Читать книгу Cops, Crocs & Leopard-Skin Jocks - Bob Magor - Страница 6

Wow! What can I say? I thought I’d met all the larger-than-life characters of the outback, but I’d never come across Wrightie, the dodger of Cops and Crocs, the wearer of Leopard Skin Jocks, until I was asked by Bob Magor to write the Foreword for this book. My eyes are still popping as I recall the many outrageous exploits Bob records of this famous (infamous?) man, Roy James Wright. He is nowadays verging on the respectable as he still does a bit of crabbing on the Wearyan River. But ten of his seventy-two years have been spent in gaol for a range of offences that would make Ned Kelly look like a poofy choirboy. He’s fathered countless children to a series of mainly Aboriginal women. Those into political correctness will deplore Wrightie’s treatment of some of these women and some of the children, but he treated them no better or worse than he treated all the people he has encountered in his long life. In some instances I found myself cheering him on as he took on the world and its vicissitudes.

Roy Wright always felt that he was victimised by the police, but they all say that, don’t they? It’s hard to respect a man who admits to so many outrageous things with such breezy candour, yet I couldn’t put the book down as I marvelled at his bush skills, his capacity for sheer hard work, his toughness, his refusal to show pain or admit defeat. I really enjoyed the exchange between the former deadly adversaries, Roy Wright and Fisheries Inspector Dave Lindner – surely one of the best duels ever unravelled in a literary work.

I’m not sure if I want to meet Wrightie or not. Bob Magor said to me: ‘Ted, he’s just an old pussy cat at this stage of his life.’ And Bob Magor’s a good judge of outlaws, rogues and eccentrics as his delightful poems have indicated over the years.

This book is not for everybody, but if you want to consider the rawest frontier life imaginable, ponder the enormous problems of isolation and brutality, reel at the knowledge that this is going on in today’s Australia, you will probably be like me and read the book in one sitting. The language of Wrightie and his associates is shocking, totally deplorable (and this is Ted Egan speaking!) but it’s nonetheless colourful, authentic, incomparable in the worst sense of the term. Bob Magor has faithfully recorded it: in fact Bob tells me he’s ‘softened’ the vernacular in just a few instances. Wow again!

This is a very worthwhile book. It’s not about role models, or I hope it’s not about role models. It’s about one of the greatest villains I have ever contemplated, yet Bob Magor has put his overview of Roy James Wright together so skilfully that you can’t not have a tiny, sneaking sense of admiration for this enigmatic man in his leopard skin jocks as he takes on the cops and the crocs. And the world in general.

Ted Egan AO