CCF20100109000

3B Biographical narratives

The story of a life

Six phrases have been removed from this text. Match the gaps (1-6) with the phrases (A-H) given below. Two of the suggested phrases do not fit at all.

OBITUARY:

Francis James

1 Had there been Olympics to select a champion eccentric, the gold would have been won for Australia by the journalist and former fighter pilot Francis James, 5 who has died in Sydney at the age of 74.

We were at the same New South Wales country school in the late

twenties. His brilliance shone (1)__.

Then, without the knowledge of the Staff, 10 he founded a school newspaper with help from local advertisers, but that admirable initiative was marred by the fact that his editorials accused the Staff of practically every criminal act. He knew it was 15 untrue but felt that society needed an external stimulus. His expulsion was

dramatic. His father, (2)_, came to

the school to thrash Francis in public.

The family moved to Canberra to a 20 new life and a new school. There he exp!oded another laboratory in a failed experiment and dared Gough Whitlam,

(3)_, to climb a high tree with the

help of a ladder. Francis removed the 25 ladder and left Gough in the stratosphere for the best part of a day before a search party found him.

Francis became (4)_. He thought

officers should fratemize with the lower 30 ranks and emphasized the point by flying our most powerful fighter aircraft along the main streets of Melbourne almost below roof level. Expelled again, he took ship to England and joined the RAF as an 35 aircraftsman in 1939.

By 1942 he had become a Spitfire pilot and I was at the BBC in London. I asked him how he had managed to get into the firing linę. ‘Easy, dear boy. Forged my 40 log books to prove I had been flying fighters in China.’ Weeks later he was shot down over France and badly burned. Taken prisoner, he was asked his name and rank and replied ‘Group Captain 45 Turtledove’. He tried to escape from a Stalag five times, once in a hot air balloon he had madę, It crashed back into the compound, setting it alight.

In 1944 I had, (5)_, a telephone

50 cali from Francis. ‘Dear boy, I am in London. I shall be with you in half an hour.’ He was. In the biggest Staff car I had ever seen. How, I asked. ‘Easy, dear boy. I was at RAF HQ, just repatriated 55 from Germany as wounded, and I said to the desk “A car please for Air Vice Marshal James of Australia”, and as you see it came.’

He was given a scholarship to Balliol, 60 Oxford. I used to visit but once found him absent. The porter explained, ‘Mr James has left. A fellow student had not_ paid his gambling debts and Mr James took him to the river to explain that he 65 must do so, but unfortunately took a loaded pistol to explain.’

Many years later he became the owner / editor of Sydney’s Anglican Times, had a profound effect on Church leaders with 70 blistering editorials, and joined Australia’s Sydney Moming Herald as Religious Editor, writing many of his

pieces on a typewriter (6)_parked

in Sydney’s main streets.

A to my astonishment

B a fellow student and futurę prime minister C in the back of a 1936 Roiis Royce D but he was a very good rugby player E the youngest cadet in the Australian Air Force F although he once wrecked a laboratory in an explosion G a six-foot-two amaleur boxer and Anglican priest H while riding a police horse

Narrative technique

The obituary of Francis James manages to tell his life story clearly yet retain a sense of drama. The writer is able to give so much Information without his writing becoming heavy and slow by using short sentences and participle clauses.

A Short sentences

Look back to see how these two ideas were actually written in the text,

1    And indeed he did arrive just half an hour later. What is morę, he came in the biggest staff car I had ever seen. I asked him how he had obtained such a car. (linę 52-3)

2    From time to tirne I used to vi$it him there, but on one occasion when I went to see him I found that he wasn’t there. (linę 61-2)

62 • Types of writing

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