Posting from Ann Blainey - At Sea
Posted by: Reading Victoria Moderator
22 December 2008
I’m writing to you from a ship near Torres Strait. My husband Geoffrey is the ship’s lecturer, and I’m his “accompanying person”. We are sailing through a sea scattered with tiny islands that look like poached eggs - the ring of sand is the egg white and the vegetation in the middle is the yoke. Some are just a speck, others are miles across. It’s a dream-like seascape - like something out of the happier parts of “Ancient Mariner”. I’ve sailed in the Mediterranean, but I’ve never seen anything as magical as this.
We have just visited Thursday Island, locally known as T. I. I love Thursday Island. So far it has resisted touristic progress. Back in the nineteenth century, its fishing trawlers went after beche de mer - those grim looking sea slugs that the Oriental gourmets prize as a delicacy and an aphrodisiac. Later the trawlers fished for pearls and mother of pearl shells; now it’s prawns and crayfish. The coral shoals make fishing and sailing a hazardous exercise, particularly at night. One of the worst disasters in Australian maritime history occurred near T. I. in February 1890, when the mail steamer the “Quetta”, sailing in the dark, struck a coral reef. A hundred and thirty three people drowned. The tall wooden Anglican Cathedral in the centre of town is dedicated to those lost souls.
I’m especially interested in shipwrecks in Torres Strait because someone from long ago - someone I’ve come to know well - was mortally injured on a coral reef off T. I. It happened on 27 December 1913. The Dutch mail ship the ‘Tasman” hit a reef at eleven o’clock at night and it was New Year’s Day before anyone could be rescued. For much of that time the unfortunate passengers huddled on deck, exposed to the howling winds and pouring rain of a cyclone. Among those passengers was Lillan Nordica, one of the operatic superstars of the early twentieth century, on her way home from a concert tour of Australia. I came across her when I was writing my biography of the famous Melbourne soprano Nellie Melba. It’s usually said that those towering divas of the golden age of opera hated one another, but she and Melba were firm friends. Though born on different continents - Nordica was American, Melba of course was Australian- - they had much in common. Both came from down-to-earth immigrant stock, both valued good sense and both spoke their mind.
Nordica was taken to the hospital at T.I. There she lingered for months in the tropical heat. Exposure and pneumonia had weakened her heart. At the end of March she was placed on a ship for Jakarta, but she barely survived the voyage, dying in Jakarta early in May. Melba was travelling in her personal train in the far west of America when she heard the news. She was due to sing that night, but she wept so hard for Nordica that her manager thought he would have to cancel the concert. That her dear friend had died so close to Australia, seems to have made Melba’s sense of loss the worse.
I would love to receive your comments and perhaps questions. However internet time on the ship is limited. I will be communicating with you again tomorrow, but please forgive me if I don’t reply to your questions and comments until the day after.
December 24, 2008 at 6:57 pm
My goodness, I know what any book vouchers I get for Christmas are going on. I can’t believe I haven’t already obtained and read this excellent biography, Ann, and it is a terrible tease reading bits of it here.
You are possibly the first person I’ve read to blog from a ship. Silly sentence, but you know what I mean, I hope. My aunt has been teaching ‘on’ T.I. for about eight or nine years - she is now retired and lives in Cairns, but a piece of her lives on Hammond as well I think.
December 23, 2008 at 11:56 am
It certainly is interesting to ponder whether Melba would have fallen into her operatic career as you say had she not been in Mackay - one would like to think that with her outstanding talent she would have found her voice and career somewhere else. Not only do you need the voice but the drive, commitment and ambition to succeed in the operatic world. I would be interested to know how you went about writing the biography - particularly the research involved and finding the ‘person’ - so we the readers can get to know Melba. I am waiting for my copy of ‘I am Melba’ to read and I am looking forward to it. Just the little you are writing about Melba in this blog make me want to get to know her more.
December 22, 2008 at 11:38 am
Although I haven’t yet read I Am Melba, I’d be interested to hear about the ‘relationship’ that you developed with Nellie Melba while you were writing; hearing biographers talk about how the dealt with/related to their subjects is endlessly fascinating to me!
December 22, 2008 at 11:34 am
Hi Ann,
How wonderful to be sailing in such a beautiful place and at this time of the year - I am sure it is magical and relaxing - especially so to find places with less tourist impact. I have googled images of Thursday Island and it looks lovely. How are the sunsets? Have you been on land to see any of the sights? What is the flora and food like - any different exotic fruits? It is always a delight seeing new places and what they have to offer! I’m sure the people are very friendly.
How very sad - what circumstance can play to lives. While 130 people died by drowning when the “Quetta” steamer hit a reef, (carrying Lillian Nordica on her journey home to America from I’m sure a very happy and successful tour in Australia), she survives the accident but consequently suffers a decline in health and loses her life months later. I can well imagine how devastated Melba would have felt, as you say, not only losing her friend but so close to her own country Australia.
Looking forward to hearing more about your cruising when you have time. I have travelled extensively and love the Greek islands but have never cruised. My sister tells me there is so much to do on ship.
Lyne