Women's Nook
There’s always a story behind the story and so it is with Liz Harfull. I’ve already written about The Blue Ribbon Cookbook, Liz’s prize-winning book on the many show cooks in South Australia and their wonderful recipes.
And you may have followed Part One and Part Two of my interview with Liz where she talks about the fantastic time she’s had in writing the book and visiting almost every rural show in South Australia over a 7-month period!
But Liz herself has an interesting tale to tell after making the big decision to leave her corporate job and concentrate on writing - something she has wanted to do since childhood.
I think we all know women, possibly even ourselves, who would love to do something new or different, if only … But as we also know, it’s not that easy to change course - the longer we leave it the more embroiled we are in our lives and the expectations and obligations that surround us. Liz Harfull did take that leap into doing something different, so in this last part of her interview we follow her personal journey …
The initial decision was very hard. I was a partner in a well known public relations consultancy, heading up a team working in the agricultural and environmental sectors with clients across Australia. The work was challenging and I enjoyed it, but the hours were very long and the pressures enormous. That left no time and no creative energy to write, and I have wanted to write books since I was a child.
The final wakeup call came when a very good friend, my age, was diagnosed with cancer. It made me realise life is precious, and sometimes short, and I shouldn’t put off trying to accomplish my dream of becoming a published author any longer.
But the biggest concern I had was financial. I’d been a salary earner since I left high school at 16 and got a cadetship at the local paper in Mt Gambier, where I grew up. Leaving my job would mean no guaranteed regular pay check and I still had a mortgage to pay. But in the end, I decided the risks were probably not all that great – my family and friends would not let me end up on the street and I had good contacts from my years as a journalist and consultant that should result in getting casual work.
In fact, with some careful budgeting I have never really had to worry. And I’m now in the luxurious position of being able to turn down work because there is more available than I can handle.
The consequences have been all good – I have tremendous freedom in how I structure my days, I have more time to spend in my local community compared with when I was a commuter and really only ‘camped’ here. I have been able to spend a great deal more time with my family. And my dream of becoming a published author has come true.
I will continue to focus on non-fiction and telling the stories of regional Australia.
I am an optimist by nature. I’m always looking for the silver lining, which I guess some people might find irritating at times. I believe that people on the whole treat you as you treat them, and that at all times, and above all else, you should try to be kind to each other. Kindness is a vastly underrated virtue, and maybe a little old fashioned, but the world could do with more of it.
I have to say I am generally a happy person these days and have a great deal to be thankful for. But I guess, I love it when I my kitchen is full of friends, enjoying each other’s company over a meal I’ve prepared. Walking on the beach at Robe with the dogs on a winter’s day is hard to beat too, as is spending time with my family.
I suspect, like most writers, I am a great reader. I love books and reading. My parents read to me as a baby and signed me up to the local library even before I went to school. They loved reading and my father was a great story teller. He loved history and was the ‘keeper’ of the family’s history and stories. And I had some amazing teachers who encouraged me to read and write.
When I was about 10, I was also extremely fortunate to meet a woman called Kathleen Bermingham, who wrote local histories about a town in South Australia called Robe. Her book, Gateway to the South East, was the first major book published about the area. She was an amazing woman who’d worked as a journalist in Sydney in the 1920s or so.
We visited her to find out more about the history of chinese goldminers coming into Australia via Robe, which was one of the most important ports in southern Australia at the time of the gold rush. My great grandfather had guided some across to the goldfields when he couldn’t get a backload after delivering goods to the port. Dad wanted to know more about this period in the town’s history, and Kathleen, who was also the local real estate agent, ended up selling him a house!
We used to visit her whenever we went down there to work on restoring it, and when she found out I liked to write she encouraged me to become a journalist and writer. I never really considered anything else after that.
Kathleen, of course. She died when I was about 12 but her influence lingers on.
And my mother – she left her family and life in central Melbourne to marry my father and move to a farm 400 kms away. The farm didn’t have electricity until the 1960s and by then she had four children. She worked on the farm as an equal partner and ran the farm books, but she also made most of our clothes, cooked for us and the workers in harvest time, and volunteered in the community.
I am constantly amazed by their multi-tasking, their ingenuity, their ‘can do’ attitude, and their ongoing 
optimism even when times are tough.
Capturing the lives of the ‘every day’ people who have contributed so much to our country and who we are. Its the unsung heroes that interest me most.
And I feel very strongly that something needs to be done to close the increasing gap of understanding between people in the cities and those in the bush. People either have a very romantic notion of the ‘bush’, which is far from reality, or they are hyper-critical of farmers and farm practices without really knowing anything about them. These are the people who work seven days a week to feed the world, and who hang in there despite appalling lack of services, low prices, drought and lack of opportunities for their children.
Animal welfare, food security and water are the top issues worrying farmers around the world.
Tim Winton for Cloudstreet and Breath.
Dorothy Dunnett for her remarkable historical fiction
Diana Gabaldon. I love the concept of time travel and the Scottish settings – some of my ancestors came from Scotland.
I’ve just finished reading all the Sharpe books by Thomas Hardy. He’s the first author I read who wrote about a world I understood – farming and the seasons, even if it was in England, and in particular steam engines and threshing machines (my family are steam engine enthusiasts and the farm I grew up on had a working steam traction engine which was used to drive a chaff mill).
Peter Carey – what a master! Have just read Jack Maggs which I loved.
I have to confess to thoroughly enjoying the Stephanie Myer Twilight series, having never really been interested in ‘vampire’ fiction before.
A national version of The Blue Ribbon Cookbook, and if funding comes through, working with the community at Robe, to pick up where Kathleen left off, to write a new book about the community and its history.
I want to thank Liz for her generosity in allowing me to bring her story to you. I certainly hope that she does write a national version of The Blue Ribbon Cookbook. It’s such and interesting and worthwhile project - not only getting to meet the show cooks - some of them real characters - but having the opportunity to make their wonderful recipes! Visit Liz’s blog to follow her story as it continues to unfold.
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