ABC Radio Sydney Drive presenter Richard Glover has begun a few months long service leave, but he won’t be putting his feet up. He has embarked on a tour to promote his new book, Best Wishes.
His first stop this weekend was the Blue Mountains Writers Festival, where he spoke about his book with Amy Sambrooke.
The book is full of ‘wishes for the world to do better.’ The ‘wishes’ are really an excuse for funny observations about modern life, often looking back to an earlier, more simple time.
Glover began his talk with some thoughts about modern restaurants.
“They’re all shiny, long rooms made of glass and hard surfaces… they reflect sound.
“You can never have a simple conversation over dinner because you can’t hear each other, the whole place is noisy and echoes… sound bounces off the hard surfaces. The waiters are all cool hipsters with beards because the beards are the only way they can dampen down the sound to hear your order….
“I wish they would bring back the old style restaurants with carpet, nice drapes, tablecloths so that I can hear what everyone is saying.”
He talked about other wishes for a better world, such as no more pre-ripped jeans or pedestrians who walk five abreast. He also has a problem with over priced take-away sandwiches and plastic-wrapped fruit.
“Have you ever gone to buy a pair of scissors and found that it is impossible to open the the plastic packet. You need scissors to open it, but you don’t have any, that’s why you’re buying scissors! Why do scissors need to be in plastic?”
Glover also talked about the joys and challenges of radio talkback, which is such a rich source of ideas from listeners. “So many stories have started with a comment from a listener on the talkback line.”
As an author, one thing that worries him is the obsession of the ABC listening audience with proper grammar.
“I hope I haven’t made any grammatical mistakes in this book because the ABC Radio Sydney audience will pick them up,” he said. “Please don’t call me on the talkback line and correct the grammar… it’s probably because my mother ran off with my English teacher.”
Most of all, Richard thinks the world would be a better place if people got back their sense of humour. His book is his way of helping to do that by making the world a less annoying place, one wish at a time.
Other ABC Radio Sydney personalities speaking at the Festival are Richard Fidler and James Valentine.
Fidler told stories from the ancient world about how the Babylonians stored the wisdom of the old world in the Library of Baghdad and how stories that were thought of as myths were really based in realities of the ancient world that have been lost to us in modern times. He writes about this in his latest publication, The Book of Roads and Kingdoms.
Fidler was interviewed by James Valentine, who is also presenting other sessions this weekend at the Katoomba based writers festival.
While Glover is away on leave, a range of high profile ABC personalities will fill in for him, including Fran Kelly, Craig Reucassel, Jennifer Byrne and Hamish Macdonald.