The Inner Object

OK. Quiz time. Who remembers doing Australian history at school? Of course, this question only counts for those with a few years under the belt – it’s not fair answering yes to remembering anything at school if you’re still going there. Anyway, I do remember and it is not pretty. I obviously grew up in a time when history was a giant list making exercise. List of ships in the 1st fleet? Check. List of Governors of New South Wales? Check. List of major farm exports of the Riverina? Check. List of lonely farmers captured by aliens for probing? Actually, that last one might have been interesting which is probably why we didn’t do it. My point being that for many of us Australian history was boring. Egypt got mummies, America got a revolution, England got most of the world. Australia got Edmund Barton. Now Edmund was probably a fine man, but placed alongside such characters as Henry VIII or Abe Lincoln, he paled somewhat. And of course, we learn very little about Aboriginal culture.

Now, however, Australian history is getting seriously sexy; sexy enough that even TV is taking notice. First, SBS screened the excellent First Australians and in the past few weeks the ABC has shown The Bridge and just last week, the story of Alexander Pearce. All were great shows for their type, and presented Australian history as richly hued, complex, passionately driven, and mercifully free of lists.

Last week’s show on Pearce particularly caught my eye. I first came across Pearce when I was a youngster visiting my grandfather in Cowra. He owned two books I read every holidays – one was on bush rangers (Hall was my favourite) and the other on convicts. I loved poring over grainy photos of lean looking men leaning laconically against fence posts, dodgy drawings of the dogs at Eaglehawk Neck and lastly an engraving of Alexander Pearce.

He was shown gaunt, dreadfully lined, dressed in rags, recoiling in fear as troopers advanced upon him - at his feet was a fire and a small parcel wrapped in cloth. The contents of the cloth are not hinted at, but the story makes it plain that hidden inside those cotton folds was the flesh of a newly murdered man.

Pearce was the first man in Australia to be hung for the crime of cannibalism, a crime he committed twice whilst escaping in Van Dieman’s Land. Last Sunday the ABC did us all a favour by putting this little slice of Australian history on the box in a very juicy docudrama. It was a fine show and did a very good job, through the use of original documents and getting into the head of Pearce exposing the why and how of what he did.

This is something museums often find hard to do – the tyranny of word limits somewhat precludes really long stories with gory details. But just because museums find it hard to do does not mean that visitors have the same problem. In fact, an active museum visitor is more than capable of exploring the hidden parts of the objects on show. All it takes is time.

For example, the Western Plains Cultural Centre has the artificial arm of William Cross on display in the Dubbo Stories exhibition. William, a local boy, lost his arm at Gallipoli. As an object it has some interest, but it is also dry. However, spend some time looking at the arm and trying to put yourself in his mind and it becomes a point of fascinating departure. Did he ever regret signing up? Did he ever rage in frustration at his disability? Did he consider the price he paid a fair one? What would I have done in his place? It is a fascinating way of touring a museum and opens up new places not just in your understanding of the past, but also of yourself.

A museum may not have the fancy tricks available to the modern TV Director, but it has something better – the imagination of the human mind. So why not bring you and your imagination down to the Western Plains Cultural Centre and see what new things you can discover.

This post first appeared in the Dialy Liberal on Staurday, 31st January 2009.