Justine Larbalestier

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The Tall One

John Hinde was one of my favourite film critics of all time. He was a wonderfully warm and funny man. He could give charmingly negative reviews to sucky films without a hint of rancour, reviews that made you want to see the crappy film just to see what he was talking about. I always wanted to meet him. When he died I cried.

Now he’s made me cry again by setting up an extraordinary literary prize in his wife’s memory. It’s the “Barbara Jefferis Award for the best Australian novel that empowers the status of females or depicts them in a positive light.” The award goes to an Australian writer, but isn’t restricted by setting or genre, only by the requirement that they postively depict women. (Were Patrick White still alive NO WAY would he win one of these babies.1) So if you’re an Aussie and you write a book set in Uzbekistan about a zombie unicorn apocalypse you’re still in with a shot. That’s in keeping with both the wide variety of films John Hinde loved and with the tremendous range of Barbara Jefferis’ novels.

Barbara Jefferis was brilliant. I read and adored her novel The Tall One when I was eleven or twelve. The book had a huge impact on me.

See, when I was young I was very tall. Much taller than anyone else my age. When I stopped growing at twelve I was 172.5cm (5ft8in). I got teased about it a lot. My aged Old World relatives offered to pay for operations to stop me growing so I’d still have a chance of getting a husband. No, I’m not making that up. My parents were laughing too hard to be horrified. “What are they going to do cut off your knees?”

Despite everything my parents said about the fabulousness of being tall and of being a girl, I was taking in the messages from my insane relatives and the kids at school. I slumped my shoulders and desperately wished to be a boy. Reading The Tall One helped clean that crap out of my mind. It’s about this 182cm (6ft) girl in medieval times in, I think, England (it’s a while since I read it so I’m hazy on the exact setting). Here was someone like me, or, at least, how I’d like to be: Tall and strong, standing up to people putting her down, owning her power, standing straight. And wry and funny too.

I was smitten and started being proud of my height. (After which I promptly stopped growing and ceased to be tall. Whatcha going to do?)

This award is a wonderful legacy from two exceptional and fascinating Australians, John Hinde and Barbara Jefferis. I hope it honours a series of wonderful novels and, even more, I hope it will do something towards bringing Jefferis’ work back into print. I’d love to see The Tall One readily available again.

  1. I am suppressing the urge to list all the prominent living Australian novelists who are even less chance than Mr White. I sit on my fingers. I hold my breath. Must. Not. Be. Bad. [↩]

Posted by Justine at 10:23, 3 April 2007 under Reading, Sydney/Australia, Unicorns, Zombies | 9 Comments »

Comments

  1. hipwritermama Says:

    a wonderful tribute to two people you greatly admired. and what a funny story about your sadly misinformed relatives. thank goodness you had a wonderful book you strongly identified with to help you realize how truly fabulous you are. sending good thoughts for this literary prize.

    April 3rd, 2007 at 4:13 pm

  2. Diana Says:

    Hijacking the thread to make sure it is known to Justine’s fans that I am currently giving away a signed copy of Magic’s Child on my blog. Will ship to foreign places. Will ship slowly, but will ship nonetheless.

    April 3rd, 2007 at 6:54 pm

  3. Jonathan Shaw Says:

    I’ve just met you the once (which I don’t of course expect you to remember), but I could have sworn you were still really tall. I must have picked up some kind of psychic emanation.

    April 3rd, 2007 at 8:07 pm

  4. Cameron Says:

    I like the idea of an Australian literary award that could put Andy Griffiths (Bumageddon has some quite strong female characters) up against Patrick White and have Andy come out on top.

    April 3rd, 2007 at 9:00 pm

  5. jenny davidson Says:

    list! list!

    i still think that you are tall, i would be delighted to be 5ft 8in which seems to me a particularly satisfactory height…

    April 3rd, 2007 at 11:11 pm

  6. marrije Says:

    goodness! I’m taller than justine! By a measly 2,5 cm (one inch), but still.

    of course, i live in a country famous for its ridiculously tall people, so i still feel like a midget whenever i’m on a bus with all those 210 cm (erm, think basketball height) people going to the university.

    April 4th, 2007 at 1:05 am

  7. Rebecca Says:

    I’m 5ft 7in but took a much longer time getting there. I always wanted to be tall. So I could look older. :P

    April 4th, 2007 at 3:09 am

  8. Ally Says:

    justine!! guess what?? well, i’m currently 14 and i’m 5ft 7.5in!! except people don’t make fun of me for, they all wish they were tall..I don’t though, I don’t do alot of things that make me stand out or make me look taller. like today we were all jumping up and down and i didn’t like that just b/c i felt like a giant sort of and i not fat but im not skinny either, im normal so its not that big of a deal i guess..

    April 4th, 2007 at 10:39 pm

  9. Ally Says:

    oh wait that was when you were 12..i was like 5′5 or 5′6

    April 4th, 2007 at 10:41 pm

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