Thirty years ago, Gina Chick’s mother Suzanne wrote a bestselling memoir after discovering that her birth mother was none other than iconic Australian writer Charmian Clift.
That book, Searching for Charmian, has now being rereleased with a new foreword by Gina and an afterword by Suzanne.
Read on for an extract …
ABOUT THE BOOK
When 48-year-old Suzanne Chick discovers the identity of her birth mother, suddenly nothing will satisfy her but knowing everything. Charmian was nineteen when she gave birth to her baby girl and had to give her up for adoption. By the time Suzanne unearthed her birth mother’s name, Charmian was dead, having taken her own life in 1969 at the age of forty-five. By then she was a beloved columnist, novelist and essayist whose name was known to thousands of readers. But for all her talent, intelligence and extraordinary beauty, Charmian’s life was marked by deep unhappiness.
As Suzanne learns about the mother she will never meet, she finds herself re-examining the course her own life has taken, gaining insight into the woman who brought her up – her adoptive mother, Marjorie Shaw. More than just a fascinating piece of literary history, this is a moving account of the consequences of adoption and Suzanne’s search for identity.
**********
POSTSCRIPT
(Thirty Years later)
1994
Hydra, Greece
We had seen it in a coloured photo-a two-storied rectangular white island house with blue doors and windows and a riotous purple bougainvillea. It stood in front a small square with a blue-capped well: The House by the Well. Charmian and George and their children had lived here.
Finding it was another matter. Hydra had many white houses with blue doors and windows. Some had purple bougainvillea or sat in squares with wells. Next, we tried to find their taverna to ask questions. Their writings led us to a sleazy dive filled with smoking men watching sport on a giant TV. Not this one, then. Finally, on a corner by the waterfront-a coffee shop/bar and restaurant, the place where the older Katsikas brothers had championed the Johnstons, even lending (or giving) them money. Charmian and George drank in the taverna over the way while the children ran in and out of the Katsikas shop.
The present proprietor, Tassos, was the son of one of the older Katsikases. His teenage son spoke English and interpreted for us. My story was told, and we relayed our problem in :finding the Johnston house.
‘Look behind you,’ he said.
I turned to see a very old man with arthritic hands :fingering his amber kombolloi, his worry beads. Nikos-one of the original brothers.
Yet again I told my story. The clatter of diners and drinkers slowed then stopped. This was Greek tragedy. Drama.
‘They were my friends.’ He said it in English. ‘Charmia and Mister Johnston.’ He held his hands over his heart. ‘And the children? They are well?’ The words dropped like stones into the silence of that bar.
I answered sadly, ‘Only the baby, Jason, is still alive, a man now.’
‘Oxi. Oxi. No no no.’ Tears in his eyes.
Tassos and his son looked at each other, then at me.
‘The Johnston house you want to see?’ Some more Greek, then shrugging. The boy looked worried. ‘But Mister Johnston he does not have it now,’ he said.
‘I know that. He is long dead.’
More Greek. ‘But you want to see it?’
‘Yes, please.’ I had guessed what was worrying them. ‘I know we can’t go inside. Just the outside. Please?’
Without another word, Mr Katsikas turned, took my arm, and led me away from the waterfront, setting a cracking pace. He certainly didn’t act eighty-something, the way he was dragging me along. Even Doug had to step it out.
‘We’re going to want to come back here, love,’ said Doug over the old man’s head. ‘Try to remember the way.’
‘You’re the one with the camera! Take photos,’ I snapped. My voice sounded strange in my ears.
Past the taverna, left turn then right turn, up a narrow alley, high walls on both sides topped with black and white cats. Left around a second taverna under a pergola of dry rustling vines. Now we were in an even narrower lane. Already lost.
Beside a whitewashed church, right around the apse, between white-walled houses. And there it was.
The Johnston house. The house by the well.
Doug lifted the camera. A small, cobbled square with a well roofed over in blue painted concrete. A typical blocky whitewashed island house with bright blue doors. Bright blue windows with bars. On the second floor, three tall blue windows and, hanging over a high white wall, a purple flowering bougainvillea, all thorns. Clearer than words it said, ‘Keep Out’.
I promptly burst into tears. The old man hugged me to him, then twice hit his clenched hand strongly against his chest. Two audible thuds. His voice was just as strong.
‘Charmia … Johnston … my friends, my friends,’ he said.
Days later on the waterfront, we sat, emotionally exhausted, drinking black coffee by the hydrofoil mooring. By chance we met Tassos Katsikas. He was off to Athens and told us that he had seen a light in the Johnston house. Someone was home.
So we returned to the house by the well like proverbial flame drawn moths. We were hemming and hawing in the lane about knocking when the door opened in front of us and out walked a woman, a man and one of those yappy little dogs Doug can’t stand. They passed without a glance. Doug hesitated. So did I. Then I was grinning from ear to ear as I raced after them.
I promptly burst into tears. The old man hugged me to him, then twice hit his clenched hand strongly against his chest. Two audible thuds. His voice was just as strong.
It was indeed the woman who owned the house. We were invited back the next morning at eleven o’clock.
At ten to eleven the next day we started off again, me with washed and dried hair, wearing my only skirt, proper shoes on my feet and a very nervous feeling in my stomach.
We knocked on the big double doors from the side lane. From inside came barking and the sound of bolts being drawn.
An embarrassed face greeted us. ‘I’m terribly sorry, my guests are having a morning lie-in. What about tomorrow? Will you still be here tomorrow?’
‘We’ll still be here.’ Doug’s deep voice broke in before I could break down.
She suggested we come back after the big celebration for the patron saint of Hydra, Saint Constantine, had ended.
On the morning of the celebration, the town was in conniptions. Women washing already scrubbed doorsteps, arranging flowers in urns and displaying precious icons. Local bands blurting and farting in preparation, the high-up Pappas from the mainland posturing in their very best robes (ludicrously printed with Disney characters), young schoolgirls comparing baskets of rose-petals, children being corralled towards the highest island church ready for the winding procession down to the waterfront. Over-excited dogs were racing through and around the crowds, frightening the yiayias and tripping the donkeys.
Midday bells rang out. We watched from above as police and military bands led the accompanying crowd while the mummy of Saint Constantine in his elaborate catafalque was ritually paraded down the steep winding road to the waterfront. We followed.
Before us is the heavy blue door. Our knock reverberates again.
Once again we hear a barking dog and heavy bolts grinding.
‘Come in,’ welcomes the owner of the house by the well, her yapping dog at her feet. ‘I’ve been expecting you.’
My eyes snap imaginary pictures as she leads us through rooms I have only seen in photographs. Enchanting pictures of a busy young
Charmian in her delightful kitchen. We climb stairs to baby Bouli’s little room and even more stairs to the airy writing room where she famously edited with a pencil in her mouth sitting on a windowsill, a view of vertiginous island stone steps rising behind her. ‘How many books were written here?’ I wonder.
The double doors to the balcony, where Charmian and George both typed in the sun, are partially open, and distant sounds of Saint Constantine’s festival drift up to us. ‘Do you want to come out?’ I am invited. Of course I do.
As I step up over the high threshold, onto the balcony, I look down at the entire massed island bands with mainland reinforcements and hear what sounds like every drummer in Greece begin the sforzando grand finale to this day of days for Saint Constantine.
‘There, Suzanne!’ exclaims my hostess when we can hear again. ‘That’s for you!’
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Suzanne Chick
Suzanne Chick was born in Sydney in 1942 and grew up in Mosman, the same suburb where Charmian Clift and George Johnston settled on their return from Greece in 1964. An adopted child with utterly different talents from those of her new family, Suzanne exhibited an unstoppable creative urge from the earliest age. Educated at North Sydney Girls’ High School, she progressed to the National Art School and Sydney Teachers’ College. After a long career teaching art and bringing up three daughters, she now makes her living as a painter, with occasional forays into the world of words.
Gina Chick is a barefoot nomad who’s happiest sleeping on the ground next to a fire, muddy paws and all. She’s the daughter and granddaughter of bestselling Australian authors Suzanne Chick and Charmian Clift. Writing is in her genes. She recently won the inaugural season of the survival show Alone Australia (produced by iTV for SBS) after spending 67 days completely solo in the Tasmanian winter wilderness, dancing barefoot in the moss and singing to a platypus; which just goes to show she’s a bit bonkers but also never quits. She gives great hugs. Her Instagram is @gigiamazonia, and if you want all her grown-up stuff,
0 Comments