CANBERRA
ON COUNTRY: CONNECT, WORK,
CELEBRATE
An exhibition of indigenous land- and
sea management practices.
When and where: Until 20 July,
National Museum of Australia, Canberra.
More information: http://www.nma.gov.au/
exhibitions/on_country/homeHOBART
ROYAL HOBART
REGAT TA
Tasmania’s oldest
sporting event
began in 1838
and broke a
Guinness world
record last year.
When and where:
8–10 February, Regatta
Ground, Queens Domain.
More information:
http://www.royalhobartregatta.comSYDNEY
FLICKERFEST FESTIVAL
Watch great short fi lms at the beach.
When and where: 10–19 January,
Bondi Pavilion, NSW.
More information:
http://www.flickerfest.com.auLEURA, NSW
THE LEURA SHAKESPEARE FESTIVAL
Sport for Jove performs Much Ado
About Nothing and Edmond Rostand’s
Cyrano de Bergerac.
When and where: 11–15 January,
Everglades Gardens, Leura, NSW.
More information:
http://www.sportforjove.com.auBOYUP BROOK, WA
BOYUP BROOK COUNTRY
MUSIC FESTIVAL
It features country music artists, bush
poetry and a street carnival.
When and where: 13 –16 Februar y,
Boyup Brook Music Park, WA.
More information:
http://www.countrymusicwa.com.auW H A T ’S
ONAn Astronaut’s Guide
to Life on Earth
CHRIS HADFIELD,
MACMILLAN, $32.99
Canadian astronaut Chris
Hadfi eld is famous as the
commander of the
International Space Station.
Chris oversaw an emergency
spacewalk and skilfully
engaged those of us back on
Earth through his wonderful
photographs and videos about
life in space (plus there was his
zero-gravity rendition of David
Bowie’s Space Oddity). He tells
his story through anecdotes
and has plenty to draw from:
he was selected as an astro-
naut in 1992 and led 25 shuttle
launches. The book is highly
readable and the author’s
enthusiasm is charming.Lost Animals,
Extinction and the
photographic record
ERROL FULLER,
BLOOMSBURY, $49.99
By restricting his focus to
extinct animals of which
there are photographs, writer
and artist Errol Fuller has
assembled a chronicle of
animals – mammals and birds- that have become extinct
from about 1870, to as
recently as 2004. It is a poign-
ant book, indeed. Perhaps
because drawings of animals
in the wild are usually scientifi c,
they lack even a hint of the
personality of the creature.
But these photographs can’t
help but communicate a sense
of the animal’s individuality,
giving emphasis to our loss.
AG’S BOOKSHELF
1914, The Year the
World Ended
PAUL HAM, WILLIAM
HEINEMANN, $49.95
Prize-winning Australian
author Paul Ham’s thesis is that
the men who ran Europe either
willingly chose, or weakly
agreed, to go to war in August
- This contrasts with the
common belief that govern-
ments ineptly “sleepwalked”
their way into the confl ict. His
judgement is that World War I
- which wounded or killed
more than 37 million people
and paved the way for the
Russian Revolution, Nazism
and the Cold War – was avoid-
able. His closely argued evi-
dence is drawn from primary
national archives, classic texts
and from new sources.
WE HAVE fi ve
signed copies of
Peter Elfes’s beau-
tiful book, The
Green Desert: The
Many and Spectacular Faces of
Lake Eyre (HarperCollins, 2013)
to give away. Peter has been
photographing the Lake Eyre
region for fi ve years, and in this
book he reveals the spectrum
of colours, the dramas and the
infi nite changes that can be
witnessed here. You can enter the
competition by downloading the freeviewa app and using your smartphone
to scan this page, or by visiting the
AUSTRALIAN GEOGRAPHIC website.Competition
January-February 2014 125