I pedal over to Kensington just after dark. As I roll along the lane
towards the railway underpass, a young Asian woman on her way home from
the station walks out of the tunnel towards me. After she passes there's
a stillness, a moment of silent freshness that feels like spring.
Helen Garner is one of Australia's greatest writers. Her short
non-fiction has enormous range. Spanning 15 years of work, Everywhere I
Look is an audiobook full of unexpected moments, sudden shafts of
light, piercing intuition, flashes of anger and incidental humour. It
takes us from backstage at the ballet to the trial of a woman for the
murder of her newborn baby. It moves effortlessly from the significance
of moving house to the pleasure of re-reading Pride and Prejudice.
Everywhere I Look includes Garner's famous and controversial essay on
the insults of age, her deeply moving tribute to her mother and extracts
from her diaries, which have been part of her working life for as long
as she has been a writer. Everywhere I Look glows with insight. It is
filled with the wisdom of life.
