Memoirs of a Semi-detached Australian

by PASSMORE John

In this vivid and iconoclastic memoir, John Passmore takes us on an unsentimental journey from his childhood in Manly, then half-village, half-resort - 'seven miles from Sydney, a thousand miles from care' - to the hot-house environment of the University of Sydney, and on to the realities of his imagined Europe. These physical voyages - first across the harbour, then half-way around the globe - were rites of passage. The first marked the end of the fierce parochialism of childhood, inducting him into university life at a time of intellectual and political controversy, when the proceedings of philosophy congresses were routinely reported in the daily press. The second saw the death of 'the little boy from Manly' and his replacement by a semi-detached Australian - not a rootless 'citizen of the world', but an Australian whose angle of vision had been permanently changed. In Memoirs of a Semi-detached Australian, he mounts a passionate defence of the life of the mind, displaying the intellectual energy and insight that has made him a philosopher of international stature.

290 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 1997