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To Begin To Know: Walking in the Shadows of My Father - David Leser
Judges' Comments
This book is a rich amalgam of self-exploration, family memoir, and documentary of an important period in Australian media history. The story begins with a Jewish family’s escape from Nazi Germany to Australasia where David’s father, Bernie Leser, rose to become the publisher/founder of Vogue Australia, and managing director and chief executive of Conde Nast in the UK.
Leser applies his exceptional skills as a feature journalist to his self-portrait. He recounts episodes from his life with disarming honesty and humour, in an attempt to understand why and how his father’s shadow continues to fall over his life. Along the way, Leser writes about writing memoir itself. And he grapples with understanding his father just as he grapples, unsuccessfully in some ways, with understanding himself.
In the end, this is a book about love and relationships. Why we become the people we are is part of the author’s narration of a family history and it is the struggle within the memoir, and Leser’s almost painful desire to know himself, that gives this book its poignant depth.
About the Author
David Leser has been a Middle East and Washington D. C. correspondent as well as feature writer in Australia for the Murdoch, Packer and Fairfax presses. He's more recently gained a reputation as a brilliant profile writer; among his subjects are Alan Jones, Dame Edna Everage, Helen Garner, Margaret Whitlam, Oriana Fallaci, the Dalai Lama and Xena, Warrior Princess. The recipient of a number of awards, David has worked as a staff feature writer for the Daily Telegraph, The Australian, HQ, The Bulletin, The Sydney Morning Herald, Good Weekend and the Australian Women's Weekly.