What do you think?
Rate this book
Bjelke Blues
Bjelke Blues: Stories of Repression and Resistance in Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s Queensland 1968–1987
‘Bjelke Blues gives heart and soul to the remembrances of the men and women who were at the end of police batons... at the front line fighting for justice and decency’ – Matthew Condon, journalist and author of Three Crooked Kings, Jacks and Jokers, All Fall Down and The Night Dragon
With stories by: Nick Earls, Melissa Lucashenko, Bob Weatherall, Sam Watson, Raymond Evans, Anne Jones, John Willsteed, Matt Mawson, David Margan, Dan O’Neill, Mandy Nolan, Andrea Baldwin, Sean Mee & many more
‘Bjelke Blues gives heart and soul to the remembrances of the men and women who were at the end of police batons... at the front line fighting for justice and decency’ – Matthew Condon, journalist and author of Three Crooked Kings, Jacks and Jokers, All Fall Down and The Night Dragon
With stories by: Nick Earls, Melissa Lucashenko, Bob Weatherall, Sam Watson, Raymond Evans, Anne Jones, John Willsteed, Matt Mawson, David Margan, Dan O’Neill, Mandy Nolan, Andrea Baldwin, Sean Mee & many more
256 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 2019
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
June 21, 2020
Simply put, this book went on for too long. It is structured as a collection of 45 stories, each about 5 or 6 pages long about the terrible time living under Bjelke-Petersen's regime, but once you get about halfway through the book, the stories become very repetitive.
The editor, Ms Shaw, tried to give as many contributors a voice in this publication but that makes the book fall flat as none of the stories really develop any depth, and all they have time for is to reiterate the same points made a dozen times before in the same book. There is no sense of narrative cohesion to the book, which I think would have benefitted greatly if the stories were at least arranged chronologically, but even that did not occur.
Initially I was fascinated by the stories told by the authors but once you've read ten you're not going to milk much more out of this book
The writing quality varies greatly between contributors as well, which made it hard to get through.
The one saving grace this book has is the passion with which each author wrote their story, as you could really feel the anger and frustration they had towards the Hillbilly Dictator, then and now. The stories themselves aren't bad at all, but there's only so much one can get through before saying "enough".
The editor, Ms Shaw, tried to give as many contributors a voice in this publication but that makes the book fall flat as none of the stories really develop any depth, and all they have time for is to reiterate the same points made a dozen times before in the same book. There is no sense of narrative cohesion to the book, which I think would have benefitted greatly if the stories were at least arranged chronologically, but even that did not occur.
Initially I was fascinated by the stories told by the authors but once you've read ten you're not going to milk much more out of this book
The writing quality varies greatly between contributors as well, which made it hard to get through.
The one saving grace this book has is the passion with which each author wrote their story, as you could really feel the anger and frustration they had towards the Hillbilly Dictator, then and now. The stories themselves aren't bad at all, but there's only so much one can get through before saying "enough".
January 27, 2020
‘Joh was not a Premier that Queensland should be proud of. He reduced it to a state ridicule in the 1970s and later brought it into disrepute. He set out to harm the lives of many people. He used the legal process to cower his opponents with unaffordable costs. His regime was a rapacious destroyer of some of Queensland’s most wonderful assets. That any survived is a tribute to the Queensland conservation movement. He was a fool who supported a quack with some snake oil cure for cancer, and a charlatan who claimed to be able to run cars on hydrogen. He corrupted what had been an effective, efficient bureaucracy committed to serving the public into an organisation which was only to serve the political party in power. He used his position to gain favours for himself and his favourites. He was corrupt and he appointed corrupt people to high places.’
You know how sometimes you read a book and you need to constantly remind yourself that it’s fiction? Well, with this one, I had to constantly remind myself that it WASN’T fiction. I moved to Queensland towards the end of 1987, but I was still in primary school and oblivious to politics, as the majority of eleven-year olds often are. As I got older, I of course became aware of Joh Bjelke-Petersen, but only in the sense of him as a former premier who farmed peanuts in Kingaroy and had a wife named Flo. We moved to Queensland from Victoria in the late 1980s for a ‘better life’. I’m wondering now what memo my parents got that farcical notion from. Don’t get me wrong, Queensland is my home and has been ever since then, but it seems odd, that as so many were leaving Queensland to escape the tyranny of Joh Bjelke-Petersen and his police state, that we would be traveling in the opposite direction. Must have been the sunshine.
Bjelke Blues is all about resistance during the nineteen years that Joh Bjelke-Petersen reigned as Premier of Queensland. It’s the kind of book that has you laughing while also crying and beating your head against the table. This was Queensland? It beggars belief. Countless remembrances written by a wide variety of Queenslanders make up the content of this book. Ordinary people who protested for a better Queensland; people who were openly harassed in the most appalling manner and subjected to violence, arrest, surveillance, and financial penalty by the police for the most ridiculous reasons. This is the sort of stuff that you read about under police states; life in the USSR during the Cold War. But no, this was Queensland from 1968 through to 1987. A democratic state within a democratic country. Like I said, I had to frequently remind myself this wasn’t fiction.
There’s a lot of ground covered within this book and it’s all utterly fascinating, yet also horrifying. It’s also kind of uplifting and hopeful, particularly when you consider those who relentlessly ‘fought the good fight’, despite knowing that the police were not ever going to be on their side. The corruption was astounding, the bogus laws appalling, the archaic views of Bjelke-Petersen horrifying. The racism, sexism, homophobia, and widespread prejudice against youth, certain religions, creative people, university students, people with a modicum of intelligence…the list goes on. What a frightening time to have lived in Queensland. This book tells so much, and at times, yes, it’s downright distressing to read about how certain people were treated. But it’s so important, as people who live in a democratic nation, to read a book like this, a history from within your own country that is not too distant, where the echoes can still be heard within the voices of politicians getting voted in today, not just in Queensland, but all over Australia.
Thanks is extended to the author for providing me with a copy of Bjelke Blues for review.
You know how sometimes you read a book and you need to constantly remind yourself that it’s fiction? Well, with this one, I had to constantly remind myself that it WASN’T fiction. I moved to Queensland towards the end of 1987, but I was still in primary school and oblivious to politics, as the majority of eleven-year olds often are. As I got older, I of course became aware of Joh Bjelke-Petersen, but only in the sense of him as a former premier who farmed peanuts in Kingaroy and had a wife named Flo. We moved to Queensland from Victoria in the late 1980s for a ‘better life’. I’m wondering now what memo my parents got that farcical notion from. Don’t get me wrong, Queensland is my home and has been ever since then, but it seems odd, that as so many were leaving Queensland to escape the tyranny of Joh Bjelke-Petersen and his police state, that we would be traveling in the opposite direction. Must have been the sunshine.
Bjelke Blues is all about resistance during the nineteen years that Joh Bjelke-Petersen reigned as Premier of Queensland. It’s the kind of book that has you laughing while also crying and beating your head against the table. This was Queensland? It beggars belief. Countless remembrances written by a wide variety of Queenslanders make up the content of this book. Ordinary people who protested for a better Queensland; people who were openly harassed in the most appalling manner and subjected to violence, arrest, surveillance, and financial penalty by the police for the most ridiculous reasons. This is the sort of stuff that you read about under police states; life in the USSR during the Cold War. But no, this was Queensland from 1968 through to 1987. A democratic state within a democratic country. Like I said, I had to frequently remind myself this wasn’t fiction.
There’s a lot of ground covered within this book and it’s all utterly fascinating, yet also horrifying. It’s also kind of uplifting and hopeful, particularly when you consider those who relentlessly ‘fought the good fight’, despite knowing that the police were not ever going to be on their side. The corruption was astounding, the bogus laws appalling, the archaic views of Bjelke-Petersen horrifying. The racism, sexism, homophobia, and widespread prejudice against youth, certain religions, creative people, university students, people with a modicum of intelligence…the list goes on. What a frightening time to have lived in Queensland. This book tells so much, and at times, yes, it’s downright distressing to read about how certain people were treated. But it’s so important, as people who live in a democratic nation, to read a book like this, a history from within your own country that is not too distant, where the echoes can still be heard within the voices of politicians getting voted in today, not just in Queensland, but all over Australia.
Thanks is extended to the author for providing me with a copy of Bjelke Blues for review.
January 1, 2022
Neat set of memoirs to use as a jumping off point to find out more about this period in history. Many authors refer to much deeper analyses of this period in time, which is useful as well. There is a concentration on the police corruption... again. As this period affected multiple political portfolios, it would be nice to see a similar collection for education, health or housing ministries.
April 13, 2023
Almost comprehensive – a greater focus on LGBTIQ voices would have been appreciated.
It springs to mind that ole Joh just set the template for the authoritarian streak of latter day ALP state governments and their fetish for the pigs crushing protest.
Queensland led the world in theocratic police states in the West for a good thirty years there.
Grim.
It springs to mind that ole Joh just set the template for the authoritarian streak of latter day ALP state governments and their fetish for the pigs crushing protest.
Queensland led the world in theocratic police states in the West for a good thirty years there.
Grim.
March 24, 2020
A mixed bag of articles from various publications about living in the 1980s in Queensland under the rule of Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen. As a complete work it is rather interesting and offers a rich and varied assessment of the times. The standard of writing (both in terms of factual information and individual style) varies significantly across the individual pieces. An interesting read for those who lived in Queensland at the time, and those with a passion for political commentary.
October 6, 2022
A good collection of essays, discussing life under a tin-pot fascist regime. Growing up in this period, I was happy that writers like Dan O'Neill and Sean Mee lectured at the universities, and directed theatre. Comedian Mandy Nolan, who wrote, 'The Full Mandy', made her start in performance troupe, the Ugly Sisters, who announced Bjelke-Petersen's electoral defeat at the Livid Festival, a high point of the era. Aboriginal leaders like Sam Watson, Bob Weatherall and Melissa Lucashenko found their public voices at demonstrations against South African and Australian racism. Radio 4ZZZ helped musicians like John Wilsteed, of the Gobetweens, to get airplay and gigs, while 4ZZZ's Radio Times, Toadshow and Semper published Matt Mawson's political cartoons. I knew of Tim Gruchy as a projection artist, and didn't know of his harassment by the corrupt Qld police. 'Bjelke Blues' showed that dissent and creativity blossomed under National Party censorship and denial of the human rights to protest and demonstrate.
October 14, 2019
Incredible, heartbreaking, inspiring and essential. ‘Those who forget the past, are doomed to repeat it’, has never been more prescient. The political actions, the individual attacks, the lack of human rights and the never-ending surveillance sum up a time of severe repression in Queensland that has imprinted an everlasting mark on the state. Read this book to prevent it ever happening again or know what the future holds. The debt of gratitude for those who poked their heads above the fox hole is immeasurable. RIP those killed by the regime.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews