y separately published work icon My Life As Me : A Memoir single work   autobiography  
Issue Details: First known date: 2002... 2002 My Life As Me : A Memoir
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Notes

  • Available as a sound recording.
  • Epigraph: I do not know
    whether to put in the things I do not remember
    as well as the things I do remember : Gertrude Stein
  • Dedication: To Tessa and Emily, Oscar and Rupert
    In the hope that somewhere in these pages they might recognise their father.

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Camberwell, Camberwell - Kew area, Melbourne - Inner South, Melbourne, Victoria,: Viking , 2002 .
      Extent: x, 374p., [48]p. of platesp.
      Description: illus. (some col.), ports, bibl.
      Reprinted: 2003 With ISBN 0670040835 (pbk.)
      Note/s:
      • Includes index.
      ISBN: 0670888346 (hbk.)
    • London,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,
      :
      Michael Joseph ,
      2002 .
      Extent: x, 374p., [48]p. of platesp.
      Description: illus., ports, bibl.
      Note/s:
      • Includes index.
      ISBN: 0718145410

Works about this Work

Author as Performer : Performing Autobiographies David Sheinberg , 2019 single work criticism
— Appears in: International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media , vol. 15 no. 3 2019; (p. 326-339)

'It may be argued that audiobooks should not substitute for reading, and authors—contrary to common conception—seldom are the best narrators of their own work. On the other hand, as the first-person narrative constitutes an inherent aesthetic property of the audiobook as a unique performance-based aural artefact, the audiobook versions of autobiographies can potentially amplify one’s aesthetic experience of a written personal history. Nonetheless, rather than focusing on so-called ‘standard’ autobiographies, this essay attends to the aural iterations of Barry Humphries’s pseudo-autobiographical writing. Overall, the aesthetic complexity in Humphries’s work is virtually labyrinthine and borderline-surreal. While there surely prevail far more complex first-person narratives, the complexities in Humphries’s case stem from the texts’ incarnation as audiobooks, putting into question not only the identity of the narrating protagonists, but also their very (non)-existence. They simultaneously exist as commonplace works of fiction written by Humphries, and as the quite literal memoirs of Humphries’s own fictional characters. They thus raise the question whether certain audiobooks might in fact negate the original printed work.'

Source: Abstract.

Mapping the Vast Suburban Tundra : Australian Comedy from Dame Edna to Kath and Kim Sue Turnbull , 2008 single work criticism
— Appears in: International Journal of Cultural Studies , vol. 11 no. 1 2008; (p. 15-32)

By the time of Australian Federation in 1901, almost 70 per cent of 'Sydney’s population were living in the suburbs: a statistic that suggests that despite prevalent and enduring images of the bushman and the ocker, the ‘real’ Australia was, and still is, more likely to be located in what Barry Humphries has described as Australia’s ‘vast and unexplored suburban tundra’.1 As a satirist, Humphries has been in the forefront of an expedition to map the tragi-comic dimensions of this territory with characters such as Dame Edna Everage, who first appeared on Australian television in 1956, offering the box room of ‘her lovely home’ as a potential billet for an athlete during the Melbourne Olympic Games.2 Some 50 years later, Dame Edna not only presided over the closing ceremony of the 2006 Commonwealth Games, but was joined on the steps of the Melbourne Town Hall, during a ceremony to award her the key to the city, by two more recent suburban icons, Kath and Kim. With the international success of Dame Edna and Kath and Kim, it seems that the Antipodean suburb is still being mapped and mined for comic effect on television both at home and abroad. This article will explore the conditions of such success within a long tradition of anti-suburbanism dating back to the nineteenth century while exploring the role of comedy in constructing a national imaginary which is now widely circulated via increasingly transnational flows in television.'

Source: Sage Publications.

Books Lucy Sussex , 2003 single work review
— Appears in: The Sunday Age , 27 July 2003; (p. 9)

— Review of My Life As Me : A Memoir Barry Humphries , 2002 single work autobiography
Miscellany Tony Maniaty , 2003 single work review
— Appears in: The Weekend Australian , 19-20 July 2003; (p. 12)

— Review of My Life As Me : A Memoir Barry Humphries , 2002 single work autobiography
In Short : Non-Fiction Bruce Elder , 2003 single work review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 12-13 July 2003; (p. 19)

— Review of My Life As Me : A Memoir Barry Humphries , 2002 single work autobiography ; The Usefulness of John West : Dissent and Difference in the Australian Colonies Patricia Fitzgerald Ratcliff , 2003 single work biography
Utterly Called For Peter Rose , 2002-2003 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Book Review , December-January no. 247 2002-2003; (p. 9-10)

— Review of My Life As Me : A Memoir Barry Humphries , 2002 single work autobiography
People and Places Kathy Hunt , 2002-2003 single work review
— Appears in: The Bulletin , 17 December-14 January vol. 120 no. 6355 2002-2003; (p. 139)

— Review of My Life As Me : A Memoir Barry Humphries , 2002 single work autobiography ; Xavier Herbert : Letters Xavier Herbert , 2002 selected work correspondence
Moonee Pond Life Matthew Sturgis , 2003 single work review
— Appears in: The Times Literary Supplement , 21 February no. 5212 2003; (p. 7)

— Review of My Life As Me : A Memoir Barry Humphries , 2002 single work autobiography
The Multiple Lives of Barry Humphries Jim Davidson , 2003 single work review
— Appears in: Meanjin , vol. 62 no. 2 2003; (p. 220-228) The Best Australian Essays 2003 2003; (p. 201-211)

— Review of My Life As Me : A Memoir Barry Humphries , 2002 single work autobiography
In Short : Non-Fiction Bruce Elder , 2003 single work review
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 12-13 July 2003; (p. 19)

— Review of My Life As Me : A Memoir Barry Humphries , 2002 single work autobiography ; The Usefulness of John West : Dissent and Difference in the Australian Colonies Patricia Fitzgerald Ratcliff , 2003 single work biography
Secret Life of a Frock Star Caroline Overington , 2002 single work criticism
— Appears in: The Sydney Morning Herald , 9-10 November 2002; (p. 36)
Facing Up to Humphries Caroline Overington , 2002 single work biography
— Appears in: The Age , 9 November 2002; (p. 1,4)
I Would Like to End Up in Melbourne Sarah Sands , 2002 single work biography
— Appears in: The Sunday Age , 10 November 2002; (p. 3)
Playing Possum Tim Adams , 2002 single work interview
— Appears in: The Courier-Mail , 16 November 2002; (p. 1-2)
Mapping the Vast Suburban Tundra : Australian Comedy from Dame Edna to Kath and Kim Sue Turnbull , 2008 single work criticism
— Appears in: International Journal of Cultural Studies , vol. 11 no. 1 2008; (p. 15-32)

By the time of Australian Federation in 1901, almost 70 per cent of 'Sydney’s population were living in the suburbs: a statistic that suggests that despite prevalent and enduring images of the bushman and the ocker, the ‘real’ Australia was, and still is, more likely to be located in what Barry Humphries has described as Australia’s ‘vast and unexplored suburban tundra’.1 As a satirist, Humphries has been in the forefront of an expedition to map the tragi-comic dimensions of this territory with characters such as Dame Edna Everage, who first appeared on Australian television in 1956, offering the box room of ‘her lovely home’ as a potential billet for an athlete during the Melbourne Olympic Games.2 Some 50 years later, Dame Edna not only presided over the closing ceremony of the 2006 Commonwealth Games, but was joined on the steps of the Melbourne Town Hall, during a ceremony to award her the key to the city, by two more recent suburban icons, Kath and Kim. With the international success of Dame Edna and Kath and Kim, it seems that the Antipodean suburb is still being mapped and mined for comic effect on television both at home and abroad. This article will explore the conditions of such success within a long tradition of anti-suburbanism dating back to the nineteenth century while exploring the role of comedy in constructing a national imaginary which is now widely circulated via increasingly transnational flows in television.'

Source: Sage Publications.

Last amended 11 Feb 2008 10:26:40
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