Vew from the chair: Speeches of Richard WL Austin

As a refugee from the deep south, I am personally especially delighted to see in this distinguished gathering the faces of so many of my own old friends from Melbourne and Sydney. It is a measure of Pam's magnetic power of persuasion that so many have come from so far to be here this morning. But it is, after all, a unique occasion, because never before, as far as I know, has a book of poetry been launched in the Gallery and, what is more, Pam herself is a unique woman. Let me say at once that I am not your host today. That honour belongs to Thomas Rowland Publishers, of which Mrs Rosemary Hassell is the representative. Pam knows all about Sir John Betjeman, one of the most amusing and witty of English poets, because she gives him a mention in her poem, 'Autobiography'. In his poem 'Pot Pourri from a Surrey Garden', he tells us that he played tennis with a girl called Pam, and apparently fell in love with her because of the way she whizzed the balls over the net. Whether this was Pam Bell or not we are left to speculate. Betjeman also has something to say about days like today. He makes one of his characters in another poem 'Sun and Fun', describe a moment of high exaltation in the following way: Lunching with poets, dining late with peers I felt I had come into my own You will notice that he got his priorities right and put things in their proper order. Poets are more important than peers, and lunch (as any serious gastronome will tell you) is a better meal than dinner at which to enjoy those two essential elements of civilisation-food and wine. So here we are, about to lunch with a poet in, what is more, what was until a few years ago her house as well as mine. For four years Pamela was a Trustee of this Gallery and we still, and always will, regard her as a very close and special colleague. All of us at the Gallery are pleased and proud that she has chosen this venue for her book launching. Her contribution to the arts has been enormous: in Trusteeship, because she was a Trustee of the Australian National Gallery in Canberra for seven years as well; in sponsorship, because the walls of this Gallery are adorned with many of her donations; and in scholarship, because she has written much of great wisdom and sensitivity on the visual arts. Now she has brought to the Gallery something that has never happened before. As I said, it is the first time that a book of poetry has been launched here, and things that happen for the first time are, as often as not, the most exciting. Until this launching loomed, I am ashamed to say that I knew little or nothing of Pam's great poetic abilities-now I am better informed. Reading her poems with ever-increasing pleasure in the sun yesterday, I remembered that Charlotte Bronte had, on one occasion, come by chance upon a manuscript of poems by her sister, Emily, and had recorded her impressions afterwards. I managed to find the passage, and it is a strange coincidence that Charlotte wrote it under the name of Currer Bell. This is what she wrote: 110