Donald Horne – författare

A classic of Australian literature, The Education of Young Donald Trilogy combines Donald Horne's three autobiographies – The Education of Young Donald (1967), Confessions of a New Boy (1985) and Portrait of an Optimist (1988) – in one volume. Describing his formative years as he strays far from home, it tells how Donald moved among the social classes, strolled from one milieu to another, visited foreign lands, flirted between intellectual perspectives, had successes that were failures and failures that were successes and ends up, with an in increasing sense of exile.With a keen intellect and a sharp wit, Horne portrays the rough and tumble world of journalism.

''Australia is a lucky country, run mainly by second-rate people who share its luck.''First published in 1964 The Lucky Country caused a sensation. The book was a wake-up call to an unimaginative nation, an indictment of a country mired in mediocrity and manacled to its past.Popular PenguinsHe just wanted a decent book to read . . . Not too much to ask, was it? It was in 1935 when Allen Lane stood on a British railway platform looking for something good to read on his journey. His choice was limited to popular magazines and poor quality paperbacks. Lane''s disappointment and subsequent anger at the range of books available led him to found a company - and change the world. ''We believed in the existence of a vast reading public for intelligent books at a low price, and staked everything on it.'' Sir Allen Lane, 1902-1970, founder of Penguin BooksReading habits have changed since 1935, but Penguin still believes in publishing the best books for everyone to enjoy, and that quality books published passionately and responsibility make the world a better place.

This unique book is the last work of one of Australia''s most respected and influential thinkers.  On learning that his illness was terminal, Donald Horne began dictating his experiences of dying, and his resulting journal is full of courage, honesty, insight and humour.  Ever the intellectual, he also recorded his last thoughts on some of the big human questions; faith and regret, the uses of art, the rewards of the engaged mind.  And on contemporary dilemmas such as the Iraq War, anti-Americanism and the meaning of democracy.  These essays have been refined by his wife and long-time editor, Myfanwy, who has also written her own inspirational account of Donald''s final weeks.Far from being morbid, Dying is a book that sings with life.  Donald Horne''s memories of his well-lived years sit alongside his unflinching view of their end, and the whole is uplifted by his willingness to laugh at human foibles, his own included.PRAISE FOR DYING: A MEMOIR''This book is a love story where the decades have not dulled two loves'' devotion.''Craig Sherbourne, Australian Literary Review''Full of Horne''s self-deprecating wit and keen intellect.  For people suffering from terminal illnesses and their loved ones this would be a particularly helpful memoir,''Sue Bond, Courier-Mail''Must read''Daily Telegraph    

With an introduction by Hugh Mackay ''Australia is a lucky country, run mainly by second-rate people who share its luck.'' The phrase ''the lucky country'' has become part of our lexicon; it''s forever being invoked in debates about the Australian way of life, but is all too often misused by those blind to Horne''s irony. When it was first published in 1964 The Lucky Country caused a sensation. Horne took Australian society to task for its philistinism, provincialism and dependence. The book was a wake-up call to an unimaginative nation, an indictment of a country mired in mediocrity and manacled to its past. Although it''s a study of the confident Australia of the 1960s, the book still remains illuminating and insightful decades later. The Lucky Country is valuable not only as a source of continuing truths and revealing snapshots of the past, but above all as a key to understanding the anxieties and discontents of Australian society today.