Télécharger le PDF - Formules

CINQUIEME INTERMÈDE : LU/VU
DANS LE JOURNAL
1972 was “The year Australia came of age.”
On the 1st of January, 1973, “Sydney is looking good,” says Alderman
Griffin, Lord Mayor. He wants big buildings like those in New York.
Australia Square was still the highest in the city skyline.
January 6: “New rules to speed divorce, cut costs.”
January 7: Car genius Ralph Sarich is sitting on a potential goldmine.
“Sydney’s beaches were thronged in yesterday’s pleasant sunshine”. A girl
with a sarong and a “borrowed board” was interviewed, photographed and
arrested. “Topless” girls are warned by a police officer, a sense of decency
still prevails.
Saturday, February 4, was the opening date of the Norman Lindsay
Gallery and Museum. (Matilda Jones bought a train ticket to
Springwood).
March 27: Fair weather. Moderate breeze. (Jacques Voisin wrongly identifies
the girl with a sarong as his student Matilda Jones. Matilda kisses Mr.
Voisin’s hand. )
May: Don’t let the recent fine weather fool you. Winter is coming. But a long
overdue 24 p. cent rise on academic salaries is granted, and the Australian
dollar exchange rate is 6.40 French Francs to a dollar. (Jacques and Sylvie
Voisin feel almost rich, but isolated: a total French mail ban is imposed the
same month by the A.C.T.U. News will have to travel through Belgium,
Switzerland or the U.K.)
October 20: Official opening of the Opera House. Utzon is not present.
(A disproportionately heavy second hand black and white TV set was bought
for $20. “Number 96” could be watched at 8.30 p.m. on Channel 10.)
1981, January 17: “In films, postcards and expatriate memories, Sydney exists
only in summer,” writes Geraldine Brooks. After two decades of steady decay,
the Corso, Manly, has re-emerged as one of the brightest spots of Sydney.
The badge of the Kambala Anglican Girl’s high-school in Rose Bay still
reads: Esto sol testis, “Let the sun be my witness.” Can you imagine their
magnificent suntans, the fuzzy, shiny triangles of blond pubic hair?
(In 1930, a very young poet, Alec Derwent Hope, age 23, had written this Song:
159