Review of The Sea Coast of Bohemia: Literary Life in Sydney's Roaring Twenties by Peter Kirkpatrick

Abstract

One of many anecdotes in The Sea Coast of Bohemia is Jack Lindsay's account of 'the party to end all parties', the true parable of Johnny the squatter's son, who sold his sports car in order to stock his flat in a Sydney mansion with enough whisky to supply a booze-up that could last a month. This ambitious festivity fizzled out after a few days, a victim to the survival instinct of ordinary humans; presumably Johnny and his girlfriend Lilith got on with the washing up. The one moment of tawdry magic for Jack Lindsay occurred when Lilith asked him to hold her hand while she had a wee, as she did so reciting his poem about Aphrodite rising from the waters of Sydney Harbour. 'That is the loveliest compliment a poet has ever had paid to him,' he told her.