Vignettes from life of Bob Carr

Run for Your Life

AUTHOR: Bob Carr PUBLISHER: Melbourne University Press RRP: $34.99

REVIEWER: Mary Ann Elliott

BOB Carr was the longest continuously serving premier in the history of New South Wales.

Later, he entered the Federal Senate and served as foreign minister for 18 months.

Since leaving politics Carr has had a distinguished career as an author, speaker and academic.

He yearned for a life in politics ( “a fever in the blood”) from the night he joined the Matraville branch of the ALP at the age of 15.

Carr’s book is a series of vignettes from his life. His chapters are short and in no chronological order.

We jump from young Bob running wild in the bushland on the La Perouse peninsula which

is now a Sydney metropolitan biodiversity hotspot, to Labor meetings, talks with Bill Clinton, hosting royalty, and meeting farmers and union officials.

Carr was born into a working family, and absorbed their working-class ideologies in his youth.

He resented his second-rate education that prepared him for trades or clerical jobs but did not include languages, art, debating or drama.

While waiting for a lowerhouse seat, Carr worked as an ABC reporter and on The Bulletin.

Meetings with Kerry Packer, Gough Whitlam, Paul Keating, John Howard and other luminaries propelled him toward politics.

Carr is known as the premier who did nothing, but conservationists have a different view: “It’s fair to say that the major conservation achievements of the last 16 years of Labor rule will probably never be equalled”.

Why has Bob Carr kept running? Because he’s addicted and because it has kept him interested, his openness and selfdeprecating humour in this book kept me reading, despite his back-and-forth style.

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HE RESENTED HIS SECOND-RATE EDUCATION THAT PREPARED HIM FOR TRADES OR CLERICAL JOBS BUT DID NOT INCLUDE LANGUAGES, ART, DEBATING OR DRAMA.