Round 22 – North Melb v Hawthorn

Saturday 24 August 2013, Etihad Stadium

Trending now…Hawthorn

Tracking pop culture trends is the job of social ethnographers and trainspotters, with Age columnists following a year or so later. The very nature of the task means there’s usually a lag time of some degree between a trend emerging and the same trend being recognised and widely acknowledged as such. Some argue that social media forums have quickened the process dramatically and exponentially, but these are people whose idea of a cultural movement is something that stretches only as long as a hash tag compound or echoes as far as a retweet.

In the case of literary genres or schools of art it can take years for the similarities and shared influences of individual practitioners to become apparent. Post modernists and the Pre-Raphaelites had been at it for years before anyone noticed anything unusual. Not that anyone cared much even then.

In popular music genres can be picked up much quicker, but even there, one singer in flared satin pants teamed with high heeled boots does not Glam rock make.

Broad cultural movements spanning a range of artistic endeavours or mediums can often take years to emerge, let alone be recognised and understood. Modernism, which began in the 1880s didn’t really get its name until well into the 1900s.

But there is a nascent movement now emerging across literature, music and football and which could well yet spread to other disciplines, other spectrums, until it defines life itself…Hawthorn.

The Hawthorn Renaissance

Last year I reviewed the novel, Eleven Seasons by Paul D Carter. It charts a young boy’s journey through adolescence measured against eleven seasons following Hawthorn, encompassing the great 80s period.

I’m currently reading The Whole of My World by Nicole Hayes, published earlier this year, another coming of age novel, this time about a teenage girl called Shelley who is obsessed by Hawthorn, or as they are known in the book, Glenthorn, in probably the least convincing example ever of ‘the names of some teams have been changed to protect their identities’. The team are known as the Falcons, they wear brown and gold, they are based in a suburban ground in Leafy Crescent, which strongly resembles Linda Crescent, and one of the cheer squad chants begins with “Give us an ‘H’!” despite the team name beginning with a ‘G’ . Go on literary trainspotters – knock yourselves out.

Whereas in Eleven Seasons Jason Dalton is a young boy living with his mother as a sole parent, and who goes to watch Hawthorn games at every opportunity; in The Whole of My World, the main character, Shelley, is a young girl living with her father as a sole parent who goes to watch Hawthorn games at every opportunity. It might just be that Hawthorn is the ‘family club’, but you don’t have to be Freud to work out that Hawthorn takes the role of surrogate parent in each case, even if they are different genders.

The book is set in the 80s and I pick it as being set in set in 1984 – there is a reference to Hawthorn winning the premiership the previous year after a five year drought (1983-1978).  Given that I was a prominent member of the Hawthorn Cheer Squad during this period I read on with interest thinking I might recognise a few people (especially given how poorly disguised the football team was), and was more than a little chuffed when about 25% of the way through (sorry, I can’t give a page number, I’m reading it on a Kindle), the leader of the cheer squad appears wearing pointy shoes, pants and a tweed jacket, rather than jeans and a footy jumper.

Of course I never wore tweed back then, or indeed ever, but I certainly wore suit pants, jackets and pointy shoes, so this character may indeed be loosely based on me, or an amalgam of me and others. This may well be my avatar, my debut as a literary character! Okay, so he’s not quite Holden Caulfield or Stephen Dedalus, and sure, I’d have quite liked to have made my debut as a libertine or a master seducer in a work of erotic fiction (well, it would have to be fiction), but it’s a start.

My chief criticism of Eleven Seasons was that there was too much focus on plot and character development at the expense of Hawthorn (including failing entirely to mention the 1989 Grand Final even though the book took place across that season). Of course Mr Carter shouldn’t be too angry; I make the same criticism of Cloudstreet.

This criticism can’t be levelled at The Whole of My World, at least up to the half way mark, as Hawthorn is central to the action (even two of the teachers are known as Whitecross and Hodge), but I’m puzzled by the decision to disguise the true identity of the team, especially so transparently.  Is it some post-modernist cypher? A comment about the nature of identity? Or some weird legal nicety?

In any case I’ll keep reading, if not to find out Shelley’s dark secret (for sure enough, there’s one of those), but just to see if the Mighty Falcons can pull off the big one!

These two novels carry explicit references to Hawthorn and I’d say that together they constitute a new genre of literature (which will be supplemented by my rollicking novel about a shortish, balding, portly 40 something who nominates for the AFL draft, gets picked up by Hawthorn and against all the odds kicks the winning goal after the siren to win the flag, all the while engaging in a torrid affair with goal umpire Chelsea Roffey).

There are also books with less explicit references to Hawthorn the club, but which nonetheless can be considered as part of the genre; ‘Hawthorn and Child’ by Keith Ridgeway among them. Again, notice the parent-child relationship in the title. By subverting the style of title familiar to religious paintings of the Madonna and the baby Jesus, this book again casts Hawthorn as the surrogate parent, except in this case the parent of all humanity. Fair enough too.

The Hawthorn and Child of the title in fact are not parent and child, but two detectives. Hawthorn is a gay man who suffers from bad dreams and has a propensity for unexplained weeping – clearly a man haunted by last year’s Grand Final loss.

It’s perhaps fitting that as the Melbourne Writers festival continues at Federation Square, we’ve unearthed a major new literary movement. But this genre is not confined to literature. In music too the Hawthorn motif is becoming prominent. Mayer Hawthorne is a singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer etc  who has just released a new album, ‘Where Does This Door Go’ to critical acclaim.

Likewise, Youngblood Hawke is an indie band currently touring Australia with Pink while New Zealand born singer Ladyhawke also continues to grow in popularity.

This confluence of the ‘Hawthorn’ and ‘Hawk’ names across literature and music constitutes an emerging and powerful pop culture movement, a renaissance in fact, one that will culminate, I predict, with another era of dominance in the AFL by Hawthorn.

Twerking now…Hawthorn

Another emerging trend in the world of what might be loosely called dance is that of ‘twerking’. It’s been around for awhile but is now hitting mainstream consciousness, thanks largely to Miley Cyrus’ hit video ‘We Can’t Stop’ and her performance this week at the MTV Awards with Robin Thicke.

Twerking is essentially a dance that involves bending over in front of someone and rolling your arse about in front of them in a lewd and provocative manner. I’m unsure of the etymology of the word ‘twerking’, and perhaps ‘sphinctering’ might be a more accurate term to describe the dance, but you get the point.

Is he going for a specky?
photo: thehollywoodgossip.com

Miley Cyrus sparked moral outrage with her performance at the MTV awards where she performed her now signature move while wearing a flesh coloured bikini and, bizarrely, a giant Coles hand. It’s comforting to know that pop singers can still cause moral panic among the prudes and populists, and it reminded me of how Hawthorn approached Saturday’s match against North Melbourne.

Earlier in the year we defeated North by a few points despite being largely outplayed for most of the match. A combination of North’s poor kicking for goal and some Cyril magic got us over the line that evening.
Again in this match North completely outplayed us in the first half. Hard running, a bold, attacking game plan and good execution gave North an edge the Hawks found difficult to counter.  North was winning it from the centre thanks to Goldstein, spreading quickly and playing through Wells and Black, and they were kicking straight.

After Breust kicked the first goal of the match, North through some sharp footy banged on the next four. The Hawks looked flat-footed and slow by comparison, but thanks to some strong work by Buddy and The Rough, we managed three goals towards the end of the quarter to even things up.

But this was only temporary for in the second quarter North turned it on again. Goals to Jacobs, Thomas, Goldstein and Harvey, who outbodied Lake to take a mark, gave North a 26 point lead and it was all looking a bit, well, ugly, particularly with Shields injured and Hodge bleeding. But thanks largely to Buddy, the second quarter finished like the first with Franklin bagging a couple and Cyril and Breust each kicking one.

Thirteen points down at half time was a relatively good place to be given how the two sides had played, and knowing that no one can blow a lead like North.

The Rioli Quartet

So it was no surprise when the Hawks took over in the third, thanks largely to Cyril working his usual routine. After Roughead marked and goaled early, Cyril was pretty much responsible for the next four Hawthorn goals; kicking one himself after some artful twisting and dodging, then handballing over to Breust who ran into an open goal, followed by some more elusive dodging to set up Hill and finally putting a pass into Hale’s hands.

For the second time this season North had worked into a position where they looked like they might win, only to take their collective eyes off Cyril for long enough that he could steal it from under them.

It wasn’t all Cyril though – Bailey started to get on top of Goldstein, Mitchell went into the middle and won the ball, and Hodge, well Hodge pretty much repelled every North forward thrust and reinforced why it’s perfectly acceptable to have a man crush on him, even with a bandage around his head.

Both teams missed opportunities in the final quarter, but goals to Rough and Buddy were enough to seal the match and condemn North to another narrow loss.

Max Bailey twerks Gunston

The thing about twerking is that it is a provocative tease in which the ‘twerker’, if you will, assumes a vulnerable position while arousing their partner or antagonist and allowing them to feel dominant and in control. This is exactly the dance the Hawks have done in front of North twice this year – we’ve bent over in front of them inviting dominance, teasing them with the illusion that they can take us, only to then slip away when North has hesitated to act.

In addition to teasing, bending over in front of someone to present your arse has long been a sign of contempt or dismissal, such as mooning. What we’ve done to North this season is exactly what Miley Cyrus did at the MTV awards – we at once teased them with the ridiculous hope of victory while also mooning them.  Nice work Hawks!

Final scores: Hawthorn 17 15 117  d  North Melbourne 15 13 103

What we learned: Shane Warne’s transformation from bogan to bourgeois goes beyond the tan, weight loss and teeth whitening. After England players were caught urinating on The Oval pitch after the conclusion of the fifth Test in London, Shane Warne labelled them ‘crass and arrogant’. Warney that is, calling England crass. Brilliant. You really know you’ve gone off the rails if Warney’s giving you advice on etiquette, deportment and humility.

What we already knew: The AFL would go soft on Essendon: Hird banned for 12 months, the team kicked out of the finals, $2 million fine and loss of draft picks for two years. Weak!  Essendon moaned about Demetriou hearing the chrges – they should be thankful it wasn’t me sitting in judgement. They’d have wanted to swap places with Bradley Manning.

Having said that, I have a more generous and forgiving viewpoint than The Age.The cover of Wednesday’s paper announcing the penalties imposed on Essendon had a full colour photo of James Hird with the headline in large font, “BANNED”, while in the top right hand corner level with the masthead was a small photo of President Assad of Syria.

The charge sheet against Essendon and James Hird is very serious, but whatever Hird is guilty of doing to the Essendon players, it falls somewhat short of deploying chemical weapons against his own citizens, as Assad is alleged to have done. Perhaps some perspective.