going on with Raygun? Yeah. He just had some powers, I guess. Really, yeah, really good writer, but also I think he could tell the future. This guy's good.

My brother, huh? I don't really get it, though. Not a literary type of yourself. So Max Harris, he's like so excited by it. He's like, what a great fine. What a discovery. So he shared the poems with his friends who showed similar appreciation. They read them and went, this is good stuff.

This is great. That's great. Because I would have, it's the kind of thing where I'm like, I couldn't tell you. Obviously, I'm a layman. But it's amazing. I would have thought even in that world, some would be like, this is great. And some were like, no, it's not. How can you tell?

Yeah. But it's like almost unanimous. All the people that write this sort of stuff are like, this person's got it. So literary scholar, Jeffrey Dutton described what he'd read as somebody who had the real voice. Whoa. High praise. That is high praise.

Not everyone agrees, I should say. Author Stephen Orr, who's written a book about events at this time, described the poems to the ABC in 2021 as very modernist, very bizarre, little bits of facts and bits of lists, strange images. It's all over the shop. So not everyone likes it. But that's not, you know, that's modernism. Not everyone gets it.

That is funny. He said it's modernism. He's like, it's very modernism. It's like fantastic modernism poetry. It's no good. Not for me. Yeah.

I mean, I, you're saying it's, oh yeah. It's not for you fair enough. But it's like a music journalist going, this new post-Malone album. Good.

Good start. Good solid start. He's like, he's speaking real fast or slow. or whatever his style is. Sometimes fast and slow, then he speeds it up again, maybe. Really, there's not as much double kick drums that I like.

So I don't know if it's any good. You got, like, I think it's, yeah, it's weird criticism I would have thought from that guy. 2021, he should know better. Yeah. That's true. What was his name? His name is Stephen or.

Stephen, or if you're listening. Take a fucking, take a good fucking look at yourself, mate. And all the names are reservoir. He's the only one that could still be listening. Damn it. Damn it. So Max Harris, he loves the poems. This is exactly what he's looking for.

This is right up his alley. John Reed, his angry Penguins co-publisher was also a big fan. So the two people you need to impress are impressed. Okay. There was some speculation that maybe the backstory was too fanciful, too good to be true. A few people like me who are a bit suss on this whole story.

And they're funny because how fanciful is it? My brother died. He wrote some poems. A bit far-fetched. A bit far-fetched, no. Like it feels like. It's believable. It's very convenient.

This guy who's this genius poet has only been discovered, like, once he's dead. And we found these letters. It's a very romantic way of, like, oh, we found, it's a good backstory. Yeah, yeah. It gets people hooked in, right? Totally does. And they thought maybe it's like a, like you're thinking, like a pseudonym, maybe someone else that's just made up this story.

Or maybe it's just completely made up. They weren't sure. But John Reed replied to Harris that, quote, since the poems were good, they should go ahead and publish them, damn the risk. Yeah. Put them out there. They're good. What is the risk?

Yeah. Damn the risk. It comes out that, yeah, I guess that it's a pseudonym and they go, well, whatever, they're good. Sudenum, that's pretty common though. pseudonyms, right? In literature, I study literature university. That's why I know some of these terms like pseudonym.

It's become very clear on this episode as well that you remember quite a lot. I did it. I just remember dozing off in the lecture theater as a, Some of the best sleeps in my life. Like our lecture, one of the lectures had the best voice. This is a sort of slow-talking Englishman. And I just remember, I don't even remember ever reading it, but he talked about something called Wide Sargasso C.

Oh, yeah, I've done that on a book chair. Yeah. And he talked about it in relation to something else. Jane Eyne. Tempest or something. Janeair, yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's like, basically it's fan fiction.

And I just was like, I just remember just like, oh man, I don't know what you're talking about, but I am drifting off and it's so relaxing. I wish I recorded it just for, to listen to it at nighttime. Yeah, that's what you try to capture now when you listen to you, on your audible app.

Matt, he's, he listens to books. What do you put on on 0.75 speed or something? Yeah, 0.75 speed. Listen to a slightly interesting but not too interesting non-fiction book and I don't make it 20 minutes.

Whereas I used to listen to podcasts. Like I used to listen to two guys, one cup or something, normal speed. And I get to the end of the episode. I'm more excited than ever. I've just heard about a player's bio. His favorite movie was Shawshank Redemption.

I didn't see it coming, my heart's racing. So now, just to slow it down, and I'm listening to a book about the history of the Marvel comic book thing. And he's just talking about the office and guys in the office. I don't know. I hardly get through, you know, 10 minutes now, and I'm drifting off. Hot tip. How's your hot tip?

Unless people listen to this, podcast at bedtime, then keep doing that. We'll take wherever we get the downloads. We'll take it. If you need to, just play it on an app that you're not listening to, you know, in another room. So, they decided to dedicate the next edition of the Angry Penguins to earn Mali,

Australia's previously unknown poet. 36 pages of the autumn 1944 issue were dedicated to him. Sidney Nolan painted the cover and Max Harris wrote the edition's introduction, writing of Malley's short life and untimely death. He wrote, convinced that this unknown mechanic and insurance peddler is one of the most outstanding poets that we have produced here.

That is, yeah, I forget that part of it. That's making it particularly romantic, isn't it? Yeah. Toiling away under cars. He's a working, a man, a working man. Just quietly a genius. It's also a genius, yeah, you're right. And it's high praise.

Some of the, you know, the most outstanding poet we've ever produced. Copies were dispatched to London's publisher Faber and Faber and to Gotham Bookmart in New York City. And the Angry Penguins unveiled earn Malley to the world. Yeah. Even if he, like, we are doubting it. There's probably a twist coming. But I don't really understand what the problem is. If it's like, oh, it turns out it was his sister or it was, it was another poet.

Well, it feels like it could be an invention of the Angry Penguins too. Right. Yeah. Like they as a literary movement could have got together to make this sort of like, like art project that's beyond. Yeah. Yeah. Like they've got together with bloody Sydney Nolan and some of their artie mates and they're like, we're going to do some. And, and almost.

fooling the world. Yeah. But it... This is the art. This is... This is the art. And yeah, we had you believing... Step back.

And the other... The other thing is, because we're all going, this is good because this group are saying it's good. But if they're also wrote it and they're like, it actually sucks. Like, that's the reveal. They go, you publish that. It sucks.

You're idiots. That's the art. I was not you idiot. Now, this is the art. Step back. This is the art. And now we're podcasting about it. A further step back.

And this is the art. They come in. The art. It made you talk about 80 years later, huh? This is the art. Well, here is some of that art. Here is some more of Ern's writing from the poem, Perspective love song.

This is one of the verses. Princess, you lived in Princess Street. That's not good. That's bad. I don't look. That's. They are taking the piss now. They're getting cocky.

What else can we get away with? That does really feel like, now we're going. Let's really fuck with them. In a princess house with a princess hat. Princess, you lived in Princess Street, where the urchins pick their nose in the sun with the left hand. You thought that paying the price would give you admission to the sad autumn.

of my Volhalla, but I too invented faithfulness. Oh, yeah, I don't know. By the end, I'm like, yeah, that sounds like a good one. It is my favorite line in all of Ernst's writing is Princess. You lived in Princess? But people love, you know, they're authors, their friends, they love it, so the publishers, but not everyone was convinced of what they were reading. They didn't believe Earn Malley's story.

They were a bit like, well, here. They're cynical. That part, I'm wrecking. put to one side, is the writing good or not? That, like, I don't know. But I'm pretty sure that first line isn't, but... But if it's good, I don't know why the story matters that much. But I'm wondering if it's bad.

I can't wait to find out. Well, according to the ABC, soon after publication, a University of Adelaide literature lecturer lecturer publicly declared that he believed Max Harris had authored the poems himself. Max is making the darking. The dirty penguin himself. The angry penguin. Yeah, well, he's become a dirty penguin.

That sounds like a completely different thing. The Dirty Penguin, that's unreal. Like, urban dictionary. That's really rank. Yeah, no thanks. Gross. The Adelaide Press followed the controversy. Reporting rumours that Mowley was actually literary professor and crime writer J.I.M.

Stewart, aka Michael Innes. They're like, you write crime under another name. Maybe you're writing poetry under another name. So fingers are being pointed. Okay. Like, you're earned, your aunt, no, I'm earned, no, no one's admitted here. But all of this must be good publicity for earn. Great publicity, because like now, newspapers are picking up the story.

And before, this is just a literary journal that literary types literary. That's it. Student bookmakers reportedly started offering odds on the poet's true identity at Adelaide University. Look at that. Yeah. I love the idea of student bookmakers, too. Like apprentice hairdressers. Yeah. We'll give you a pretty good odds.

We're not sure, you know. I'm not a professional. Max Harris himself hired a private investigator to try and get to the bottom of Earnmeli to find out if he was real. Am I him? You break it out. That's a great way to throw it off the same.

I've hired a private investigator. It's clearly not me. It's very Billy Joel we didn't start the fire tactics. Why would I have done that? I would sing a whole song about it? I would sing a six-minute song about it. Journalists also started digging. On the 18th of June

1944, the Sunday Sun ran a teaser that said, Earn Malley, the greatest poet or the greatest hoax? Adelaide University

student newspaper On D, teamed up with the Sydney University equivalent, which is Oniswa, and discovered the address given by

Ethel Mali was in fact, that is in the sister the return address, was in fact the residence of a Sydney poet called

Harold Stewart. Oh. So the truth was starting to leak out. That's a bit weird. How do you spell Stuart? Proper way?

The proper way. Oh my God. Uncle Herb. All right. The following week, fact or capitals, which is the supplement of the Sydney newspaper, Sunday Sun and the Guardian at the time, ran an,

so you can trust it. It's called a fact. We know that. We know that. They ran an article that identified 26-year-old James McCauley and 27-year-old Harold Stuart as the hoaxes under the headline

Earn Malley poet of debunk, full story from the two authors. Right. So, but they're not going to, oh, well, I guess we'll find out. But if this is just two guys, I still think that if the poets, poetry is good. If it's good, it's good. Yeah. But I can't wait to find out if it's bad.

Well, the two men who are, who are both poets themselves in an army unit stationed in Melbourne at the time. Oh, wait. They're doing both. Yeah, fighting and rutting. Fighting and rotten. This is the rare combo. So it would be the name of their first book.

Fine a writing. So the reason that fact had this article was they released a statement to them explaining their actions. Yeah. And I'm going to read a series of quotes from the two men explaining what they did. They said, We decided to carry out a serious literary experiment. There was no feeling of personal malice directed against Mr. Max Harris, co-editor of Angry Penguins.

For some years now, we have observed with distaste the gradual decay of meaning and craftsmanship in poetry. They were, did it purposely bad. Oh my God. That hurts. Oh, poor Max. Oh, no. Oh, no.

They're right. Oh, that hurts. And he's just gone. I guess this is the only world in which your thing that it, like, if it's a combination, you're like, that's fine still. If they're doing good. Yeah. Oh, it's no.

Oh, no. Yeah. That's the only way that Harris could. He's just fully pumped it up. This is one of Australia's best ever poets. And they write, Mr. Max Harris and other angry penguin riders represent an Australian outcrop of a literary fashion

which has become prominent in England and America. The distinctive feature of the fashion, it seemed to us, was that it rendered the devotees insensible of absurdity and incapable of ordinary discrimination. And they go on to say what they don't like about this sort of poetry. They say, our feeling was that by processes of critical self-delusion and mutual admiration,

the perpetrators of this humorless nonsense had managed to pass it off would-be intellectuals and bohemiums here and abroad as great poetry. Their work appeared to us to be a collective of garish images without coherent meaning and structure as if one erected a coat of bright paint and called it a house.

However, it was possible that we had simply failed to penetrate to the inward substance of these productions. The only way of settling the matter was by experiment. It was, after all, fair enough. If Mr. Harris proved to have sufficient discrimination to reject the poems, then the tables would have been turned. What we wish to find out was,

can those who write and those who praise so lavishly this kind of writing tell the real product from consciously and deliberate concocted nonsense? So they're like, we'll send in some crap, and if they detect that it's fake, then we'll know that they actually can tell the difference between, like, Dylan Thomas and, And a couple of guys.

But Dave, is it not possible that they stumbled upon accidentally great modernist writing 17 times? And then they were all each better than the last. Yeah, they're amazing. And they went on to describe in their statement how they created the poems. And it's quite interesting how they say they wrote them. They say, we produced the whole of Earnmellie's tragic life work in one afternoon with the aid of a chance collection of books, which happened to be on our desk,

the concise Oxford Dictionary, a collected Shakespeare, and the dictionary of quotations. We opened books at random, and choosing a word or phrase haphazardly, we then made lists of these and wove them into nonsensical sentences. We misquoted and made false illusions. We deliberately perpetrated bad verse and selected awkward rhymes from Ripman's rhyming dictionary. So that's what they had before Rhyme Zone was Ritman's Rhyming Dictionary. They did this the wrong way. I reckon if it was me and I'd done that and it starts blowing up, I'd go, all right, I'm flipping now.

We are, earn mallee and we did this on purpose. I'm a modernist. I'm a modernist now. Look at that, like, you're a, what's better being a debunker or like seen as a great artist? I just go, I could bang these out as much as we like. Yeah, it's Ethel here. I found another 50. Yeah.

I am, yeah. So, because if. wow it's a lot of because if there's like if you were doing on purpose as art like you know

if somebody said to you actually this was my process like David Bowie did art like this sometimes right where yeah like so if you were as an artist saying yeah this is how we put together this modernist poetry

I literally just read from different books there's Shakespeare there's the phone book there's literally I was reading the phone book and I saw there there was this woman called Princess she lives on Princess Street I thought that was funny I chuck that in like you know

I intentionally put some hard-to- rhyme bits in there as well. You people would go, oh, yeah, that's great art. Like, that makes sense to me as art. Just the intention of it. Because they were doing it as a debunking way. Yeah, it's a bit of a pisteak. It's suddenly different.

Yeah. Yeah. Princess on Princess should sound like a Bruce Springsteady lyric or something. That's how good it is. Yeah. I guess it's like, you know, if you're at a fancy restaurant and they give you like, like, ingredients on a plate, they can go, oh, this is deconstructed. Whereas, like, if you just, like, found those ingredients in other circumstance, you'd be like, like that's my shopping.

Yeah. Like I have to make it into something now, right? It's a context that's important. It's very true. Like, it feels like, I'm sure I've read stories of this, like a painting or sell for a bunch of money with a fake story and it turns out a baby painted or an elephant or something. You know what I mean? It's like that.

You go, we knew you couldn't tell splodges of paint apart. You say that this is high art, but it's just nonsense. We got you. And it feels bad. I don't know why. That makes me feel real. really uncomfortable. Like,

oh, let the art people think, you know, believe the nonsense. Who cares? If you like it, you like it. Yeah.

That's why, I mean, it's interesting that somebody looked at a poetic movement and went, we've got a debunk. Yeah. What?

Well, yeah, Australian culture was so different back then. Poetry debunkers. It's like, these guys are in Melbourne waiting to go off to, to war,

where they probably won't come home and they're like, I know what I'm going to do with my final days. Yeah. Not with family or friends. I'll make up a poet. That's a way to kill a day.

They explained that they even made up quotes from historical figures like Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, who was quoted by Earn Malley as saying, The emotions are not skilled workers. And he never said that. That's like, girl, that sounds great. Sounds great. Sounds really good. I'm the, like, yeah, everything they say, I'm like, apart from that princess on princess.

Yeah, I did choose that. So I'm just like, I chose it. Yeah, this sounds like it could be. There was also a clue or two in there that it was all made up. They put a couple of little hints in there. Take this line from the poem, Sibbelene. It says, it is necessary to understand that a poet may not exist, that his writings are the incomplete circle and straight drop of a question mark.

That's, I mean, again, that sounds awesome. That sounds good. But also, in retrospect, that sounds pretty obvious. They've also highlighted the line that poem may not exist. Yeah. That's like when people think that there's, you know, when they, like, the Delta and Omicron came out and if you rearrange the letters of Delta and Omicron, it's like media control. And the thing that I always love about that is, it's like secret people running the

world, but like, they're leaving clues. Like, if you can just work it out. They haven't a bit of fun. It happens to fun with it. And these guys, that's a big clue. It's like, oh, this author might not be real. Yeah. That, yeah, they're playing like they're the riddler, you know.

We want Batman Avenue. chance to figure it is. I mean, I could just blow up all these buildings, but, you know, that's the fun in that. Where's the sport if we can't get caught? In this statement, the two hoaxes also said that the first three lines of the poem, Culture as Exhibit, which are swamps, marshes, borough pits, and other areas of stagnant water serve as breeding grounds. We're taken from a direct quote from an American report on the drainage of breeding grounds

of mosquitoes. And they've just put it over three lines. That's awesome. But you know what? I'm with Matt. That sounds good. It does sound good. I'm into it.

I mean... Although they're clearly choosing stuff that is believable. They're not really taking the piss. I'm sure I could read you a bit of T.S. Elliot now and we'd all be like, oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That could be a fun game.

You're bullshit or not. Yeah. That's fun. The statement also said that despite the dupe taking in Max Harris and many others that he showed the work to, it doesn't prove their lack of intelligence. They write, proves something far more interesting. It proves that a literary fashion can become so hypnotically powerful that it can suspend

the operation of critical intelligence in quite a large number of people. So they're like, these people want to believe. Yeah. So they believe. Yeah, I think it is. It's really interesting. And it also makes the criticism of Stephen Orr from 2021, like, mate, how it's easy to do it in 2021. He's like, yeah, I don't think it's that good, actually.

It's like, now that you know that it's not... From a mosquito report. Why are you even talking about it now? Like, it's worth criticism. Stephen Orr, there's villains in this story, probably. But my main one... It's Stephen Orr. My main one is Stephen Orr.

And if you're listening, Stephen Or, thanks so much. Interestingly, one of the only two people that McCauley and Stuart, the hoaxes, had let in on their hoax, was McCauley's friend from his high school days. John Kerr, who would go on to become the Governor General of Australia. Yes. He's the one. The Whitlam one. He's famously sacked Australian Prime Minister of Goff Whitlam.

Was he also the one who was drunk at the races? The race is. That's right. Well, that's a weird side character to be introduced to this. Mate point in the report. But I found that's so weird that they let two people know. One of them was their old mate John Kerr who would go on to sack Australian Prime Minister of Goff Whitel.

Well, that knowledge destroyed him. Yeah. You could never trust anyone at that I. He was like, are you the prime minister? Who is the queen? Am I the representative? Huh? I couldn't tell you anything about any other governor general that I think.

That's, he needs a movie. That's like a almost Forrest Gump style. He's just floating through history. I mean, not quite floating. It was pretty key in the sacking of a government. Yeah, the only one to ever sack the prime minister. What was the story about him being drunk at the races? He got drunk at the races.

And then he spoke of. microphone or something? Yeah. I think I'm conflating the Sandy Roberts calling. Yeah. Different. Yeah. He got, her name was.

I think something Dick. Dick and he called a cock. It was like, it was. She was like Miss Australia or something. Yeah. And he was like Samantha Dick and instead he calls a Samantha cock. That's so good for Sandy. That's great.

But that wasn't the government general. No, that was not the governor general. He was just slurring his words. And he was there, part of the Earned Melly. Wow. The other one, the other person they led in on the hoax was everyone's favorite 18th century poet writing in the 20th century. A.D. Hope, who was of course well known as an enemy to Max, publicly taking shots at him. And many speculated that A.D. Hope was so in on the hoax that he may have contributed to it.

They say, oh, we just told him about it. But others are like, he could have been. It was like hope. and the strings. Yeah, totally, a real mastermind because he had one of, he really, he pledged to bring Max down. And that's,

and that's what he was doing. Yeah, totally. Oh, yeah, all right. Jeez. There's also a great conjecture about, they say it only took one afternoon, but most modern journalists are like, I reckon they worked on this for a lot.

Yeah, yeah. It sounds better to be like, yeah, that's how easy it is. We were at 17 in an afternoon, but most people think that. Because they're like the ones you read, apart from Princess on Princess Street, sounded like they took a bit of time,

you know. That one about bacteria. You don't just, oh no, that one I did just fully copy. That couldn't have taken too long. Max Harris was deeply shocked by the hoax, but continued to vouch for the poetry's merit, a stand he took throughout his life. I actually, I'm just remembering in year nine,

I kind of did something like this as well. And it was so lazy, because we had an English assignment where we had to bring in two poems about animals that reference animals. And I'd forgotten to do it. So, and we had to go up and read him. So I just, I banged one out about a cat and went up and read it just like and caught it by Derek Johnson or whatever.

And, you know, I just got away with it. Because, you know, poems are nonsense. So you just, like the black cat purrs. Purrs, it does. Look at it purr. Purring like a cat. That one was Derek Johnson and the next one. What's the teaching of say?

They're probably not hardly paying. attention. And then you're just like, I think that one was about socialism. Yeah. Yeah, actually makes them, I love how open it is to interpretation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The one thing I know is, it's not about a cat. What is it about? I don't know. What do you think it's about? It's asking questions. I know that. Not about it's not about it. Certainly not about cat. I can rule that out. You're the modern day earn mallee then. Yeah, yeah. Well, earnmally. Dot net writes, whether they

liked it or not. Max Harris asserted that McCauley and Stuart had written their best poetry, their only poetry of real genius. The assumed persona of Earned Malley had liberated them. He kept saying like... Oh yeah, that's good. Yeah. He's doubled down. Well, by the way, this is the best thing that you've ever done. This is actually good shit. Yeah, and you're normally terrible. Oh, I like your style, Max Harris. The most surprising thing is that you wrote something this good. Wow. So apparently you're like George Costanza. It's opposite day. If you're not trying to write good poetry, you actually come up with that. That is the perfect way to play it.

A lot of Max. Double down, Max. Yeah, this could threaten his whole career, right? If he goes, I've been fooled. And I imagine it probably did take some shine off him. It was bad for him. The subsequent... The school asked for 16 of the 20 prizes, but...

The subsequent issue of Angry Penguins largely was devoted to the analysis of the poems. And they got a bunch of the... their writers and friends to give their opinions. And the merits of the poems are actually still debated to this day. There are still fans of the poem. Not Stephen Or. But other people are like, this is really good modernist stuff. Yeah.

And I feel sorry for Max Harris, who was still only 22 years old when this all happened. And he was widely ridiculed for publishing the fake poetry. Despite doubling down, there's these articles written about him like, ha ha, they made fun of you, you modernist dickhead. And it wasn't nice. nice for him. Meanwhile, the hoaxers were praised. Time magazine, so big Time magazine wrote about,

wrote that they had a headline Australian Army Lieutenant James McCauley who fought at New Guinea and Corporal Harold Stewart were out to kill more than an afternoon when they concocted Malie's poems. These guys should write poetry. The bulletin gave

earnest thanks to the diggers who were described as joint debunkers of Bosch and Blah and Blather. Oh. Yeah, because the mainstreams always love to take down, you know, the fancy new modernness. Yeah, literary types. Like, oh, they're a bit hoity to it. Yeah.

I knew it didn't make sense. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I knew it was dumb. Yeah, when I didn't get it. No, I wasn't the problem. Yeah, I knew I wasn't the problem. These latte sippers, inner city elites with their fancy words. So they're saying, they're calling them the thanks to the diggers.

There's no mention of the angry penguins contributors who also fought in the war on never came home, but they're trying to make it like that there's these literary types, and then there's these Aussie heroes. Yeah, yeah. Showing them for the fakes they are. You still get that in Australian politics, right? The very wealthy politics, like, it's all, it's rings so disingenuous when you hear these politicians who are saying the elites.

Yeah, they'd want to the, you know, caring about, you know, woke nonsense. And they're, they're talking about the elites like they're not rich, you know, Like the leader of the coalition is a super rich guy. I don't think he owns like 100 houses. And he's always talking about the battlers. And no, I don't understand why journalists don't ever go, can I just double check something with it? I don't know. Is this true that you own like 100 houses?

Who's elite compared to you? I mean, also the idea that poets would be in an elite group by modern days that it's also like, like someone's like a poet, you're like, yeah, but what's your real job? Well, I think, I think Rayban. What's the name? Rayban. Ray ban. Ray gun. Ray gun.

Raygun is sort of the modern, David, because she's been copping a lot of heat because she's had some public money for a university work and stuff. And her being not that good at break dancing has opened up a lot of people who hate that sort of stuff. like anyone going to university for free and stuff like that. It's really opened her up to a lot of vitriol and whatever. And fair enough, because we all know academics. That's where the money is. You become an academic to become a multi-millionaire. Academic money.

And I know, there's people on both, like, people are attacking her for all sorts of reasons. And I don't really understand it. But yeah, some of it seems pretty ridiculous. Like, oh, she's getting money to write academic papers. Like, yeah, I think you should be paid to. That's what academics are. Paid to do your work, right?

It's getting paid to do a work. What the hell? I do feel like, you know, there's someone really bold about going, I'm an expert in this field. You can just say that. Don't put yourself so out there that people go, we're not really going to take your lectures that seriously anymore. Don't you think she maybe heard her brand a bit for her class members?

I mean, sure. But like, I enjoy the information you convey on this podcast, despite the fact that you're all clowns. That's a very good point. I can separate those two things. But now watch me break days. Very good point, yeah. So the media was coming for Max Harris.

The conversation quotes Nile Brennan writing for the Catholic advocate, who really took aim at the angry penguins. Yeah. At the time he wrote, You cannot afford to ignore typhus, and we cannot afford to ignore Harris and his gaggle of penguins, It is to be hoped that the counterattack of Mr Stuart and McCauley may well have fatal results for this mental disease. Oh, boy.

All right. So Max Harris is cop in it. And it became quite a sensational story widely reported around the world and all this unwanted attention had another bad side effect for Max Harris. In August, the police arrived at his doorstep to question him on immoral and indecency charges. relating to the urn malady poetry that he had published, and he was charged with indecent publication. I mean, I know that princess line wasn't good, but indecent? I feel like that.

It wasn't that bad. So was there frutier stuff? Is that what we're saying? Yeah, I'll read a couple of bits now. And see how fruity you think this is, Will. The matter went to trial in September 1944 with Max on the hook for the charge of indecent advertisements for which he pleaded not guilty. Again, lots of press cover the story.

just keeps getting bigger and bigger this thing. Detective Vogel sang, which is a great name, was a witness for the crown and outlined the supposed indecency. The Mali poem called Nightpeace mentions being in the park and had the line

the naked and trespassing. And the police officer said, I have found that people who go into parks at night go there for immoral purposes. Oh. So that's one of the most immoral parts. The other evidence was the

poem, Egyptian register, used the word incestuous. The poem includes these lines, the long shanked ibises that on the Nile told one hushed peasant of rebirth move in a calm, immortal freeze on the mausoleum of my incestuous and self-fructifying death. Self-fructifying. Yeah, I'm going to need a moment. I'm going to do some self-fructifying a moment. That, yeah, that's so funny.

And they now know that he didn't write it, right? Yeah, but because he's the publisher. He's put it in out and he's on the hook for it. It's so crazy. But yeah, they're not, like, they're not able to read into things at all. Because, like, the word naked in the park there, he's saying it very literally. Yeah, and then incestuous. So when writing, when giving his evidence about the word incestuous, Maggie Nolan,

again from the conversation writes, Detective Vogel saying admitted to not knowing what the word meant, but said, quote, I think there is a suggestion of indecency about it. Your honour? And he went home to his cousin wife. That's, yeah, that's so funny. Wow, I've got bad news for like just 80 years on

if you're gone to the internet. You're never a rude surprise. Noted literary critics testified to defend Max, but it was not enough. And at the end of the trial, Max Harris was found guilty fined five pounds in preference to a six-week prison sentence

he chose to pay instead he was ordered to pay an additional 21 pounds in legal costs which today is closer to a thousand pounds I think this is right because while we're you know his compatriots are fighting for our freedom overseas that we're not allowed to say words like naked

what are they over there fighting for if it's not for our right to say naked in a poem you know what? Rough. Yeah. And the actual writers of the poetry face no charges. None.

They're not in trouble at all. They're in the press as heroes for debunking. Max was wounded by the public humiliation, but the angry penguins continued on for a couple of years before ceasing after issue number nine in July 1946. And I don't want to upset you here, Matt, but I'm going to quote from author Stephen Orr again. Oh, no.

Or is back. He told the ABC in 2021 that Max Harris never really recovered as a poet. Oh, that's a shame. Although he did try and embrace the whole saga and once again backed Earn Malley when in 1952, along with John Reed, his old publishing pal, they published another poetry journal that they called Earn Malley's Journal.

That's great. But Max himself didn't write as much poetry, but he did have a lasting influence on the Australian writing, publishing and book selling scene. He later teamed up with former Angry Penguins business manager, Mary Martin, and joined her running the Mary Martin Bookshop, which he fully took over in the 60s and became one of Australia's best booksellers with shops across the country.

You heard of? Yeah. He sold the business in the late 70s, but there's still a few left in Melbourne in South Bank, Port Melbourne, and there's one at the Queen Vic Market as well, still with the same name. What's the name, sorry? Mary Martin. Mary Martin, yeah, so he was instrumental in that, and that's what he did for a long time. He also co-founded the Australian Book Review, devoted to critically reviewing Australian literature,

and wrote a column for the Australian newspaper for... 27 years. According to the ADB again, in 1973, the owner of the newspaper, Rupert Murdoch said, every society needs a max. To identify its successes as well as its failures, its forlorn hopes,

and its lost causes. And also to shake it out of its smugness and hypocrisy to act as a catalyst and an irritant. Jeez, Rupert's changed a bit, hasn't he? That doesn't sound like something he would say now, shaking us out of arrogance and, yeah, weird. Yeah, it's weird that like Rupert Murdoch being a fan of his makes me not like him.

Just immediately suspicious. What kind of guy is. You know what actually? He deserved what came to him. That's what I'm here. Mary Martin Bookshop. That was pretty good though. A collection.

So he continued to write poetry, but I believe he didn't publish it himself anymore, which is a bit sad. But a collection of his work was published posthumously by the National Library of Australia as the Angry Penguin. Great. He was made an officer of the order. It would be great if it turned out later that it wasn't his work. And it was just calculations and other things. In an ultimate. That would be sick.

Or he wasn't really dead. Yeah. He won a few more prizes before death and also after death. He was made an officer of the Order of Australia. The Alumni Association of Adelaide University awarded him the title of Father of Modernism in the Australian Arts. He died in 1995. but in 2018 he was inducted into the Australian Media Hall of Fame.

So, yeah, he couldn't help getting those honours. Wow. And as for the hoaxes, well, McCauley Stewart and A.D. Hope, the 18th century's best 20th century poet, made their serious poetry debuts in 1946 being published in H.M. Greens' anthology, Modern Australian Poetry. Their hoax and the public ridicule of modernism actually had a real effect on poetry in Australia for decades after this. In 1964, the poet and journalist Ronald McQuague

claimed that the hoax determined the way English literature would be taught in universities and in Australia for generations and that McCauley and Hope gained academic authority through the notoriety generated by the hoax. Modernism was for a long time dismissed in this country because of this whole debacle, yeah. People like, oh, it's that easy to get published

so they stopped reading anything else. It's funny that despite trying to ridicule modernism with poetry that they claim they came out within one afternoon and then dedicating their lives to what they considered as superior art form, the opening line of Harold Stewart's Wikipedia page says it all. It says Harold Frederick Stewart, date of birth, date of death, also in 1995, was an Australian poet, an oriental scholar. He is chiefly remembered alongside poet James McCauley as a co-creator of the Earn Malley literary hoax. So 80 years on, the hoax is stuck around.

round. And it's like his most famous achievement. And this is the art. This is the art. Smoke bomb. And yeah, 80 years later, Ernie Malley still has fans.

Like I said, the poetry is still widely read and talked about. Something that not many of the other poets of their day can say, which is so crazy. I love it. And some contended that by dropping all inhibitions and treating the writing like modernist style as a bit of a joke, they dropped their facade completely and wrote some truly good poetry.

That's so good. Even if accidentally. And I thought I'd finished with another final reading from Ern Malley. This is the poem Petit Testament. In the 25th year of my age, I find myself to be a dromedary that has run short of water between one oasis and the next mirage. And having despaired of ever making my obsessions intelligible, I am content. at last to be the sole clerk of my metamorphosis

begin here in the year in 1943 I resigned to the living all collateral images reserving to myself a man's inalienable right to be sad at his own funeral I guess that sounds good to me

that sounds pretty good to me I gotta be honest I think they I think they accidentally just were really good at poetry for us Yeah. That's the story of Australia's greatest literary hoax. Wow, that was great, Dave.

Yeah, I'm so glad. That was really good. I enjoyed that very much. When I discovered the story, I hadn't heard of it either. So it had been suggested by those people in the hat, and I was looking for a hoax to talk about. I thought that would be a fun thing to put up for the vote for our Patreon supporters. And I was just really, yeah, intrigued by the whole bit.

in the ongoing debate eight decades later. Is it good? Is it? In the back of my mind, I was thinking, oh, you're telling us the backstory of Max because he is going to be Mally. Yeah. But, yeah, I love the twist.

Fantastic stuff. And the fact that it was my uncle as well. That's right. Harry. Probably, probably an uncle. Where is he from? Is he from Melbourne? Yeah, let's say that.

Yeah, sure. Thanks so much for joining us, Will. I appreciate it. I just feel like I'm going to get tism more. That's the real thing I'm going to want more. That was the aim here today. Yeah, I'm definitely going to, I've just never really critically analyze many of their lyrics. I just find them, they're very catchy and fun. Yeah.

And the stuff I get is fun and funny. But, yeah, the literary stuff, I'm like, I get that he was an author. Or he was some sort of a, like, there's one all about, like, feminist stuff or and uh like yeah that's deep man you had it it took you a second but you definitely heard it yeah there's you know

a lot of good stuff in there and I you know I just think it's really cool and clever and interesting so that's right when I was when I was reading about this Matt I was thinking about how sometimes Matt and I both big fans of Nick Cave.

And we sometimes send each other like lyrics out of context of his. Because he's also, takes his writing very seriously and he sits down at a typewriter every day, nine to five, busts out whatever comes to him. And then he turns out into these songs. But sometimes they are outrageous the lyrics. Like my favorite is from Elephant song, I am a Botticelli Venus with a penis, riding an enormous scullough fan. It's like, it comes out, there is no Nick Cove.

Yeah, yeah. elaborate high school prank and we love him but there's 40 years and people like he's seen as a

great writer and everything but some of it you go are you taking the piss out of us are you are you

are in Malia what are you doing yeah what's that one about from an old a bad seed song or he talks about

um what turned out the you used to be your favourite one about Miley Cyrus oh yeah

is a virus or something you know Oh, Hannah Montana crosses the African savannah. Yeah, yeah. That's not a lyric. That's not a lyric. Yeah.

Nick, what are you talking about? Like, I laugh because it was part of his 20,000 days on Earth, his documentary, him writing that song. I had to pause it because it was, I laughed so hard. I'm like, that is a parody of Nick Cady. Yes. And now Montana crosses the African Savannah. There's like heaps and the boy, you're listening.

You're like, oh, I bet, oh. One of my favorite ones from the same one as the Botted Jelly P penis album, he goes, he goes, what are he says? I take off my tap dancing shoes and put on my lap dancing shoes. You are, you're fucking with the same. It's so funny. So good. Or is it?

Or is it? Hey, making us think. You know what? I can't wait to find out. Yeah, yeah. I love it too. Will, thank you so much for joining us now. You do so many podcasts and they're all fantastic.

And they've recently over the last year or so come together under one banner. We can find them all in one spot. Thank you, Dave. That was very well explained. I appreciate it. Yes, they are all in the everyone-relax feed wherever you find podcasts. So there is four different podcasts there, but they're all within our world and they're all within that one feed.

One of, and if, because we got a bunch of majority of our listeners overseas, and I'd talk about Ozzie Rules Footy a bunch, but you've got a weekly podcast about Ozzy Rules Footy. A weekly Australian rules football podcast called Two Guys One Cup. We call it an AFL adjacent podcast. So if you are someone who doesn't really follow the AFL, I think it's like a show you can still listen to it. Because we talk about a lot of side issues around the sport.

There's not a lot of analysis. No, no. In fact, that's the weakest spot if we ever stumble into that. Hairs styles, club songs, whether the players wash their own socks, storylines between whether they're friends or not. Like, yeah, it's that sort of vibe. And then we have two podcasts, Charlie and I sort of do it together. But then I have an interview podcast called Willisophy,

where I talk to people about their life philosophy. And Jess has been a guest on that. So if people want to have a... Yeah, check that as a great episode. It was really fun. I think I've been on a couple episodes of Fofop as well. Yeah. Tofopop With Friends is now what that is.

called. But yes, that's correct. One of them, me and Charlie, just spoke about limp biscuit for like an hour, I think. Sometimes. I planned and just some reason we're. Look, yes. Like, that is what our world is. Yeah. Like, you just hear for whatever it is. I told you that we've got a regular thing now where we're just trying different biscuits on the podcast.

It has no reason other than we thought it'd be nice when we did the podcast that eat a biscuit. That's so good. A treat for you. Yeah. Oh, cookie. What's the segment called? No, no, we don't have a name for the segment. That's literally how.

But we have been saying, let's crack the pack. That's out on T-shirts. Let's crack the pack. It's time to crack the pack. Oh, that's so good. Yeah, so people can check it out. Everyone relax. Will Anderson, thank you so much.

Thank you. As we say goodbye to Will Anderson, we say hello, patron support. Hello! I know you've skipped ahead again. I've said this before, but really a great episode worth going back and listening to. Yeah, good first episode for the Patreon supporters to listen to, I think.

Yeah, I think so. Good entry level. Good entry level episode, yeah. I mean, they did vote for it, so. That's right. Miley Cyrus floats in a swimming pool into Luca Lake. There's another Nick Cave lyric from that song where he talks about Hannah Montana. Does the African Savannah?

Doesn't even cross the. African Savannah. Oh, does the... It's like it's a dance. He sat down at his typewriter wearing a suit and wrote that out. As the simulated rainy season begins, she curses the queue at the Zulus. There's a... Well, then Nick Cave read it when I was looking this up to see if there are any other

funny ones. There's a post about funniest Nick Cave lyrics. Oh, yeah. And one is a... I can't even remember this one, but my baby calls me the lock. nest monster, two great big humps, and then I'm gone. Yeah, that's, that's, I think that's from that same album, isn't it? Oh, I can't remember that. Um, I'll look it up. That's from, that's from Grinderman. Oh, God. Worm tamer. Oh, yeah. The warm tamer. That's the great song, actually. Um,

and I'm looking up another song off that, uh, Grindy Man 2 album as well, which has a, a lyric, um, It's all about It's called Palaces of Montezuma And it's sort of like Everything I'll give you I guess it's saying How much I love you

I'll give you everything He says stuff like Psychedelic invocations Of Matahari at the station I give to you A Java princess Of Hindu birth A woman of flesh

A child of the earth I give to you Thank you Nick Thank you Nick I'm okay Yeah No thank you The spider goddess and the needleboy, the slave dwarves they employ.

I give to you. Okay. Thank you so much. What's the spinal cord of JFK wrapped in Marilyn Monroe's negligé? I give to you. I've actually already got one. Thank you. Thank you, though.

Thank you. One more for me. Far from me, but the lyrics, someone's posted. it's good to hear you're doing well but really can't you find somebody else that you can ring and tell? Yeah. Cold.

It's kind of clunky as well. I know, Nick. Well, we love him. Oh, no doubt about that. We are not making fun. We love him. Can I, and I have been talking about the song,

what I was calling T.S. Eliot, he wanker. It's actually Mr. Elliot, he wanker. And that's alluding to... A different Elliot. Well, no, it's all about T.S. Elliot.

It alludes to The T.S. Eliot poem, The Hollow Men, which has the epigraph, Mr. Kurtz, he dead. So it's a play on that.

Mr. Elliot, he wanker. That's good. Okay, I've got to the bottom of that one. But can I,

can I read you the lyrics because I think this is poetry? Well, T.S. Elliott turned, turned the radio, couldn't get rid of the static. Serves him

right for being so enigmatic. T.S. Eliot crashed his motor car, snapped a clutch cable. I bet you my youngest daughter could drink him under the table. T.S. Eliot lost his wallet when he went into town. Serves him right for hanging out with the likes of Ezra Pound. T.S. Eliot thinks he's famous because he's a genius. But don't you know I'm ambivalent about the modernist achievements? That's good stuff.

Thank you, Tism Thank you, Mr. Elliot. He wanker. He wanker. I think they got him there. Got him. All right.

So this part of the show is all about us thanking our great Patreon supporters. If you want to get involved, go to patron.com slash 2G1Pod. There's a bunch of stuff you can get involved in there, Dave. Oh my goodness.

More bonus episodes that you can point a stick at these days. And should we say, this is for everyone, please sign up to our touring mailing list where you can put down any cities that you would come to a live show at because that's something we've just been talking before we recorded today and yeah, we're planning probably our biggest year of touring yet in 2025 and if we know where you are and where you'll come to see a show

that really helps us plan where we're going to come to as well. And that's if you're in Australia, New Zealand, America. Canada, the UK, Europe, Asia. We've got numbers in Tokyo, apparently. Yeah, it's awesome. If you want to, like, if you want us to know that you're there in Hobart, Amsterdam, Rio, wherever you are, the best way for us to know that you will come to a show is by filling out this little form. And then it's very quick name, email, tick a few boxes of where you'd come, send,

and then we'll just contact you when we're going to go to those places. And it helps us plan where much more likely to come to those places if we see the numbers on the screen. And yeah, you can find that link on our social media. It'll probably be, yeah, it's certainly on Instagram, but it's also on our link tree. And yeah, you don't have to be a Patreon for that. Anyone can sign up to that. But if you are a Patreon, you will be the first to hear about the live shows. And you'll get discounted early bird tickets as well available before anyone else.

And sometimes we sell nearly all of them to the patrons alone. Yes, that's true. But yeah, planning a big year next year. we've been sending out some messages today from stupid old just seeing how we can, where we can go and what we can do. I'm so freaking excited. We are very, very excited about that. And yes, and whilst you're on the Patreon, you get the bonus episodes as well. We do four a week, four a month.

Is there 4,000 up there now? 4,000 episodes. How many? 250. 250,000. The Baker's 400,000. We do four a month, including our ongoing Dungeons and Dragons, do go D&D campaign, which has been getting a lot of love. Yeah.

Tell you what, my character. Lemmy, no, not Lemmy Kilmister. Dimebag Killmaster. Dimebag Killmaster. That's a badass. Almost as badass as my name. Terry Sharfner. Terry Sharpener.

Bit of fun. So much fun on there, yeah. And D&D fans have been saying that we're really good at it, which is surprising. And, yeah. Yeah, we were worried we'd offend them by being so bad at it. But, you know, being silly. It's been very nice getting the positive feedback. So, yeah, that's really really good.

great. And then, yeah, all sorts of stuff. It's patreon.com slash do go on pod. You get to vote on topics like today's topic. Although, Dave, you said to me just off mic, there was some controversy with this. Controversy. This topic actually came second. But when I looked into the first topic, there wasn't quite enough information online,

especially in English for a full length episode with Will. So we've done it as a Patreon bonus episode that you'll be able to listen to. It would already be out by the time. time this one's out. But I don't know what it is. I don't want to spoil it for Matt, but it's a great topic. He had the best pitch ever.

That's why it won the vote. But yeah, there weren't that many sources online. And I say that like, there'll still be, it'll still be an over hour episode. Like all the bonus episodes these days, they go for over.

We were originally, we'll just do mini topics. Yeah, half hour episode. They go for over an hour. Because sometimes two. We feel, we don't edit them at all, really, and we take them for a bit of a walk.

We have fun. We have fun. So, yeah, look out for that one as well. All right. But the first thing we normally do in this section where we thank our great supporters is for people on the Sydney Schaumburg level or above, they get to give us a fact of quota question or a progress suggestion. I think in a recent episode I actually forgot that there is a jingle for this section. Oh yes. I wonder if anyone noticed.

Which goes a little something like this. Fact quote or question. Bong. Oh no. He always remembers the sing. I always. Sometimes he forgets the song and sometimes he adds a bong. Yeah.

So, Dave, what we do in this section is people who sign up on the Sydney-Shanberg level, get to give us a factor, quota, a question, or a brag of a suggestion, or really, whatever they like. And they also give themselves a title. I read out a few each week, two, three, four, maybe. This week four, it's a bumper crop. Wow, love it. And the first one comes from Katie Mae Westgate, who's given themselves a title of Olympian, brackets, sort of. Okay, this could be the most intriguing title we've had for a long time.

time for me. I believe this is a first time entry into the fact quota question section. Perfect. It's a question with Katie writing, sorry it's taken me so long. I'm just over two years away from the big five-o. So I'm thinking it's the right time to have a mid-life crisis. So my question is, what do you think I should do? Tattoos, piercings. These all have question Mike says what I'm doing that. Very good. Sports car. Find myself a hymbo twink. What would you do? Oh, my title is a reference to me being a volunteer performer in the opening ceremony of London 2012, which I consider to make me an official Olympian. Oh my gosh. You've got to start right there. You've got to commemorate that. You've got to get the rings. Oh, yeah. Like all the athletes get the rings.

Yeah. You're at the Olympics just as much as they were. Yes. I did read an article about some Australian Olympians who are getting the rings removed because it reminds them of failure. Oh, right. I think I saw that. Yeah, because they came fourth or fifth, then people ask, hey, you're at the Olympics and they say, yeah. And apparently, they get pity back. Yeah.

Yeah. Oh, what did you do? A diving or whatever. Oh, did you get you go? I came forth and they get people going, oh, I'm sorry to hear that. I need the fourth in the world. What? That's so sad.

We, uh, we got, we got some issues. Yeah, that's wrong. Come on. You made it to the Olympics. And even I'm so impressed that. West Gady over here West Gady West Gady

Yes that's good Yes that's good That's good stuff So possibly that could be a good tattoo idea Yeah I think What do you think Do you think maybe

You think maybe you just buy a sports car Maybe an Audi sports car But you add two more rings That's great The first Olympic Audi Olympic ring piercings Maybe hymbo twink Who's an Olympian

That's really good Yeah I think you just go Just make it a whole personality now Yeah I'm nearly 50. I'm all Olympian.

I'm all in. Yeah. I mean, I assume that Katie's somewhere near London to be, though, I suppose that obviously his performance would have come into volunteer to be part of it, but let's say,

so they are. Is there any sort of British things to do? Go to, what are those big stone hinges? Climb stonehenge. Allegedly. Yes. Put you on the mark on.

What about? Repel down stonehenge. What about climb mountains? Sometimes people freak out and they, you know, all the, I don't know. After that story you told us a month ago or whatever. Oh no, UK's highest peaks.

That's probably doable. Go up, Ben Nevis. Oh, yeah. 1,345 metres. That sounds all right. That sounds doable. How hard is it to climb that? Go up Arthur's seat.

Okay. I've never done that in Edinburgh. Should we do that this time? Yeah, let's do it. When were there in November? I think I went up it. 10 years back, maybe. Okay.

I've typed in Ben Nevis and people also ask, can a beginner climb Ben Nevis? also known as pony track the mountain park that sounds good good is best for for beginners out and back route is roughly 16k or 10 miles long

1340 meters of descent usually 7 to 9 hours that sounds like a good get your midlife crisis over in 9 hours yeah and I mean we're talking about an Olympian here exactly so I think that'll be an absolute walk in the park

yep So yeah Katie Mae Westgate or West Katie As people call you Friends of yours call you Yeah I think that's the way to go Or drive up in your new Olympic Audi That's the best of all

And then get a tattoo on the top Take a tattooist with you Fantastic First Olympic tattoo on top of Ben Nevis Oh and go up with a twink Yeah A twinky tattooist The tattoo? That's efficient

Then you can do it all Drive a you know like a two-seater Exactly get a really sporty Audi Oh yeah With the Olympic rings Fantastic. Great question, great work. Congratulations on being in your late 40s. The next one comes from Jordan, aka self-appointed vice president of sore bums.

This is a brag, okay? There's a twist that this is a brag. Although, what's your guess? Saw bums. All right, let's just see what they write. Some sort of world record. Absolutely worth it. Oh man. Yeah. I took, yeah. All right. So the Jordan writes, hey y'all, I've just had the best vacation. I rode my motorcycle. That's where the sole bums are.

Gotcha. Almost 14 hours to go to an event. At the event, I met someone and I'm now dating that someone. Hell yes. Four exclamations. She does live in another country, but that's besides the point. On my ride home, I managed to get. an iron butt riding 1,609Ks or 1,000 miles. Wow. That's for the Yanks. That's written by Jordan.

Oh, I assume Jordan was Yank because of the Yawl. Yeah, the Yawl felt. I'm like, oh, this is coming in from the south? Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. And if they live in another country, if it's Mexico, it's probably not that far. Yeah. Or maybe they're from Canada. Yeah, either way, because I was thinking if you're Australia, it's hard to ride the motorcycle

or to your new partner's place. An old, well, just straight up the Hume. Yeah, but to another country. Oh, it says country. Yes, it's not say country. Straight up to him to a puppy in the UK. Yeah. Or, you know, via a cruise ship.

And I'll tell you right now, my bum was very sore. Was this about the ride or the date? Which date? Also, if you all have any advice, there's you all again, have any advice on long-distance relationships that wouldn't go astray. Thanks, bunches. Have you ever done a long-distance thing? Yeah, well, one time I traveled for like six months while my partner was at home.

And the day I got back, she dumped me. This is not the advice we need. No, so I think I would not be, because I, I, you know, I was young and maybe didn't understand what was going on a bit. But yeah, I probably didn't check in enough. But she wasn't checking. You know, it was just a thing. Yeah, that makes sense. We're just sort of.

And then she's like, in her head, she's like, I assumed you were off gallivanting. I was, I was, I was, I was missing you the whole time. Oh, yeah. You were never far from my thoughts. I like, you know, this is 15, this is nearly, you know, coming up to 20 years ago, maybe. Yeah. It's like, I, you know, it wasn't like you, you can text easily. Text costs like, you're 1300 bucks or something.

There's a pre-wats of the 200 bucks. You know, I could only afford a couple of those in a trip. So maybe these days we were. say keep in touch. Keep in touch. Text and text, yeah. Few photos. I mean video calls.

They don't forget what you look like. Video calls even, you know? Yeah, video calls are good. But yeah, just be honest with each other. I don't know. But yeah, be open and honest. It's all about communication. That's the key with all relationships, I assume.

I would guess, and I haven't been in a long distance relationship, but something like having a date to look forward to, like, you know in four months, I'll see you again. Or I'll see you again in six months. You sort of. Yes. It's not. Try and start on the same page.

Yeah, it feels like... If you're like, I'm never going to want to leave this city, probably let them know that, because you don't want to be a year into the relationship and they go, you'll both realize you would never leave and you'll never be allowed to be in the same place again. I don't know.

Yeah, maybe have those sort of conversations, but at the same time, it's always nice to be in something new and feel nice and fun about it all. Yeah, and good on you, your firm butt. Oh, yeah, and of course, you've got a butt that won't quit these days. Literally, you've been on that butt.

forever. Thank you so much, Jordan. Congratulations on the new butt and the new relationship. Next one comes from Dominic Lindner, okay, proud owner of a do-go-on-inspired tattoo. What? What? Man, we've got the three rings in do-go-on as well.

Imagine a do-go-on Olympic tattoo. That would be really cool. West Katie, just something to think about. Nothing would say mid-life crisis. Then a really niche tattoo like that. Anyway, Dominic has a fact writing. I've been listening to DoGo on for many years and your podcast even resulted in a tattoo of mine. Let me just check.

Yes, this is a first time fact quote or question from Dominic. Me being German, I did not learn about Ernest Shackleton, brackets, release the slugs, all caps, in school, but on your pod. The story about perseverance, camaraderie and endurance really spoke to me and I know. now have the HMS endurance and the root of Shackleton's expedition on my leg. Wow! It reminds me to soldier on even when life is tough sometimes. Thanks for being a part of mine in the last, thanks for being a part of mine in the last seven or eight years.

I really appreciate you. Hey, Dominic, we really appreciate you too. That's amazing. I'd love to see a photo of that. Dominic, please. Dominic, please. And that's the second do go on in Spiretonsia. tattoo from that episode.

Is it? Because... Someone got a slug? Sophie, in the UK, our Patreon group mum, has released the slugs tatted on her. That's so good. Which is also incredible.

Sophie, and I'm so in my head about how to pronounce her name and I know I always get it wrong because I double bluff myself. I think it's Tudor. You tell me it's Shudor. Did you notice that I didn't say her name

because I'm sorry, Sophie. I think it's Tudu. I think it's Tudu Tudor. Sophie Tudor, I'll say it now, has a great tattoo. On your Sophie Tudor, let us know that I've probably done it again, because I always, I flip the two and I go, Dave always says it wrong. And he says, shoot, so it's Tudor, but now I may have mixed those around, but I'm pretty sure it's Sophie Tudor.

Anyway, on your sofa, you and I haven't even written in. Thank you so much, Dominic, that's sick. Yeah, I love that. Release the photo of the tattoo. And finally this week, Simon Ma, aka Uncle Simon of the pod Turned up to your sports ballgame champ I wouldn't miss it for the world here

Thanks Simon I've got you some orange slices Thanks Unkey Unkey Simon Always comes in with the slices Right at the right time Do you think that makes him Sophie's brother I think it does

She's she's pod mom He's pod uncle Pod uncle Uh But anywho, Simon writes, oh, I've got a question. Hi, Pod Gang, Hope, this is a cool uncle stuff. Podgang, right off the back. Yeah, that's cool.

Hope it's hanging well. Oh, this is a cool uncle. That's cool uncle stuff. He's doing shockers, I'm sure. Yeah, Hope's hanging well, my guys. Here, here's a little nip of Jim Beam. Don't tell you, dad. That's a little sit, like that.

Last time, it's just becoming like a, maybe a bit of an iffy uncle. Last time I asked the five fingers question And it seems I stirred the pot With my piss finger To clarify, error, text missing Well, I hope that clears it up Okay, that's classic uncle Funny uncle

Classic uncle Pull my finger Pull my piss finger Pull my piss finger Anyways, I've got a new question for y'all Oh my gosh Someone else from the deep south Yeah, wow incredible

But y'all I think y'all is gaining traction around the world because it's it's beautifully what do you call it? Gender neutral. That's right. And what do we? We say yars.

Maybe sometimes. Use. Yars. Yars. Yars. That's the Germans. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Yars. I like use, but yeah, y'all probably is better. Anyway, what do you think is more of in the world? What do you think there is more of? in the world. Legs or eyes. Now, as a tradition, I must answer my own question.

Do you want to have a go before we, the answer? Because you're thinking like spiders, eight legs, but don't they have like, shit loads of eyes? Then like, don't flies have like,

you know, dozens of little, it depends what bit you count. And eyes of needles? Do they count? Yeah, but then legs of chairs. Oh, yeah. Hmm.

Then millipedes, you know, they've got like a hundred. Yeah, how many eyes do they have? I think just two. Okay. So that's, Hmm So I'd probably

Add a guess And I'm sure we'll get Some facts coming up here But I'd probably guess legs Legs Because of the chairs There's so many chairs Yes

And And you can't Do they call it Stilts like on houses They legs Probably not Or like a stump Yeah

Stumps But stumps But stumps are the lack of legs Usually Yeah That's right Hmm Makes you think

Makes you think What are you thinking though I I And I mean it's E Y

It's not like You can't say The eyes. The eyes have it. I, um, mine's eye. Does that mean everyone's got three eyes? Oh, okay. Brown eye.

If you count the brown eye, you steal bum hole. You add one per person. You know, like Jordan's got a, you know, a rock hard. Well, I guess they're around the eye, the bum there surrounding the eye, I guess. You could say. All right. Ending of a big day of potting here today. We are winding down in.

You probably can maybe tell that. Anyway, I'm doing that. It's starting to sound like the Booker of Sittle Towns comedy club. This is the busted. The busted nut. So good. Anyway, as always, I'm ripping off Tony Martin without realizing it. So Simon answers the question saying.

But you haven't locked one in? Oh, I'm going to go eyes just to be contrarian. Yeah, I think I'm going to lock in the eyes there. So now, as this tradition, I must answer my own question, and I'm going to go with legs. There's lots of insects with lots of legs, but fish don't have legs. Oh my gosh, didn't consider fish. There's plenty of fish in the sea. Yeah, they don't have any legs, though.

And they all have at least two eyes. Three-odd-fish, I've just said, Blinky's got three. Yeah, that's right. Maybe chair legs don't count then. But then it says, but there's got to be more insects than fish, right? But then, like we say, some of them don't have just like heaps of eyes, or do they not count as heaps of eyes? Just heaps of lenses or something. Thanks for indulging me.

And as always, thank you for your amazing hard work at being so funny and wholesome. And a special shout out to Big Popper on a special day. Oh, Big Popper. We love you, Big Papa. And Big Papa. I assume. For a second, I'm like, oh, that's a private shout out. To someone.

Yeah. He knows his big popper, but no, it's a shout out to Big Bopper on a special day. Congratulations. Love you all. Love you all. XX OO XX O O. Oh, oh. Thank you so much.

It looks like five eyes for a fly, five eyes for a B. Okay. But probably more legs. Like, what are they, six legs? Yeah. How many legs? Fly. Flies have six legs.

You're right. The ratio's out. I'll be thinking about that as I go to sleep tonight You got frogs You know and a lot of animals have four legs of course And two eyes Yes Yeah no I'm coming around

Are we counting eyes of needles Yeah There are a lot of needles out there Thank you so much to Simon Dominic Jordan And West Katie As everyone calls her I hope I get to meet West Katie Someday and she'll say

Hey it's West Katie I'll say Oh cool She was like, you said it quite a lot Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, West Katie, what's up? Yeah, West Katie, yeah, I remember. Bring it in. I was in a, I was in a bit of a caffeine haze.

So yeah, I've quit caffeine six days of the week. On Pod Day. You go wild. I go hog wild. With like, this one I'm drinking right now, I specifically asked for low caffeine. Yeah, there was quite a long conversation between you and the Bristow about that. Yes.

What do you mean low or none? And I'm like, well, can I have like really low? And she'll be like, well, that really just tastes like milk. You'd be better off having decaf. And then some coffee flavour. All right, well, give me like low, not too low. Oh, I wasn't that long of the conversation. Dave, fucking hell.

All right. Next thing we do is shout out to a few of her other fantastic supporters. And this is, of course, on episode 466. Amazing. Almost the number of the beast. Yeah, that's right. speak it that was a an Adam and Will bit

you know from their show back in the day yeah um I'm pretty sure I'm remembering this right Adam had this joke because he's like a comedian and math guy as well but he uh he did this joke about made up this band called salmon hater and their hit song um 6.66 uh is one hundredth of the number of the beast

and then they got a I believe they got a CD in the mail a band just pumped out a song, sent it in and ended up making the hottest 100 and stuff. Really? Oh, that's great. So it's funny you say that. 466 is some percentage of number of the beast. All right, so Dave, what do you want to do here?

What do we do for the game? Oh, yes, we could have an un-mally poetry hoax. I could say, what about I bring up some earn mallee poetry and I dedicate a line. Yeah. That fantastic. So I'll read out the names. I should say in the show notes, as always, there's going to be the sources I use, but also I will link to there's a website that had all of 17 poems.

Oh, great. So if you want to go through and read a bit of Eurn Malley and make your own mind up. Is it good? Is it bad? Is it a joke? Is it? Yeah. Is it good?

Is it bad? Is it a joke? Is it sad? Gosh. You're a poet. Thank you. All right. May I kick us off?

Absolutely. Firstly, oh my gosh. from address unknown. Return to sender. I can only assume it from within the fortress of the moles. Please. And thank you, Luca M. Luca M.

Can I just say, and I must go with stone feet down the stairs of flesh. Like, I mean, they're taking the piss, but it's funny that they're going, this is nonsense. I'm like, this sounds like poetry to me. Yeah. So it must have been so influential that stuff.

Yeah. Because I'm like, to me, this does. I fully buy this as I would have assumed this is good stuff And that's from Sweet William That poem's called Next up from Lawson

A namesake of Great Australian writer Henry Lawson Am I wrong? Yes Yes I'm wrong No sorry What's the question

Lawson Namesake of Australian poet Yes Henry Lawson is Is he man from Snowy River Or is he No is Banjo Patterson Yeah I get those too confused Is he the man from Ironbub

No, that's Bancho. Is he? All right. Because I visited his grave, actually. Obviously, he was a big fan. I stumbled upon it when we're up in Sydney for the live Sydney show. Oh, that's right, because there's a beautiful cemetery up in Sydney. Yeah, right on the beach.

Incredible views of the coast. Malcolm Young's there from ACDC. Was it one of the great early Australian test cricketers was there? Maybe a Shane worn? No, even earlier than that. He's in Melbourne, man. I know. It was the first Greek?

I wanted to say Merv. Merv Hughes. Even earlier? And the, I love a sunburnt country writer was buried there as well. Is that name? Merv. Margaret. Maybe Margaret something.

Anyway. Dorothy McKella? Dorothy Mkeller. A.K. Margaret to me. But probably only a good friend. Now her is Margaret. Anyway, from Lawson. in New South Wales, Australia,

that probably almost definitely is named by Yeah. John Cornell. John Cornell, let me dedicate this to you. The children throw a ball against their future walls. The evening settles down

like a brooding bird over streets that divide our life like a trauma. I made a game. That sounds good, doesn't it? That does sound good. And I feel like I know what he's saying. That feels vivid.

The children throw a ball against their future walls. That's good. That's sick. I think this is good writing. And that's from a sibling, which also includes Princess. It picks up after the opening line. Princess Street.

Oh my God, we've got another person from Address Unknown. Return a sender. Could I assume deep within the fortress of the malls, please. And thank you, Paige. What an appropriate name for an episode about poetry. Oh, page. Let me turn the page, page, so I can find your next line, which is, we have lived.

as ectoplasm, the hand that would clutch, our substance finds that his rude touch runs through him, a frightful spasm, and hurls him back against the opposite wall. I mean, there's a bit of rhyming in there. Yeah, that is, um, colloquy with John Keats, that's called. That's, that's again good stuff. And I like how they've used the wall again there. Yeah, a bit of a motif. Page's surname starts with G based on the email address.

So in case, mole liver, Paige doesn't know who she is. Either that or it's a Gmail. Or both. So, next one comes from Carterton in New Zealand. Thanks, hello, and please. Ocky. Oki? Do you think it could be Mark Okalupa?

Oh my good. The Oki? The world champion Australian surfer? Wow. Ocaluppo. Well, either way, this is dedicated to you. And in conclusion, there is a moment when the pelvis explodes like a grenade. I, who have lived in the shadow, that each act casts on the next, act now emerge as loyal as the thistle,

that in session puffs its full seat upon the indicative air. I have split the infinite beyond as anything. I tell you, that is way hornier than the other lines that they got done for. Yeah, that's from Petit Testament, which I think also had one of the other lines. lines in it. That sounds like someone... No, that was when I quoted at the end, but I love that. Can someone please comment on my thrusting video on my YouTube? Just quote that. There is a moment when the pelvis explodes like a grenade.

That's a great one. That does sound like they're describing someone having a good old thrust. Thank you so much, Oki. And I thought that was beautifully attributed to Oki, whose initial seemed to be C.S. C.S. Eliot, maybe. I'd love to also thank from, oh, this is a rare opportunity to use my French in the patron section.

Besancourt in France. Please and thank you. Freak theory. Frock Thorough. Frock thorot. Ferock Therot. Freck Therot. And here is a line from Egyptian register.

which I think that's one of the horny ones because it's got incestuous and self-fructifying death. And so funny, like the word incestuous. I know. Then the cop had to say, I don't know what that means, but it sounds bad. Yeah.

Dictionaries hadn't quite been invented yet. This is a line. Magic in the vegetable universe marks us at birth upon the forehead with the ancient ink. Nature has her own green centuries which move through our thin, convex time.

That's beautiful. We learnt in an episode a few, not too long ago, about the Pharaoh Hatti. That Egypt, ancient Egypt and incestuousness. Oh yeah. Yeah. That'd be done for eternity in 1940s. Next up from Canberra, Australian Capital Territory.

Please and thank you to Alyssa, Miss Alyssa. Alyssa, this is for you. Oh, whoa, whoa, Miss Alyssa. This is for you. I have been noted in the reading rooms as a borer of calf-bound volumes, full of scandals at the court. My lord had his hand upon that snowy globe, milady Lucy's sinister breast.

Where was that one in the court? Melady. Miletus, sinister breast. That feels. Geez, yeah, they've not read all of it. Yeah, that's from prospective love song. Actually, that's the one that has Princess. No, sorry, it's a different one.

That's from Cultra's exhibit. Thank you so much to Alyssa. Is that right? That doesn't matter. Okay. Next one comes from Arlington in M.A. in the U.S. A.K. Mouse, I guess.

M.A. U.S. I'm going to say Massachusetts. Oh, yeah. Is it? I don't know. Let's look it up. Miami, Massachusetts. Maine.

I think it's Massachusetts. Please and thank you to Sarah. Arlington. Is it which part of... Arlington, M.A. Oh, I thought you were saying it because he said Miami. I was like, what's going on here?

It is Massachusetts. Thank you. Can you read this in a Massachusetts accent? No idea. What do they sound like? Harvard. I'm not... I can't do it.

That's definitely you and Jessus domain. All right, you give me, you say it to me, you whisper it and I'll say it. Okay. I really hope it says word Harvard. All right, let me keyword search for Harvard. imagine. No, imagine.

I'm being great. I could feel like it's something that they would reference. What about car yard? Is there any car in here? No, go on. Just hit us with the one you were thinking. Because you know, you're connecting on it like a spiritual level. The thank-ee and the words of earn.

Earn. Now we find too late that these distractions were clues to a transposed version of our too rigid state. It is an ancient forgotten ruin. and a natural diversion, wiser now, but dissident. Wiser now? I'm like Quimby.

I know Quimby off the Simpsons is that kind of accent. It's supposed to be T.FK. Yeah. Thank you so much to Sarah. And two more, oh my gosh, from Calgary in Alberta and Canada,

home of the Stampede. It's on my bucket list to get to the Calgary Stampede. Awesome. Please, and thank you to Andre Genereux. Andre Genereux. This is for you.

from Nightpiece. Among the water lilies a splash, white foam in the dark, and you lay sobbing then upon my trembling, intuitive arm. That's beautiful.

That's beautiful. That gives me pause. And finally, from Labrador, a beautiful spot. I've stayed in Labrador a few times up on the Gold Coast in Queensland here in Australia.

Please and thank you to Amanda Robamond. This is also a sexy one. Finish with the sexy one. I have remembered the chiaroscuro of your naked

breasts and loins for you were wholly The cop, what was he doing? I know. I remember the cop. He didn't bother reading it. Kiara scuro is

Damon Cowell's disco machine references Kearas. Oh, there's the light and the dark. Is that what it is? In art? Yep.

Who are you talking to? The chiaroscuro of your naked breast and loins. For you were wholly an admonition that said, From bright to dark is a brief longing. To hasten is now to delay. But I could not obey.

Hmm. How do you spell Kiaroscura? C-H-I-A-R-O-S-C-U-R-O. What's the second part? C-S-C-C-R-O. C-S-U-R-O. I've looked it up here. Do you want me to read out the definition?

Yeah, what does that mean? An Italian term which translates as light, dark, and refers to the balance and pattern of light and shade in a painting or drawing. Okay. Wow. Kiara Skura. I think he uses it like in one of his songs as a, the name as a DJ, the world's hottest DJ. Yes, that's great.

That's fun stuff. That's Kiaroscura of your naked breasts and loins. That is the sexiest one so far. I can't believe the cop missed that. It's amazing. How funny is it how many Damien Cowell were like, because these people don't know, one of the singers in Tism and songwriters, how many references that this episode's brought up where I'm like, oh, I know that word. But until now, did not really know what it meant. But it's good stuff. Thank you so much to Amanda, Andre, Sarah, Alyssa, Freak, Ocky, Paige, John, and Luca. And the last thing we need to do, Dave, is welcome in a few members into the Tripitch Club. We've got three. inductees this week. Fantastic.

They are being inducted to our Hall of Fame, our nightclub, our Theatre of the Mind, our clubhouse, our honour roll where people who have been supporting the show

on three consecutive years or above, they already got a shout-out, but now they get inducted into the Hall of Fame where we welcome them in and you can never leave and why would you want to

and we'll have a great time together because there's music, there's food, there's entertainment, there's places to relax. I'm so excited to be in here. Dave, you've booked a band

for the after party. We have a party every week on episode day. So, you know, new inductees get invited in and everyone else who's already in there because I can't leave are still in there. No, yes, you'll never are going to believe who I've booked this week. Because I think Adam and Will are going to have to dig out those old costumes because I have Sonic Animation who would be performing the hit. You couldn't remember the name of Theophilus Thistler in brackets and exercise in vows.

That's right, and exercise and vows. I was vaguely near it. you were, no, you were very close, but I remember that song from the Theophilitha, theophila, it's very hard to say. Yes. Because I think if I literally did get, it was a, like a vocal warm-up. Ah. Um, I might be misremembering that anyway. But, uh, so three inductees this week. I've also got a drink behind the bar. Uh, and it's called the urn Malley. Uh, unfortunately, it's not what it says it is. It's called a, uh, high-end, um, cocktail, but it's actually just Jim Beam and But your uncle's given you a sit.

Yeah, and he's winking. Oh, bro. We've given, I think we, I might walk back some of that stuff. Simon Maher is not a dodgy uncle, okay? He's a cool uncle. Cool uncle, cool uncle. All right. So three inductees this week, Dave.

You are on stage or I'm seeing the night. You're going to be hyping them up using some weak to moderate word play based on their name or where they're from. Yeah, I guess so, yeah. It's a really make him feel at home. And I'm going to read out the name. So if you hear your name, I'll lift the velvet rope. You run on in to the club and let Dave hype the crowd up for you. And then we're all going to hang out and listen to Theophilus Thistler, the Thistle's sister.

And part into the night. All right. So first up from Glasgow in Scotland, it's William Delo. It's Wilson Deluxe. Oh my gosh. What could I do with this? It's the Deluxe Wilson. Holy molly.

Gosh, the Ducks of our times, Deluxe Wilson, aka Wilson Deluxe. From Peoria in California in the United States, it's Roman. All roads lead to Roman. And finally from Bournemouth in Dorset, I reckon in Great Britain, it's Daisy Mowls. Oh my God. And exercise in Males. Yeah, that's what I was going to say, get loud, get Daisy instead of crazy, go Daisy, it's Daisy Mouth, but an exercise in the mouse is excellent.

Welcome into the club, Daisy, Roman and Wilson. Make yourselves at home. I've got the ice hockey air table. Frosty, ready to go. So it hasn't been thought because I've heard from a little birdie that Jess might be back soon. And she's going to be pretty pissed off when she sees the state of that table. We've currently got two ice hockey air tables. And are they both icy?

Oh yeah. Oh, you've got to start thawing one. She's going to crack the shits when she comes back. Nah. You leave? That's what happens. Yeah, exactly. I'm very brave when she's not in.

Nah, who cares? I don't care. I don't say it to her face. I wouldn't. Soon she's back. No one tell her I said this, please. Welcome in Daisy, Roman and Wilson. Anything we need to tell people before we go?

Well, basically, we're coming to the most magical time of the year. Oh, that's right. Next week will be the first episode of Blockbuster Torrey. about 2025, where we count down our most voted for, our most popular, our biggest, baddest topics of the year. And this year we're doing two of them live. Yes. Come see them.

This is October 5 and 6, 2024. You can see us at Stupid Old Studios. On the Saturday, we're doing a do-go-on followed by a book sheet. And on Sunday, we're doing a do-go-on followed by who knew with Matt Stewart. Special guests, all sorts of fun stuff planned. And you can watch it in-person at Stupid Old. That's in Melbourne. Or you can get tickets to watch it.

live streamed or on catch up. And like, they do it properly at stupid all. It's not just one camera. It's a full multi-camera set up. It'll sound good or it'll look good. It'll taste good. Oh, yeah. And that festival's got Will Anderson on it too.

Yeah, that's right. Will's part of it. It's part of the, so we're doing our own mini festival within a festival. We're calling ours Blockbuster Toba Live. But it's part of the cheerful, earful festival. And our Sammy Pee and Confessions are doing it. I saw, yeah, Willowsy, Pop Gaze.

Who, have I seen other? Nick Cody. and Luke Heggy's Oh, mid-flight brawl Which we've done a cross-over with in the past Yeah, so that's all part of the cheerful, earful festival Online Really should have brought that up with Will earlier

Yeah We'll be seeing him there Yeah So absolutely please get involved If you want to do that But apart from that Get ready for Block 2025 The next few weeks are going to be big

I'm also I'm going to do a stupid old tour for patrons on during those or before those live shows as well. So if you're a patron, get here a bit earlier. I'm going to give you a guided tour of the studio. Yeah, we'll show you all the sights, all the sounds. I get all the tastes.

I might even introduce you to Dave Warnocky. Oh my gosh. We should set it up so you're working at your desk. Oh, hi, didn't see you there. Or no, you're doing push-ups. Yes. Oh, sorry, guy. I'm really, really sweaty.

A thousand and four. A thousand and four. Doing curls on one arm and push up with the other. The only problem is I don't know if you'd physically be able to do that. I'll have to start training now. Just for that one. Yeah, so you can get tickets to our shows at do go onpod.com. We'd love to see you there or, you know, see it on the stream.

It'd be awesome. So good. Well, I think that's all we need to tell people. Please follow us on Instagram and elsewhere, TikTok and whatnot. Do go on pod. I think we're do on podcast maybe on TikTok, but you'll figure it out with a quick search. Yeah. And, yeah, Dave, put this baby home.

We'll be back next week with Blockbuster, 25 but until then I'll say thank you so much for listening and until then it's goodbye later because people still like that's like a running joke I think people who work at triple j still get text saying it's gone down hill since adam and will left yeah and I think but did you did you have that yes yes shows before I think Mikey and so it was Mikey and Sandman Paul McDermott like a whole bunch of different people had done that show Maynard you know back in the day I'm sure Mikey and Helen got calls from, you know, like Maynard fans going, this station's been crap since I got to Maynard, you know.

But I was probably the luckiest there's ever been in that every show being hated by the sort of, you know, the audience of the previous show. Because Adam went in and did a year of the breakfast show by himself first. And so he was kind of a buffer. I was a regular guest on his show, but I was just doing it from Melbourne. and he was in Sydney. And so I had a year of, I guess, like the audience being gradually inoculated to me,

you know, introducing a little bit of poison. Adam's getting all the hate, taking it for a full year. Yeah. But they're used to him by the time you're full time. That's right. Like just a little bit of me at the time until I'm fully in your system

and then suddenly I was there all the time. But like introducing the stepdad to the kids. Who's that friend of yours? It just comes to fun things. And then suddenly, oh, did they sleep with you, my side, mom? Hang on, he's been here for three weeks. So I, yeah, I got that.

I was very lucky, but we used to, where before the internet culture really took off as well, so that idea that you could be constantly, you know, contacted. Like, people, we answered our own phones. So if you rang the studio, you would get Adam or I most of the time, you know, if we went to the phones on something. And often people didn't know that. So occasionally you would get a little bit of feedback that someone thought they were talking to a producer about us, not realizing they were speaking directly to us.

You tell that will. You can tell him right now. Yeah, let's see where this goes first. Yeah, yeah, play cool. Don't forget to sign up to our tour mailing list so we know where in the world you are and we can come and tell you when we're coming there. Wherever we go, we always hear six months later, oh, you should come to Manchester. We were just in Manchester. But this way you'll never,

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