What Days are For …
Paula Xiberras
Robert Dessaix is a true gentleman. As soon as I call him he says he was expecting me and that I was the highlight of his day! I guess it was a quiet day for Robert as I’d hardly call myself a highlight, however I do my best to not disappoint this celebrated author too much.
The name Robert means ‘bright fame’ and Robert definitely has a bright, enquiring mind evident in his new memoir ‘What Days Are For.’
Robert has made Tasmania his home for 4 years now and says the decision included a couple of factors, one being he was not wealthy enough to live on the mainland and of course a very positive force was the major attraction in Tasmania of the ‘natural wild and accessible landscape.’
We are chatting about Robert’s new book ‘What Days are for’ but detour and digress occasionally to talk about holidays in Malta and the fact it is heavily populated by German tourists and also about the similarities between Hindu and Catholic places of worship regarding their statutory!
Hinduism with its deities that in some ways bear similarities to Catholic saints with seemly incredible stories to tell. Robert tells me that that this contemplation of religions was the subject of his novel ‘Arabesque’.
The name of Robert’s most recent book comes from the title of Philip Larkin’s poem which ponders just that, ‘what are our days for? what do we fill them with?’;
Often these ponderings don’t fill our minds until we are faced with a defining moment such as Robert was when visiting Sydney to see his play performed and finding himself in hospital for three weeks experiencing the effects of a heart attack.
Robert cleverly juxtaposes the occasion of his visit to see his play being performed to himself becoming the object of observation as his situation quickly metaphors into the formula of a play. We read of friends visiting him in hospital ‘waiting in the wings’ (behind the curtains). Robert’s memoir contains the Shakespearean elements of drama, comedy and tragedy with Robert centre stage while an audience of medics, critics in their own way, surround and appraise him.
‘What Days are For’ is published by Random house