Gerald Glaskin

Gerald Marcus Glaskin
Born(1923-12-16)16 December 1923
Perth, Western Australia
Died11 March 2000(2000-03-11) (aged 76)
Perth, Western Australia
Pen nameNeville Jackson
NationalityAustralian

Gerald Glaskin (G. M. Glaskin) (16 December 1923 – 11 March 2000) was an Australian author.[1]

Biography

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Early life

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Gerald Marcus Glaskin was born on 16 December 1923 in North Perth in Western Australia.[2]

He attended Perth Modern School and served in the Second World War in the Royal Australian Navy and Royal Australian Air Force.[3]

Career

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His published works were extensive. He wrote poetry, short stories, and novels. Some works also included issues of science fiction and new-age spiritual guidance related to the interpretation of dreams. He was also involved in the Western Australian Fellowship of Australian Writers.

Some sources claim that he won the Commonwealth Prize for Literature in 1955, but subsequent research has disproved this, finding that he was awarded a grant in 1957 which he could not retain due to living outside Australia at the time.[4] His works were received more favourably in Europe than in Australia. He lived mostly in Asia and later the Netherlands, until returning to Perth in 1967. His extensive time overseas may have been because of the oppressive Australian moral climate of the period against homosexuality. In 1961, he had been charged with indecent exposure on a Perth beach.[5]

A resident of Cottesloe, he was enthusiastic for its beach environment.[6] As a writer in Western Australia conditions were not always supportive of the profession.[7]

His involvement with the Christos experiment[8][9] saw his writing a number of books related to the subject.[10][11][12][13][14]

His novel A Waltz Through the Hills was made into a 1988 film of the same title.[15] His most commercially successful work was a novel about a homosexual love affair, No End To The Way (1965),[16] published under the pseudonym Neville Jackson.[17][18] Interviewed in later life about the novel, Glaskin said: "It was banned in Australia and the paperback publishers, Corgi, researched the Australian censorship laws, and discovered that the book could not be shipped to Australia. So they chartered planes and flew them in".[19] It was partly autobiographical, and inspired by his relationships with Dutch men.[20] Its publication preceded his relationship with noted genealogist Leo van de Pas (Leonardus Francisus Maria van de Pas, 1942–2016), whom he met in 1968 in a gay bar in Amsterdam, and lived with from then onwards till the end of his life.[21]

He was also a silent financial partner in The Coffee Pot, a popular Perth meeting place for homosexuals, bohemians and students which was established in the 1950s by Dutch Indonesian migrants, and was then the city's only late night cafe.[22][23]

In 1967 he met the British writer Iris Murdoch, who was visiting Australia. In a letter to her friend Brigid Brophy she wrote: ... the opera house is the most beautiful single object I've seen since getting here (with the possible exception of a West Australian novelist called Jerry Glaskin, whom I had reluctantly to leave behind in Perth).[24]

Death

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He died on 11 March 2000.[25][26][27][28][29]

Works

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  • A world of our own, James Barrie. London, 1955 |
  • A minor portrait (Barrie Books, London, 1957 — fiction)
  • The mistress (Panther Books, 1957 — fiction)
  • The Beach of Passionate Love (1959)
  • A lion in the sun (Varrie and Rockliff, 1960 — fiction)
  • A change of mind (Doubleday, 1960 — fiction)
  • The land that sleeps: Travel and adventure in the virgin west of Australia (Doubleday, NY, 1960 — travel)
  • A waltz through the hills (Barrie and Rockliff, 1961 — fiction)
  • A small selection of short stories (Barrie and Rockliff, 1962)
  • Flight to landfall (Barrie and Rockliff, 1963 — fiction)
  • No End to the Way [pseudonym 'Neville Jackson'] (Corgi, London, 1965)
  • The man who didn't count (Delacorte Press, 1965 — fiction)
  • The road to nowhere (1967)
  • Bird in my hands; a personal experience (Jenkins, 1967)
  • "The Inheritors" (Mercury Press, 1972) https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?51389
  • Windows of the mind: Discovering your past and future lives through massage and mental exercise (Wildwood House, London, 1974)
  • Two women: Two novellas (Ure Smith, Sydney, 1975)
  • Worlds within: Probing the Christos experience (Wildwood House, London, 1976)
  • A door to infinity: Proving the Christos experience (Wildwood House, London, 1979)
  • One way to wonderland[30]
  • A many-splendored woman: A memoir of Han Suyin (Graham Brash, Singapore, 1995)

Bibliography

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  • Burbidge, John (2013), Dare me! : the life and work of Gerald Glaskin, Monash University Publishing, ISBN 978-1-921867-73-6[31]

References

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  1. ^ "Austlit — Gerald Glaskin". Austlit. Retrieved 19 April 2024.
  2. ^ Detail from summary of his papers left in Battye Library [1]
  3. ^ "For the interest of readers we say a few words on this page". Western Mail (Perth, WA : 1885 - 1954). Perth, WA: National Library of Australia. 4 April 1946. p. 17. Retrieved 8 June 2014.
  4. ^ "G. M. Glaskin". AustLit: Discover Australian Stories. Retrieved 14 September 2021.
  5. ^ Burbidge, John 2007 Underexposed: Gerald Glaskin’s fiction. The Gay and Lesbian Review WorldwideVol 14, Issue 6 http://www.glreview.com/article.php?articleid=719 Archived 1 October 2011 at the Wayback Machine (accessed July 2011)
  6. ^ Gerald Glaskin — talks about his love of Cottesloe (March 1984); suffers bad health needing hospitalisation (Sept. 1984). The West Australian, 24 March 1984, p.146; 26 Sept. 1984, p.13
  7. ^ Clary, Mike (1971) "It isn't easy to make a living as a writer. (WA authors comment on making a living as a writer)". Daily News, 7 July 1971, p. 10
  8. ^ Parkhurst, Nicolas (1973). The Christos Experiment. Open Mind Publications. Retrieved 8 June 2014.
  9. ^ Parkhurst, Jacqueline; Parkhurst, Nicolas H (1976). Altered states of consciousness and the Christos experiment. Open Mind Publications. ISBN 978-0-9596609-1-3.
  10. ^ Glaskin, G. M. (Gerald Marcus) (1986). Windows of the mind : the Christos experience. Prism. ISBN 978-0-907061-81-6.
  11. ^ Glaskin, G. M. (Gerald Marcus) (1976). Worlds within : probing the Christos Experience. Wildwood House. ISBN 978-0-7045-0215-4.
  12. ^ Glaskin, G. M. (Gerald Marcus); Glaskin, G. M. (Gerald Marcus), 1923-2000. Door to eternity (1989). A door to infinity : proving the Christos experience (Rev. ed.). Prisim. ISBN 978-1-85327-033-8.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  13. ^ Glaskin, G. M. (Gerald Marcus) (1979). A door to eternity : proving the Christos experience. Wildwood House. ISBN 978-0-7045-3002-7.
  14. ^ Glaskin, G. M. (Gerald Marcus) (1978). Worlds within (Arrow ed. with new appendix ed.). Arrow Books. ISBN 978-0-09-918600-7.
  15. ^ "A Waltz Through the Hills". IDMB. Retrieved 19 April 2024.
  16. ^ Jackson, Neville (1985). No end to the way. Corgi. ISBN 978-0-552-12621-2.
  17. ^ Fisher, Jeremy No end to the way: using G.M. Glaskin’s life and works in creative writing teaching, University of New England, in Strange Bedfellows: Refereed Conference Papers of the 15th Annual AAWP Conference, 2010
  18. ^ "No End To The Way by Neville Jackson". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 19 April 2024.
  19. ^ Burbidge, John (November–December 2007). "Underexposed: Gerald Glaskin's fiction". The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide. Retrieved 23 January 2009.
  20. ^ Burbidge, John Dare Me! The Life and Work of Gerald Glaskin, Monash University Publishing, 2014, pp135-139
  21. ^ Fisher, Jeremy No end to the way: using G.M. Glaskin's life and works in creative writing teaching, University of New England, in Strange Bedfellows: Refereed Conference Papers of the 15th Annual AAWP Conference, 2010
  22. ^ Coffee Pot Exhibition Catalogue City Of Perth, 2010 ISBN 978-0-9808513-1-1 also as Darbyshire, Jo; Perth (W.A. : Municipality) (2010). The coffee pot. City of Perth. ISBN 978-0-9808513-1-1.
  23. ^ "Out in Perth - Gay and Lesbian Perth WA News - Hot Steaming Cup of Nostalgia". Archived from the original on 1 October 2011. Retrieved 14 July 2011.
  24. ^ Gillian Dooley, "Postcards from Iris", Weekend Australian, 23–24 March 2019, Review, p. 20
  25. ^ The West Australian, 15 March 2000, Arts Today supplement, p.5
  26. ^ Westside Observer, 17 March 2000, p. 3.
  27. ^ The Sunday times (Perth, W.A.), 26 March 2000, p. 53.
  28. ^ Western Word, June 2000, p.7
  29. ^ Post Newspapers Archived 27 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
  30. ^ Glaskin, G. M. (Gerald Marcus); Steunebrink (1984), One way to wonderland : letters to a pen-friend in Europe, 1938-1945, Fremantle Arts Centre Press, ISBN 978-0-909144-91-3
  31. ^ Fisher, Jeremy (2014), O Life: Review of 'Dare me! The life and work of Gerald Glaskin' by John Burbidge: Monash University Publishing, $34.95 pb, 349 pp, 9781921867743, Australian Book Review Inc, ISSN 0155-2864
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