I came across a letter the other day, written by Charles Darwin during his trip to Australia.
asserted
I → come → Australia
Sorry, that sounds like I found the letter in my desk drawer, rather than the more conventional place to find such a letter, which is halfway through the Oxford Book of Australian Letters.
asserted
which → sound → Letters
All the same, the letter excited me.
asserted
letter → excite → me
Here was one of the world’s greatest naturalists, on the verge of formulating his theory of evolution, and he’s describing how he and a friend “went with a gun in search of the Platypi and actually killed one”.
asserted
he → formulate → one
Killing the platypus was a delightful experience: “I consider it a great feat, to be at the death of so wonderful an animal.”
asserted
it → kill → animal
We are all a product of our time, I suppose, but here is Darwin, famous for upending humanity’s certainties, and he was still imprisoned by the conventional attitudes of his time.
asserted
he → suppose → time
Killing animals was fun.
asserted
Killing → kill → animals
In every period, most people cling to the common attitudes of the age.
asserted
people → cling → age
I’ve spent the past year or two researching the history of Australian parenting for a new book, out this week.
asserted
I → spend → book
In each period, nearly every “expert” marched to the same drum.
asserted
expert → march → drum
They shamelessly copied each other’s ideas.
asserted
They → copy → ideas
They used the same phrases.
asserted
They → use → phrases
The beliefs of each age become certainties by being endlessly repeated, usually on the basis of nothing at all.
asserted
beliefs → become → nothing
When writing about sex, for example, the guidebooks of the past always used euphemisms.
asserted
guidebooks → write → euphemisms
The womb was “a wonderful room”, according to a Sydney parenting guide from 1913; the vagina, in 1941, was the “hallway of life”; while sex, according to a 1968 pamphlet from Australia’s Father and Son Welfare Movement, was “the means whereby a man and a woman can get together with God in His ongoing work of creation”.
uncertain
man → accord → creation
Which, I must say, is what I’ve always called it.
asserted
I → say → it
Then, one day in the State Library of NSW, I stumbled into the company of a Sydney doctor with a wonderful name: Gertrude Buzzard Dunlop.
asserted
I → stumble → name
Her 1928 guidebook lists the correct names for various anatomical features, including the clitoris which she describes as “the seat of erotic sensation”.
asserted
she → list → sensation
In a book mainly about breastfeeding, weaning and childhood ailments, she says women should be more active participants when it comes to sex, with the aim of always achieving orgasm.
asserted
it → say → orgasm
“Others blamed the decline in table manners on the practice of allowing one’s maid to supervise the children’s mealtimes.”
asserted
maid → blame → mealtimes
The early parenting experts also assumed every child lived in a middle-class home.
asserted
child → assume → home
If an example is given of a father’s workplace, it is “in the city” or “at the office”; never “in the factory”, or even “on the farm”.
asserted
it → give → farm
In the Catholic guidebook The Choice of a Husband, published in 1964, the father returns home each evening exhausted from a day spent with “professional contacts in a harsh and austere business world”.
asserted
father → publish → world
That’s why he needs his wife to be soft and loving as he walks in the door.
asserted
he → ’ → door
Sydney’s Muriel Danvers Power, in her 1913 guidebook Mother and Child, assumes the household has a cook and a maid, and at one point even mentions the “servant’s bell” and the need to hang onto staff.
asserted
household → assume → staff
She also sounds a warning about the evil habit of “the solitary vice”, speculating that it often takes hold after the child has enjoyed “the sensation caused by sliding down bannisters” in one’s two-storey house, perhaps not a hobby available in every home.
asserted
child → sound → home
Most writers assume there will be a separate bedroom for each child, and some insist on a playroom as well.
asserted
some → assume → playroom
“A playroom can be regarded as a necessity,” according to a 1932 booklet by Victoria’s Miss Mary Lush, proving yet again you can’t be an Australian parenting expert if you don’t have an eye-catching name.
uncertain
you → regard → name
It’s also anticipated that every house will have running water, electricity and refrigeration, in an era before such things were commonplace.
asserted
things → anticipate → era
Meanwhile, others blamed the decline in table manners on the practice of allowing one’s maid to supervise the children’s mealtimes.
asserted
maid → blame → mealtimes
Then, just as with Gertrude Buzzard Dunlop, there’s a thrill when you encounter someone willing to break ranks.
asserted
you → ’ → ranks
Melbourne’s Vera Scantlebury Brown (again, the name!) had a nice house in Hawthorn with a maid and a nanny but also understood not everyone lived that way.
asserted
everyone → have → maid
In her 1947 guidebook for nurses, she gave various formulas for modifying cow’s milk when breastfeeding had proved impossible.
asserted
breastfeeding → give → milk
She recommended adding lactose, derived from milk, but noted that cane sugar is not so bad – and “has the advantage of cheapness where this factor must be considered”.
asserted
factor → recommend → cheapness
She also gave details of how to construct a Coolgardie safe – a low-tech way of keeping milk cold in households that lacked electricity.
asserted
that → give → electricity
She could imagine the life led by others, a feat of empathy managed by so few of her fellow writers and officials.
uncertain
She → imagine → writers
Whether you are reading a letter from Charles Darwin or a parenting guide from a century ago, you are often left to wonder about the certainties of our own time – and whether you are one of those rare people who find a way to march to a different drum.
asserted
who → read → drum
Read these:
- What do I do now that I’m retired?
asserted
I → read → What
The question should be what don’t I do
- What will happen to your most cherished possessions when you die?
asserted
you → do → possessions
You don’t want to know
- I’m suddenly British, even though I really don’t want to be
-
asserted
I → want → ?
…and 3 more, not listed.
The Aporia
