Surfing Australia: A Complete History of Surfboard Riding in Australia
Phil Jarratt has taken a conquistador's approach to his latest book. It's all there in the title. He starts by defining his target, 'Surfing Australia,' and then goes on to claim all the available territory, 'A Complete History Of Surfboard Riding In Australia'. Scepticism may be my default setting but in this instance I felt justified; Jarratt's book was commissioned by Surfing Australia the organisation who oversee competitive surfing, and competition is but a small slice of Aussie surfing's dominion.
So then, a complete history of surfboard riding in Australia? Well, you've gotta admire the chutzpah.
In his 2010 book, Salts and Suits, Jarratt's research and investigative ability were on full display. The diligence and perspicacity wielded in telling that tale of surf industry machinations puts him up there with the best of gumshoe detectives. In thongs, trilby and gaudy Hawaiian shirt I imagine he's a camouflage expert also.
Jarratt would want to be wearing comfortable attire as the information gathered for Surfing Australia is comprehensive. He's roamed the historical sections of libraries, scoured the catacombs of old lifesaving clubs and utilised his exhaustive network of contacts from four decades spent in the surf industry.
It's tempting to say the resultant text is academic but it's more than that: it's forensic. It's historically complex, laden with facts, and yet the 300 odd pages are as effortless to read as water running off a warm gloss coat.
Jarratt takes up the story in the first decade of last century when Australians – Sydneysiders to be exact – began to consider the ocean in front of them. Till then the national psyche had largely been shaped by the bush and the notions of space and wide, open plains.
On beaches such as Manly and Bondi a new and unique beach culture was establishing a foothold. Daytime bathing laws had recently been repealed and the ocean was becoming viewed as a healthy place of recreation. All of this at least five years before Duke Kahanomoku rode his famous waves at Freshwater and more than fifty years before Surfing Australia came into existence.
So it's obvious what Jarratt's ploy is: extend the book's scope from Surfing Australia, the institution, to a wider view of surfing in Australia. The role of competition in surfing is still a centrepiece but it's told via a wider cultural setting.
This is especially so after the first surf boom of the late 1950s when a Baby Boomer-spawned youth culture took hold in surfing and the beach subsequently became a focus for youthful discourse: fashion, music, and all the attendant trends. Jarratt expertly weaves his tale amongst these elements encompassing each prevailing and countervailing viewpoint. Little is left untouched.
Printed in suave hard cover with hundreds of period photos Surfing Australia: A Complete History of Surfboard Riding in Australia is an enjoyably ambitious book. One that appeals to a wider audience than competitive surfing ever will. Indeed that is the book's best trait; you may have never surfed in a competition yourself, or been a member of Surfing Australia, but that doesn't preclude you from appreciating and enjoying it.
Comments
Sure about that?
Yep.
It should be in every school library and every surfboard club should have a copy for the grooms to read after the old crew have checked it out.
Around the time the 'Australian Surfriders Association' became 'Surfing Australia' there were a whole lot of organisations that went through similar name changes.
The Victorian Council for Civil Liberties became 'Liberty Victoria' and, my favourite, the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union became 'Birds Australia'.
I always figured this was just trendy marketing, but maybe its how groups like this extend their reach.
(and I never realised how close 'grom' is to 'groom' - scary)
one of the better surfing books I have read in quite a while.
Very comprehensive
Yes, Coldwater surfer, very comprehensive indeed. Phil has reserched the shit out of our history, interviewing all the major players still alive. As a little grom on the northern beaches I went along to all the first surf contests mentioned in the book. Time has taken it's toll on the memory, but now I know who organised the events, who won and what the surf was like. One tale---going over to Bondi for that comp in 1962 we were crosssing the Harbour Bridge in my older mates dad's '53 Customline when a bulletin came over the car wireless that President Kennedy had been shot. I was starting to think that maybe with the passage of time I'd got that wrong , however reading Phil's account in the book, he's stating that the old blokes were huddled around in the carpark, listening to the radio, and yes, Kennedy was shot on that very day. Get a copy for your library folks.
Bang on Mick. Here's another small example of Phil's great research and intuition though it's from a previous book, Salts and Suits. Documenting the departure of an Aussie surfing magazine in the 60s Phil noted that the publishers used a different printer between the second last and last issue (who even looks at that part of the mag?) and deduced that it likely ceased operation due to unpaid printing bills.
It's all these seemingly inconsequential and acute observations that make his books great to read.
Where do I get a copy???
Here or Amazon, Google the name and look for the best price.
http://shop.abc.net.au/products/surfing-aust-complete-hist-hbk
Good work Blind Boy.
Who brought the Australian Womens Weekly Christmas Edition?
Fair enough. was probably your lovely wife.
Nice work again BB.
??????? What's the point here wellymon? If you're trying to take the piss it's a pretty pathetic effort. If that's a sample of your wit let's hope our mutual good fortune in never having met continues .....but never mind the Xmas edition I subscribe to the WW it's a bloody good read. Never let the stereotypes of the narrow minded interfere with your fun! I mean you wouldn't want to be seen as some sort of anachronistic, misogynistic blockhead.....would you?
Now JC walked on water, we surfers surf it.....
JC might have a definative book....
Can't see how surfing can have a definative anything.
Espeacilaly as the roots of surfing were about busting out of definitions......
However the good things one can use a definition for, is defining one's place in an ego hierarchy.
Could that be the case here stu?
Hey stu have I caught the BB's?
Can't help myself.....
Every time contest surfing is used as the core theme in an attempt to define surfing, I think of those I have met who's surfing powers moved and inspired their local, yet they never went into the contest scene so never did they catch the eye of the likes of PJ and others who have attempted the definitive book on a non defined culture.
Since the marketing of surfing began, those marketing have been attempting to box surfing into definitions so they could sell it.
Yet as I stated earlier, the roots of surfing were about busting out of social definitions that excluded ones freedom to go their own way.
The success of marketing to box surfing into a definition can be found in pro surfing today.
Everyone surfing the same way on basically the same style equipment.
However that is only a very small proportion of the many expressions of surfing that defy a definitive analysis or a marketing program.
Funny as BB
Was congratulating on your link from above
I only saw the Womens Weekly thing.?
Jeepers BB
You take every thing to heart.
Im sorry, Would love to met you, you probably just live down the road?
Life is not that bad? is it?
Agree with mighty mouse.
Regards
Blockhead.
P.S. I only wish I could read.
Welly, if you want to upset a man, pay out on his Womans Weekly subscription.
An act of forgivness would be a year's subscription.
You could give it to him in person thereby getting to meet him at the same time.
Relax Welly. Sometimes every action has an equal and opposite over-reaction.
BB is a smart, intelligent and worldly man and has a forum on Swellnet that's not afforded to others.
He may be excused if he is a little precious at times.
wellymon I read the comment as sexist and vaguely insulting to both myself and my wife. If that wasn't your intention, then I apologise.
is womans weekly taboo..?? I have read so many WW's the last few mths,in waiting rooms but,do try to keep the fishnet stockings and lipstick for home and not public.....,ahhhh what a mag......
as for the Surfing Australia history etc.....I wonder how the next few years will treat them with the HPSC......but......it seems a bit like our fabled Cricket Academy,which can anyone name a great batsman that has graduated from the CA?? and for that matter can anyone tell me what Aust surfers have graduated and are now on the road to a world title.....or which batsman are we relishing to see play in the ashes....ahhhhhh???
when ya look at all the Australian sports institutes,in swimming,cricket,cycling...and the huge budgets they get.....well it looks like Surfing Australia is following the same blue print ,and well getting the same results.
a friend of mine went to the 50th celebration and was amazed to hear that one of the main jobs of SA was to promote surfing to the general public and increase the surfing numbers...Hmmmmmmm .....OK hands up to all surfers...who wants to cultivate more surfers in the line up???
Who wants to cultivate more bureaucrats,bigger bureacracy,but with declining results,and younger surfers carreer paths are just a secondary thought.......the KPI's show that our current system is a failure!!!
Hey Brutus, maybe its that our current social structures are a failure.
What ever happened to the Aussie acadamy of hard knocks that produced the likes of Dally Messanger & co, Don Bradman & co, Midget through to MP & co etc etc .... & us even......
Australia is now a blob of middle classisms..... Could that be the point your making?
Now if the mouse is correct in his Zen like perceptions of reality, who do we point the bone at in surfing who has directed this course?
Who is propagating this course and why?
Captain Cook didn't sail for the fun of it, he sailed for gain. Who's sailing surfings ship of future champions and what are they hoping to gain from it?
What have we got to look forward to here, what is surfings responsibility?
For each one that rises like a Fanning, how many are mercilessly discarded by the captain of the ship?
It could be argued MP hurt himself, Cheyne hurt himself, etc etc there's a list of them......
Maybe its time to ask a big question of this entire surfing contest thing .......
There is an old Zen proverb .... "Competition is for the insecure that need to win".
Hey Brutus, remember when you just went surfing for the fun of it.....
I read the book, my wife got it for me for Christmas, was a great read.
Being a member of Surfing Australia myself, I find it funny to see all the people whinging on about competitive surfing being not real surfing.
Firstly Non, your going to have to point out where anyone said , let alone whinged, that, competitive surfing being not real surfing.
Then your going to have to define what is real surfing so we can all see if we fit the definition and decide if we are real surfers doing real surfing or not.
Then your going to have to back peddle a bit to attempt to explain an obscurity in your miss quote.
Then we can pick up the tread and discuss some interesting questions being put to the forum and maybe get creative and place some new idea before us for our contemplation.
There's no ending to what can do......