Freudenberg was a leading – if not the leading - Labor Party speech writer for over 40 years. A former journo, raised by Liberal voting parents, he wound up writing key speeches for Calwell, Whitlam, Wran, Unsworth, Hawke and Carr – he was at Calwell’s side during the near-success in 1961 (the one Labor came so close to winning – I think the country would have been much better off if they had, if only to have power for a term, it’s not healthy to have one party in power for so long – but no one ever seems to regard this as a great “what if” of Australian history), then later on during the Vietnam War stoushes; he was with Whitlam during his battle against the executives, particularly in Victoria, and of course the dismissal; he was close to Wran during the height of Nifty’s popularity, and later during this troubles with the ABC; he was also part of the Bob Carr-led comeback.
We get an interesting view of Australian political history during that time – although it’s not as good as when Bob Ellis does it. There are lots of quotes from speeches, which is interesting. But it feels insufficient, too closed off. We get very little of Freudenberg’s private life – his marriage and divorce is disposed of in a few sentences; there are lots of allusions to drinking but no real exploration of that. He also doesn’t strike me as a deep thinker outside politics – apparently giving independence to Papua New Guinea was a terrific thing to do should have happened quicker; the nasty ABC and Herald persecuted poor Nifty and Lionel Murphy (the corruption of the ALP isn’t really explored). In his introduction where he talks about people’s interest in speech writers he refers to George W Bush, but doesn’t mention the West Wing, surely the biggest factor of them all in the recent interest in that species. Worth reading; you just wish it had been a bit better and more candid.
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