“It is in capturing the quotidian nature of a city that one finds its soul,” Christos Tsiolkas once wrote, and perhaps but for Helen Garner, no other author has captured life in Melbourne as truthfully. It feels oddly thrilling to meet the 58-year-old on his turf – in the suburbs where a man might hit a child who isn’t his own (The Slap); that might produce a troubled swimming prodigy (Barracuda); that might produce a young gay Greek-Australian who spends 24 hours chasing handjobs and cocaine across the city (Loaded).
We meet where all interviews should begin: Vinnies. When I arrive, Tsiolkas has already found treasure: a Jill Scott CD and Michael Haneke’s 71 Fragments of a Chronology of Chance on DVD, complete with an ancient Video Ezy sticker. The former was nicked from his house during a party, he says, and the Haneke is just brilliant.
