English
Robert Newton
Author of 'Runner'
On 12 September, the writer Robert Newton, author of the novel ‘Runner’, came to address the Year 7s, who are currently studying the novel. Surprisingly, Robert works at the Highett Fire Station as a fireman and gave us an insight into his daily routine.
Robert stumbled onto writing through writing bad letters to his brother who was living in Switzerland. He began inventing things to make his life sound more interesting. These then became stories, which became popular with his brother and friends in Switzerland. His brother then encouraged him to take up writing seriously.
His first book was about his brother Chris, who was dyslexic. Chris Newton referred to the words as ‘dancing’ on the page. It was much later that he was encouraged to find ‘a new way of looking at words’.
As a child, Robert’s Mum and Dad told stories. In particular, his Mum talked of Squizzy Taylor, describing him as "flash as a rat with a gold tooth!" Robert talked of 'Struggletown’, the slum areas of Richmond, which, despite the trouble one could encounter, created an ideal background for a good story.
He then spoke about Squizzy and his origins, being born locally at Brighton. Squizzy got his name from the way he looked at people. Squizzy joined forces with ‘Snowy’ Cutmore and the two created havoc in Richmond. Snowy’s ‘Fitzroy Gang’ ended up in a gang war with Squizzy’s ‘Richmond Gang’. 1919 was the year when gangsterism arrived in Melbourne and Squizzy is believed to have been involved in the first ‘drive by’ shooting in Melbourne.
Robert finds little ‘gems’ of interest which bring his stories to life. “It’s all about small details”. This was such an interesting period of Melbourne history that Robert could not but conclude: “What a fantastic time to write about!”
We were treated to Robert reading an excerpt from ‘Runner’ which carried a lively description of Squizzy by Charlie Fehan on meeting the gangster for the first time. He encouraged us to start a story, even when we may not have every detail in mind. “There is no one way to write a story”. To Robert, colourful descriptions of strong characters who are believable, are vital to a good story. He used the example of a character he created called ‘Nostrils’ who had a big nose, based on a guy Robert works with. “To be a good writer, you’ve gotta be an observer.”
He talked about "tucking away an idea" which might be useful later. He was referring to a request by his daughters to write a story about girls, for a change. This request inspired the novel ‘Mr Romanov’s Garden’. An incident involving the daughter of a heroin addict 25 years ago struck a chord with Robert. He remembered the little girl wearing pink pyjamas with white rabbits on them, the small details.
Students were given the opportunity to ask questions. Robert told us that “writing a story is like joining the dots”. He wrote 'Runner' in a year and wrote a fair bit of it at the Fire Station. Many of his characters’ names were drawn from people in his life.
Damian Smith
Archives
'Runner'
On 12 September, Robert Newton (the author of the book ‘Runner’ that we have been reading) came to speak to us. We learnt many new things about Robert Newton including:
- He is a firefighter
- He has three daughters
- His brother had dyslexia
But not only did we get to learn about Robert Newton himself. We also got to discover more about all of his books.
Robert Newton got into writing when his younger brother moved to Switzerland, Robert and his brother wrote letters to one another, until one day Robert’s letters turned into chapters of a story. These chapters then got so good that he was inspired to write his very own chapters of a book.
The main message I got out from listening to Robert Newton was that, don’t worry if you don’t have a plan for something little, or maybe even something big, everything will just happen as you go.
I found it interesting to learn about different facts from an author, that we didn’t already know. For that reason I would recommend this to future year 7s.
Chloe Winduss
Year 7