Latest news with #Boy'sOwn
Telegraph
30-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Looking for a proper adventure story for your children? Try this
Lui Sit's debut novel, Land of the Last Wildcat, is described by its publishers as an adventure story with ' environmental messaging ' – a prospect which might not make your heart sing. Saving the planet has become the central subject of children's publishing, and young readers brought up on titles such as Let's Save Earth and Recycling is Crab-ulous! might feel they have received enough messaging already. But this engrossing story turns out to be considerably more fun than its sales pitch. Our heroine is 10-year-old Puffin, a girl whose father has died, and whose scientist mother is frequently away on field trips – leaving her in the care of a family friend, who has become her surrogate grandfather: 'For as long as Puffin could remember, Mum had always been busy with work… After Dad died, it was often Grandad Moe who attended Puffin's school assemblies or parent days in Mum's place.' When the story begins, Puffin's mother is away on a remote island, pursuing her quest to find 'the kuri' – an elusive wildcat, believed to have unique powers of healing. ('Humans claim that there are seven natural wonders in the world… Maybe the kuri is the eighth.') Puffin has always taken an interest in her mother's work, and cannot understand why, on this occasion, her mother is being so secretive about her research. When Puffin and her friend Lance start to investigate, they find something far more exciting than they had bargained for – and far more challenging. It's up to them to outwit the sinister figure of Mr Smoult, and ensure that the precious wildcat imprisoned in his laboratory is not sacrificed for his avaricious ends. Sit is a highly suspenseful storyteller, who unravels a dense plot in less than 300 pages, and plunges her heroine into the sort of white-knuckle capers reminiscent of the lost worlds of Biggles and Boy's Own. 'She smashed through the doors, sprinting down the museum corridor… Lance was fast following, but close on his heels was Smoult, his face contorted with fury…' goes one typical passage. But amidst the action, Sit allows her characters time to reveal themselves, and one of the most satisfying aspects of the novel lies in the bond that the lonely heroine forms with the lost wildcat: 'She didn't know why, but the kuri felt a part of her. Gazing into the kuri's glimmering pupils, her feelings were affirmed by seeing her own blurry face mirrored.' Sit explains in an author's note that she spent much of her childhood playing in the urban Australian bushland, which instilled her lifelong love of wildlife, and led her 'to become a wilderness campaigner'. She does not hide those environmental concerns: 'Mum says nature heals only if we look after it,' Puffin observes slightly priggishly. But Sit is too good a writer to let the messages spoil the plot – and at its heart this is not so much a book about saving the planet, as a time-old story about the transformative bond between an animal and a child.
The Age
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
Lion, Wallaby and Gallipoli hero: Why the 'extraordinary life' of Blair Swannell is finally being recognised
In the telling of his great-nephew, Blair Swannell led a life that defies the bland categories of our modern times. 'He was a Boy's Own annual cartoon, almost; somebody who led a pretty extraordinary life,' Robert Swannell says. Born in England in 1875, Blair Swannell was a sailor who criss-crossed the globe while still a teenager, an adventurer who hunted gold and seals in Antarctic waters, and fought on horseback in the Boer War. He was also a star rugby player who played for the British Lions on two tours to Australia. Swannell then became a Wallaby too, after emigrating to Australia and continuing a rugby career in Sydney that was infamously polarising, given his penchant for rough and 'overzealous' play. The jam-packed life of Swannell was finally cut short, however, after the outbreak of World War One. Having signed up for the Anzacs, Swannell was killed on the opening day of the Gallipoli landings in 1915, after leading his company onto the beach and up the treacherous cliffs. He was 39 years old. 'So all in all, it's a short, glorious story,' Robert Swannell said. In July, however – 110 years after his death – Blair Swannell will have one more chapter added to his story when the British and Irish Lions tour Australia. As one of only two men to have represented both the Lions and the Wallabies, along with Tom Richards (who was also at Gallipoli), Swannell will be commemorated with a man of the match medal struck in his name. Rugby Australia and the British and Irish Lions will announce on Anzac Day that the Blair Swannell medal will be to be awarded at the tour game between the Lions and the Australia-New Zealand invitational side in Adelaide on July 12. The recognition is the result of years of lobbying by Robert Swannell, who began writing to Rugby Australia from London in 2017 urging them to take another look at the incredible life of Blair Swannell, Wallaby No.72. 'I am delighted, it's a perfectly fitting tribute when you look at all the parts his story,' he said. Sense of adventure Blair I. Swannell – the 'I' stands for Inskip and saw him known 'B.I.' or 'Blaireye' by many – was born in 1875 near Northampton in England's midlands. The son of farmers, Blair had a taste for the sea instead and at the age of 15, began a career in the merchant navy. In 1890, the teenager made the first of several return trips to Australia on giant 2000-tonne sailing ships. Each voyage to the colonies took about three months, one way, and by the time he'd turned 18, Swannell had already travelled to Australia three times. He soon became known as a hard rugby player too, after returning to his home district and representing the Northampton Saints – a still-prominent premiership club. Though not a big man at 80 kilograms and 179 centimetres, Swannell's ferocity as a flanker saw him selected for the British Lions tour of Australia in 1899, in which he played in three of four Tests on a victorious tour. When he returned home, Swannell's appetite for adventure saw him sign up for service in the Boer War as a trooper in the Imperial Yeomanry. If that wasn't enough, Swannell returned home in 1903 to join a madcap gold-hunting expedition, where he and 13 other English people set off in search of a fortune, sailing in rough conditions all the way to Canada, and then down the length of North and South America to the cold and unfriendly islands of Tierra del Fuego – next stop Antarctica – in the hope of finding gold. It proved to be a grim and utterly-in-vain adventure, and half the crew abandoned the trip before Swannell and others limped home. Throughout the trip, however, Swannell continued to pick up games of rugby – in Canada, Uruguay and Chile – and upon his return, the flanker was again called up for the British Lions, for their 1904 tour of Australia and New Zealand. Swannell's now-notorious reputation as an overaggressive enforcer only grew on the successful tour, where the Lions won six of seven Tests. To this day, Swannell still holds a share of the record for most Test wins as a Lion, with six from his seven Tests. Swannell became known by local fans as a villain on the Lions tour, however, with numerous examples of his use of foul play like kicking or high tackles. Newspaper reports in Australia and New Zealand at the time, recounted in Greg Growden's book Wallabies at War, singled out Swannell for criticism due to his unsavoury and rough play. New life in Australia Swannell decided he wouldn't return home after the 1904 tour, and instead settled in Sydney, where he joined Norths rugby club. As described by Growden, Swannell became known to some as an 'odd bod' whose peculiarities extended to never washing the stinky rugby breaches he wore in all games. Allied with Swannell's rough and dirty play in club rugby, he was a sharply polarising figure, earning as many enemies as admirers. In 1940, moments from the early life of Dally Messenger, the most famous of league's early defectors, were published in a newspaper, including when he narrowly avoided being kicked after scoring in a rugby game for Easts against Norths in 1907. The then-Wallaby took evasive action when he heard the footsteps of his assailant, who was not named in the article but was referred to as a 'famous international who'd played in England, New Zealand and Australia'. A photo of Swannell was also published in the article. Prior to that, however, Swannell was called up to play for NSW against the All Blacks in 1905, and was then selected for the Wallabies side to play New Zealand as well. Swannell was a contentious selection for many Wallabies given his past as a rough opponent. He played one Test and copped several kicks to the head from Kiwis on the trip, including one that saw him pick up a nasty eye injury. The official Wallabies team photo shows the eye swollen shut – and Swannell still grinning. One of Swannell's biggest detractors was Wallabies captain Dr Herbert 'Paddy' Moran, who later labelled the Englishman 'a bad influence in Sydney football'. 'His conception of rugby was one of trained violence,' Moran wrote. 'He was a hard, virile, unsympathetic type, but a man.' Swannell eventually hung up the boots but continued to be at the centre of rancour, later becoming a forthright newspaper columnist, joining the referees ranks – he even officiated a NSW-Queensland game in 1914 – and became a Sydney rugby administrator during a time of great upheaval as well. Swannell's profile on the Classic Wallabies website says: 'A straight shooter, he seemed to be an individual who people liked or vehemently opposed. There seemed to have been no middle ground.' One place Swannell is still fondly remembered is the famous rugby nursery, St Josephs College in Hunters Hill. Swannell coached the First XV for three seasons between 1905 an 1907. Joeys won the GPS premiership in all three years. In a monograph compiled by historians Jon Cooksey, Graham McKechnie and Dennis Burns, the trio say 'there's no doubt Swannell was a difficult, divisive man'. But they further contend: 'He was also fiercely loyal. He had a fine sense of humour and he was most certainly very courageous. Blair Swannell is a remarkable man … (and) a man who deserves to be more accurately – and better remembered – by a much wider audience.' The outbreak of war Swannell was quick to sign up for the Australian Infantry Forces (AIF) when World War One broke out. Aged 39, he was made major of D Company, First Infantry battalion, which travelled to Egypt and awaited further orders in sandy camps, with the pyramids as a backdrop. D Company was shipped out to be part of the Gallipoli campaign at Anzac Cove. Swannell's men were part of the second wave on the first day, landing around 10am on April 25, 1915. Swannell led his troops up the cliffs towards Russell's Top. By late morning D Company had reached an elevated area called Baby 700, and were preparing an assault on the Turkish Troops. But as the company came under attack, Swannell attempted to show one of his soldiers how to handle his weapon and return fire, but he was shot and instantly killed. He was one of 10 Wallabies to die in WW1, including six from the 1913 side alone. As recounted by Growden in Wallabies at War, Swannell's death was mentioned by Australia's official war correspondent, C. E. W. Bean, in his early Gallipoli dispatches. They'd sailed on the same troopship. 'I believe Major Swannell of the 1st Battalion was picked out by a sharpshooter that day while he was fighting like a tiger. He had said on board ship the day before he knew he was going to be killed. He fought that day as a footballer fights in a good Rugger scrum – as he had fought in many an interstate and international match – and you cannot say more than that,' Bean wrote. Respectful, and kinder, tributes to Swannell appeared in many of Australia's newspapers. Tom Richards was also at Gallipoli as a stretcher bearer and, as Growden recounted, wrote in his diary a few days later: 'I am really grieved, as 'Swanny' with all his faults etc was quite all right, though he was a character seldom met.' Push for remembrance Robert Swannell, a well-known business figure in London who once chaired the Marks and Spencer board, began reading up on his great uncle after he was invited to a function at Australia House and sat next to the head of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. He researched Blair's story further when he later took part in 100th anniversary of Gallipoli events at Westminster Abbey and the Cenotaph in 2015. 'It was very moving, as you can imagine, and it gave me a view of my great uncle that I just felt, he hadn't quite been recognised in the way he should,' Robert said. Robert, who has some of Blair's possessions including his Lions and Wallabies rugby caps, personal diaries and letters, and a commemorative coin issued by King George V to the next of kin of those who died in action – known as a 'dead man's penny' – discovered Rugby Australia listed Richards as the only dual Lion-Wallaby. The Lions and Wallabies play for the Tom Richards Trophy. He wrote to RA pointing out the error, which was amended, and then began a campaign to have Blair's name honoured alongside Richards'. 'My emails go back at least seven or eight years,' Swannell said. 'I am not easily put off. Maybe I have the same genes as Blair that made him a fairly determined character.' Earlier this year, Swannell was informed the Lions and RA had decided to strike a medal in Blair's name for the Australia-New Zealand v Lions clash. 'I am really delighted,' Swannell said. 'I am just very, very pleased that we have got to the point we have got to. In a way, its part of the tale of determination that Blair had in his own way, in his lifetime. 'This medal for the Lions against combined Australia and New Zealand, it's a rather good idea. Blair played for Australia against New Zealand, and obviously, the ANZAC element is very special in this case.' RA chief executive Phil Waugh said: 'On the battlefield and sporting field, Blair Swannell holds a unique place in Australian and British history, having represented both nations militarily and in rugby. 'It is with deep honour and respect that Rugby Australia and the British and Irish Lions recognise Blair's extraordinary life this Anzac Day - 110 years to the day since he made the ultimate sacrifice on the shores of Gallipoli - by commissioning an award in his name for this year's historic Lions tour.' Loading Robert, who will travel to Australia for the game, says he hopes the recognition of Blair can help people better understand his great-uncle. 'When you step back and look Blair's short and incredible life, and of course making the ultimate sacrifice at Gallipoli, it was all pretty extraordinary,' he said. 'He is certainly worthy of our remembrance.'
Sydney Morning Herald
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
Lion, Wallaby and Gallipoli hero: Why the 'extraordinary life' of Blair Swannell is finally being recognised
In the telling of his great-nephew, Blair Swannell led a life that defies the bland categories of our modern times. 'He was a Boy's Own annual cartoon, almost; somebody who led a pretty extraordinary life,' Robert Swannell says. Born in England in 1875, Blair Swannell was a sailor who criss-crossed the globe while still a teenager, an adventurer who hunted gold and seals in Antarctic waters, and fought on horseback in the Boer War. He was also a star rugby player who played for the British Lions on two tours to Australia. Swannell then became a Wallaby too, after emigrating to Australia and continuing a rugby career in Sydney that was infamously polarising, given his penchant for rough and 'overzealous' play. The jam-packed life of Swannell was finally cut short, however, after the outbreak of World War One. Having signed up for the Anzacs, Swannell was killed on the opening day of the Gallipoli landings in 1915, after leading his company onto the beach and up the treacherous cliffs. He was 39 years old. 'So all in all, it's a short, glorious story,' Robert Swannell said. In July, however – 110 years after his death – Blair Swannell will have one more chapter added to his story when the British and Irish Lions tour Australia. As one of only two men to have represented both the Lions and the Wallabies, along with Tom Richards (who was also at Gallipoli), Swannell will be commemorated with a man of the match medal struck in his name. Rugby Australia and the British and Irish Lions will announce on Anzac Day that the Blair Swannell medal will be to be awarded at the tour game between the Lions and the Australia-New Zealand invitational side in Adelaide on July 12. The recognition is the result of years of lobbying by Robert Swannell, who began writing to Rugby Australia from London in 2017 urging them to take another look at the incredible life of Blair Swannell, Wallaby No.72. 'I am delighted, it's a perfectly fitting tribute when you look at all the parts his story,' he said. Sense of adventure Blair I. Swannell – the 'I' stands for Inskip and saw him known 'B.I.' or 'Blaireye' by many – was born in 1875 near Northampton in England's midlands. The son of farmers, Blair had a taste for the sea instead and at the age of 15, began a career in the merchant navy. In 1890, the teenager made the first of several return trips to Australia on giant 2000-tonne sailing ships. Each voyage to the colonies took about three months, one way, and by the time he'd turned 18, Swannell had already travelled to Australia three times. He soon became known as a hard rugby player too, after returning to his home district and representing the Northampton Saints – a still-prominent premiership club. Though not a big man at 80 kilograms and 179 centimetres, Swannell's ferocity as a flanker saw him selected for the British Lions tour of Australia in 1899, in which he played in three of four Tests on a victorious tour. When he returned home, Swannell's appetite for adventure saw him sign up for service in the Boer War as a trooper in the Imperial Yeomanry. If that wasn't enough, Swannell returned home in 1903 to join a madcap gold-hunting expedition, where he and 13 other English people set off in search of a fortune, sailing in rough conditions all the way to Canada, and then down the length of North and South America to the cold and unfriendly islands of Tierra del Fuego – next stop Antarctica – in the hope of finding gold. It proved to be a grim and utterly-in-vain adventure, and half the crew abandoned the trip before Swannell and others limped home. Throughout the trip, however, Swannell continued to pick up games of rugby – in Canada, Uruguay and Chile – and upon his return, the flanker was again called up for the British Lions, for their 1904 tour of Australia and New Zealand. Swannell's now-notorious reputation as an overaggressive enforcer only grew on the successful tour, where the Lions won six of seven Tests. To this day, Swannell still holds a share of the record for most Test wins as a Lion, with six from his seven Tests. Swannell became known by local fans as a villain on the Lions tour, however, with numerous examples of his use of foul play like kicking or high tackles. Newspaper reports in Australia and New Zealand at the time, recounted in Greg Growden's book Wallabies at War, singled out Swannell for criticism due to his unsavoury and rough play. New life in Australia Swannell decided he wouldn't return home after the 1904 tour, and instead settled in Sydney, where he joined Norths rugby club. As described by Growden, Swannell became known to some as an 'odd bod' whose peculiarities extended to never washing the stinky rugby breaches he wore in all games. Allied with Swannell's rough and dirty play in club rugby, he was a sharply polarising figure, earning as many enemies as admirers. In 1940, moments from the early life of Dally Messenger, the most famous of league's early defectors, were published in a newspaper, including when he narrowly avoided being kicked after scoring in a rugby game for Easts against Norths in 1907. The then-Wallaby took evasive action when he heard the footsteps of his assailant, who was not named in the article but was referred to as a 'famous international who'd played in England, New Zealand and Australia'. A photo of Swannell was also published in the article. Prior to that, however, Swannell was called up to play for NSW against the All Blacks in 1905, and was then selected for the Wallabies side to play New Zealand as well. Swannell was a contentious selection for many Wallabies given his past as a rough opponent. He played one Test and copped several kicks to the head from Kiwis on the trip, including one that saw him pick up a nasty eye injury. The official Wallabies team photo shows the eye swollen shut – and Swannell still grinning. One of Swannell's biggest detractors was Wallabies captain Dr Herbert 'Paddy' Moran, who later labelled the Englishman 'a bad influence in Sydney football'. 'His conception of rugby was one of trained violence,' Moran wrote. 'He was a hard, virile, unsympathetic type, but a man.' Swannell eventually hung up the boots but continued to be at the centre of rancour, later becoming a forthright newspaper columnist, joining the referees ranks – he even officiated a NSW-Queensland game in 1914 – and became a Sydney rugby administrator during a time of great upheaval as well. Swannell's profile on the Classic Wallabies website says: 'A straight shooter, he seemed to be an individual who people liked or vehemently opposed. There seemed to have been no middle ground.' One place Swannell is still fondly remembered is the famous rugby nursery, St Josephs College in Hunters Hill. Swannell coached the First XV for three seasons between 1905 an 1907. Joeys won the GPS premiership in all three years. In a monograph compiled by historians Jon Cooksey, Graham McKechnie and Dennis Burns, the trio say 'there's no doubt Swannell was a difficult, divisive man'. But they further contend: 'He was also fiercely loyal. He had a fine sense of humour and he was most certainly very courageous. Blair Swannell is a remarkable man … (and) a man who deserves to be more accurately – and better remembered – by a much wider audience.' The outbreak of war Swannell was quick to sign up for the Australian Infantry Forces (AIF) when World War One broke out. Aged 39, he was made major of D Company, First Infantry battalion, which travelled to Egypt and awaited further orders in sandy camps, with the pyramids as a backdrop. D Company was shipped out to be part of the Gallipoli campaign at Anzac Cove. Swannell's men were part of the second wave on the first day, landing around 10am on April 25, 1915. Swannell led his troops up the cliffs towards Russell's Top. By late morning D Company had reached an elevated area called Baby 700, and were preparing an assault on the Turkish Troops. But as the company came under attack, Swannell attempted to show one of his soldiers how to handle his weapon and return fire, but he was shot and instantly killed. He was one of 10 Wallabies to die in WW1, including six from the 1913 side alone. As recounted by Growden in Wallabies at War, Swannell's death was mentioned by Australia's official war correspondent, C. E. W. Bean, in his early Gallipoli dispatches. They'd sailed on the same troopship. 'I believe Major Swannell of the 1st Battalion was picked out by a sharpshooter that day while he was fighting like a tiger. He had said on board ship the day before he knew he was going to be killed. He fought that day as a footballer fights in a good Rugger scrum – as he had fought in many an interstate and international match – and you cannot say more than that,' Bean wrote. Respectful, and kinder, tributes to Swannell appeared in many of Australia's newspapers. Tom Richards was also at Gallipoli as a stretcher bearer and, as Growden recounted, wrote in his diary a few days later: 'I am really grieved, as 'Swanny' with all his faults etc was quite all right, though he was a character seldom met.' Push for remembrance Robert Swannell, a well-known business figure in London who once chaired the Marks and Spencer board, began reading up on his great uncle after he was invited to a function at Australia House and sat next to the head of the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. He researched Blair's story further when he later took part in 100th anniversary of Gallipoli events at Westminster Abbey and the Cenotaph in 2015. 'It was very moving, as you can imagine, and it gave me a view of my great uncle that I just felt, he hadn't quite been recognised in the way he should,' Robert said. Robert, who has some of Blair's possessions including his Lions and Wallabies rugby caps, personal diaries and letters, and a commemorative coin issued by King George V to the next of kin of those who died in action – known as a 'dead man's penny' – discovered Rugby Australia listed Richards as the only dual Lion-Wallaby. The Lions and Wallabies play for the Tom Richards Trophy. He wrote to RA pointing out the error, which was amended, and then began a campaign to have Blair's name honoured alongside Richards'. 'My emails go back at least seven or eight years,' Swannell said. 'I am not easily put off. Maybe I have the same genes as Blair that made him a fairly determined character.' Earlier this year, Swannell was informed the Lions and RA had decided to strike a medal in Blair's name for the Australia-New Zealand v Lions clash. 'I am really delighted,' Swannell said. 'I am just very, very pleased that we have got to the point we have got to. In a way, its part of the tale of determination that Blair had in his own way, in his lifetime. 'This medal for the Lions against combined Australia and New Zealand, it's a rather good idea. Blair played for Australia against New Zealand, and obviously, the ANZAC element is very special in this case.' RA chief executive Phil Waugh said: 'On the battlefield and sporting field, Blair Swannell holds a unique place in Australian and British history, having represented both nations militarily and in rugby. 'It is with deep honour and respect that Rugby Australia and the British and Irish Lions recognise Blair's extraordinary life this Anzac Day - 110 years to the day since he made the ultimate sacrifice on the shores of Gallipoli - by commissioning an award in his name for this year's historic Lions tour.' Loading Robert, who will travel to Australia for the game, says he hopes the recognition of Blair can help people better understand his great-uncle. 'When you step back and look Blair's short and incredible life, and of course making the ultimate sacrifice at Gallipoli, it was all pretty extraordinary,' he said. 'He is certainly worthy of our remembrance.'
The Guardian
18-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The Sinking of the Lisbon Maru review – British wartime tragedy told with potent empathy
This enthralling and shattering Chinese documentary benefits from superb material: a dark Boy's Own yarn from October 1942 about the torpedoing of the wartime freighter Lisbon Maru, the attempted mass murder of the 1,816 British PoWs on board by their Japanese captors, and their rescue by Chinese fishermen from the Zhoushan archipelago. Directors Fang Li, Ming Fan and Lily Gong do an exemplary job of recounting this tragedy from the British, Chinese and (to some extent) Japanese perspectives with a piercing empathy. An oceanic sense of loss pervades the film. Fang, a former geophysicist and the on-camera presenter here, first surveyed the Lisbon Maru's wreck 100 miles south-east of Shanghai in 2016. Now he plumbs the depths of time to reconstruct its story, salvaging the testimony of the PoWs' families, and finally locating the two remaining survivors, nonagenarians Dennis Morley and William Beningfield (who have since died). Morley says his daughter and granddaughter knew nothing about his ordeal; a silence practised by countless others, including the Japanese civilian captain later convicted for his role. His astonished children get the news here from Fang. Morley and Beningfield's words, a trove of historical accounts and artful animation flesh out the horror. The British soldiers were transported in the Lisbon Maru's cargo holds in unspeakable conditions, then after the attack by a US submarine, the hatches were battened as the vessel started to sink. Perhaps to give them the illusion they would be saved, the prisoners were told to pump out the bilge; they worked in four-man, five-minute shifts in darkness for hours. One squaddie, believing he was in hell, went insane. The stiff upper lip factor seems to have benefited the escapees only in the short term; decades later, family members attest to a grim history of PTSD symptoms. Fang's even-handed humanism allows him to excavate this emotional wreckage on all sides, even though the Japanese one remains clouded. While he locates the family of the American torpedoman who pulled the trigger, there is no voice from the Japanese military here. The country has of course long since moved beyond the imperial arrogance that finally saw its troops turn their guns on the desperate Brits, but it's a chilling reminder for our backsliding times of the importance of international law. The film's only real flaw is an occasional sentimentality; it could have done without the syrupy torch song over the roll call of the fallen. Otherwise it's potent stuff; a blockbuster treatment, called Dongji Island, is due in the summer, but it's hard to see it being more affecting than this. The Sinking of the Lisbon Maru is in UK cinemas from 20 March.
The Guardian
14-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
‘It was wonderfully innocent': Boy's Own, the fanzine that defined the acid house generation
When Andrew Weatherall suddenly died in February 2020, the outpouring of grief was monumental. The DJ and producer was a revered figure, known for producing and remixing indie-dance crossover acts such as Primal Scream, as well as being a curatorial guru on everything from thumping techno to deep dub via obscure rockabilly. His status as an influential and beloved music figure even garnered him the nickname the Guv'nor. But prior to this he went under another name: the Outsider. This was his nom de plume as a writer for the fanzine Boy's Own, which launched back in 1986. In the first issue Weatherall set out its intentions: 'We are aiming at the boy (or girl) who one day stands on the terraces, the next stands in a sweaty club, and the day after stays in bed and reads Brendan Behan while listening to Run-DMC.' Founded by Weatherall, Terry Farley, Steve Mayes, Steve Hall, and Cymon Eckel, the intention was to document their own world, a predominantly working-class one, in a way that they didn't see being covered by the music weeklies or glossy monthlies. It was a boisterous and scrappy mixture of football, fashion, music, clubbing, politics and biting humour. Almost 40 years on from that first issue, and five since the sad passing of Weatherall, the collective have reprinted a hardback collection of all the fanzines, as well as launching a new line of Boy's Own clothing. Initially, Boy's Own was sold in pubs, clubs, warehouse parties and football terraces but 'nobody bought it', recalls Farley. 'It was very niche – just us talking about our mates.' The gang had all bonded growing up on the outskirts of London, in Slough and Windsor, as a hodgepodge suburban crew of soul boys, football casuals, clothes obsessives and ardent clubbers. Every Friday they took acid at 9pm and hit London – a tradition known as 'the nine o'clock drop'; years later this would also be the name of a compilation album Weatherall released. It would take a widespread youth culture phenomenon for things to really blow up for Boy's Own. 'A few people identified with it but it didn't kick in until acid house happened,' recalls Eckel. 'Then it went fucking wild.' By their spring 1988 issue – featuring a front cover of a bunch of young kids, one in a Boy's Own T-shirt, in front of a brick wall with graffiti reading 'drop acid not bombs' – they were publishing articles such as Bermondsey Goes Balearic by Paul Oakenfold, exploring the burgeoning scene in London around clubs like Shoom and Future, as well as chronicling his adventures in Ibiza. Two to three thousand copies of each issue were printed and the publication quickly became something of a scene bible, complete with its own in-jokes, digs and unique lexicon, so much so that by 1989 Weatherall even wrote a handy guide to the definitions of commonly used slang, such as 'Log: If you don't know what one is, you are one.' Its tagline – 'The only fanzine that gets right on one, matey' – soon became a staple saying for those in the know around drug culture. The message even spread overseas, with German outfit the Beat Pirate releasing the acid house track Are You on 1 Matey? 'It was just a bit of humour and fun,' says Hall. 'But it became the language that kids were using to explain this new experience.' In 1988, with the second summer of love around the corner for a new generation, Boy's Own was about to graduate from making DIY magazines to throwing legendary parties. That spring Eckel was working as a carpenter on a video shoot for George Michael when he had an industrial accident and lost a finger. While he was in a specialist reconstructive surgery ward he became friends with another young person there who had trapped his fingers in a credit card machine. They bonded 'over music and drugs' and would sneak a spliff every Friday at the back door of the hospital. Through this connection, Eckel learned of a guy who owned a studio in a barn that he also threw parties in. Soon enough the Boy's Own crew, operating as the Karma Collective 'because we didn't do branding then', were throwing their own. They landed in the Berkshire countryside and laid out hay bales, blew up a bouncy castle and set up a pumping sound system. The end result they describe as 'part-rave, part-punk gig and part-garden party', which brought together 'football lads, punks, fashionistas and the wide-eyed ravers who were discovering ecstasy for the first time'. It was a combination that few had experienced before. 'It was definitely the first time I'd been to an acid house party that was outdoors,' recalls Hall. Boy George could be heard singing a cappella in the early hours as the sun rose and when the police arrived at about 8am – to find a group of smiling, dancing young people in smiley face-covered bright clothes and bandanas listening to squelchy electronic sounds – they didn't have a clue. 'They just told us to keep it down and be careful when driving home,' recalls Farley. 'It all looked quite innocuous to their eyes – no alcohol and just people lounging about in a beatific sort of way.' Sign up to Inside Saturday The only way to get a look behind the scenes of the Saturday magazine. Sign up to get the inside story from our top writers as well as all the must-read articles and columns, delivered to your inbox every weekend. after newsletter promotion The parties continued and the crew was soon in huge demand. Such was their growing reputation for spinning killer records and having their finger on the pulse that Weatherall and Farley started to be hired as producers and remixers for the likes of Happy Mondays, New Order, the Farm and Primal Scream. Between 1990 and 1993 London Records gave them their own label to play with, on which they released music by Bocca Juniors, Jah Wobble, DSK and Denim, but the success didn't match up to the work the crew had done for other labels and they became fed up with one another. They wrapped up the fanzine in 1992, the same year that Hall and Farley started their own independent label, Junior Boy's Own, which signed the Chemical Brothers and Underworld before the label was split into two in the late 1990s, before things wound down in the mid-2000s. In hindsight, Boy's Own was something of an all-encompassing lifestyle brand before such a thing was commonplace: a magazine spanning music, politics, fashion and their own subculture, that released records, signed artists and threw parties. But all they wanted to do at the time was be creative and have fun. 'I'm proud that we did it for the sake of doing it, as opposed to for commercial ends,' says Eckel. 'It was wonderfully innocent. We could have been Cream or Ministry of Sound, but we just did things we believed in.' It still takes Farley by surprise how a bunch of working-class lads, made up of gas fitters and carpenters, created something that connected on such a profound cultural level. 'This guy recently pulled his sleeve down and he had a Boy's Own tattoo,' he recalls. 'And he's like: 'I love you guys'. I didn't know what to say. I smiled, it made me laugh, but it also made me kind of go: 'Fuck! This was important to people. A lot of people. And if we in any way influenced other people to do better things in their lives then it was more than worth it.' When Weatherall wrote the introduction to the final ever issue of Boy's Own, he was able to write his own obituary. 'It's with sadness (and a slight smirk) that I must announce the death of The Outsider,' he began, before painting a scenario of a body discovered around a pile of King Tubby records and Boy's Own back issues. Sadly, Weatherall didn't get to plan out his own ending in such detail, but being surrounded by music, words and his own creative output feels like a fitting, and symbolic, closing chapter. 'We miss him,' says Hall. 'But I think he'd be proud to this day of what Boy's Own achieved.' Boy's Own clothing and fanzines are available from
