How Speculative Fiction Helped Me Own My Story

It was time to recalibrate my life. After many years as a travelling musician, few income-earning gigs were on the horizon. My girlfriend at the time suggested university study to follow my interests in writing and film as every event company that hired me had something to do with both. I was nervous taking this path because I had no idea if I could do a degree, but at the same time I was excited at the future potential. I signed up for my Bachelor of Media Arts Degree with a major in Film and TV production, minor in Creative Writing, and electives including language and philosophy. The university board told me that the Italian 101 lecturer’s name was, Matteo Farina—a combination of my dad and sister’s names—I took it as a sign to choose that elective class. This decision led to connections that kick started my journey into speculative fiction. While dad was Italian, we never spoke it at home. Spending time away from home in Los Angeles, working for a non-profit helping homeless children and their parents living in shelters, got me thinking about how little I knew about my own heritage and that sparked a quest of embracing my family heritage on both sides, Aboriginal and Italian.

In a class, I met a French and First Nations student who was a former model. She shared that when modelling she was told, ‘Don’t tell them you are Aboriginal when going for job interviews.’ Intrigued by her story, I speculated about what was possible in that situation and was inspired to create a three-minute short film, called Just Be Yourself.

In the film, the model is on her way to a job interview and told not to tell them she is Aboriginal, reflecting the story she had told me. This sets her on edge as she nervously waits for the interview, drifting off to the worst place in her mind. Her thoughts swirl to a nightmare of being interviewed by a man dressed in a Ku Klux Klan hood and robe with a swastika on it, he holds a huge hypodermic needle poised to take her blood sample to test for blood purity. This terrifies her and she bolts out of the waiting room down the corridor. There on the door, she is faced with an image of a dot painted hand—an Aboriginal artwork that gives her pause. She reflects on her culture. Her posture changes as she now stands tall, and marches back to the interview. The interviewer greets her with, ‘Great resume. When can you start?’ This both surprises and delights her. The film ends there. It was a speculative fiction film illustrating the mental residue of racism. With Just Be Yourself, I received my first High Distinction for my first effort writing and directing film.

I thought that to apply artistic vision to a subject, to speculate, to bring about an increase in understanding and awareness could be a special power.

I sent it off to National Indigenous TV (NITV); they loved it and acquired the rights to broadcast it for three years. As a first year First Nations film student, it was a moment the little caboose went from, ‘I think I can, I think I can’ to ‘I know I can.’ I knew I could make a film that resonated to help create great empathy and understanding. Having my three-minute short film broadcast over and over on national TV raised my profile as a filmmaker and opened up opportunities. There was more recognition and acknowledgement than I had ever received as a travelling musician. It made a positive difference. I thought that to apply artistic vision to a subject, to speculate, to bring about an increase in understanding and awareness could be a special power.

I wondered, how would I do this consistently? It was great the first film was well received, but where do I go from here? Is it sustainable? These thoughts were percolating, not only in my mind, but they were also put to me by others who diminished my achievement, saying things like, ‘It was easier for you because you lived in Hollywood’, or ‘It’s because you are a mature age student’, or ‘Just how Aboriginal are you?’ I felt they were jealous.

Writing songs and playing the guitar is something I’ve always done when I’m trying to process things in my life. Reacting to the envious putdowns I got out my guitar and free-formed a song and lyrics that opened the flow of my thoughts and feelings.

Sail

Don’t put upon my reason
Don’t put upon my hope

For the fires of jealousy
Burn a passion with a rope

And underneath the bridge of night
That beast can hold you tight

For who knows the boat’s safety
Until the boat’s ashore

Those that never venture out
Only know the shore

But I taste the pain
Blood in vain

Whipped across my back
And until the last adventure
I sail
For more

This ended up being a mantra of mine. I committed myself to the journey, win, lose or draw. I looked further into speculative fiction from a First Nations perspective. It’s been an ongoing journey. When I first looked into it, there didn’t appear be much First Nations speculative fiction written. Recently, I found this reference from Palyku writer and academic Dr Ambelin Kwaymullina that resonated. ‘Speculative fiction—whether it involves works that might be traditionally thought of as fantasy, or as science fiction, or as anything in between—contains much else that is familiar to Indigenous peoples of this planet’.

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My grandfather, Joe, was a tent boxer trying to survive in the colony. The tent boxing world was a travelling carnival show in a time of intense racism towards First Nations people during the Aboriginal Protection Act 1869– that would facilitate and encourage Aboriginal men to assume international cultural identities in the ring such as Spanish, Māori, African Afghan, Pacific Islander, African American as part of an ‘international’ boxing show. First Nations tent boxers would imagine different lives for themselves constantly reinventing themselves to be able to stay on the road and survive.

Due to colonisation’s decimation of family, culture, and language, so much was lost of family, our First Nations history, and events. Again, it was time for me to visit speculative fiction.

Professor Richard Broome reflects that in his work, ‘By seeing the tents as theatres, and the boxers as performers acting out mostly predetermined scripts … Tent boxing produced heroes and a heroic edge to Aboriginal community history.’

Through the university courses and degree, I landed a job making films in the marketing unit for a university. I made films of building openings, concerts, films of academics, various university student events, and a couple of films about reconciliation and Welcome and Acknowledgement of Country—but where were the stories about the passion to change, or reflecting on change? Where had my speculative fiction gone? Would it ever return?

Again, another song moment to let emotion flow.

The More I Walk
The further I seem from home
They ain’t moving
But I am
They ain’t leaving
But I’m gone again

And you ask me
What I should say to you
Well, it’s been sad
To been had
For so long

I thought it was true
And I guess
I’ll just keep walking on
Walking on

That energy and purpose I touched upon in my first film was no longer there, the work I was doing seemed like a long chain of corporate marketing. Time seemed to rush by in a blur of bus trips to work, filming and editing the next marketing clip, and a bus trip home again. Where was my superpower?

Hope arrived in an NITV ‘Our Stories Our Way’ initiative for First Nations filmmakers. I managed to make several broadcast short documentaries—this opened the door to my first big production, an hour-long documentary on grandpop’s life and times as a First Nations man who was a champion boxer of South Australia from 1929–1934. He danced, sang vaudeville, and married a blue-eyed blonde—something that was taboo for a Black man in those times. Grandpop also served in the military. Joe was called the ‘Black Panther’ in the boxing ring—due to the government policies treating Aboriginal people as the lowest form of people, a dying race, and part of the flora and fauna of Australia, he understandably adopted other identities to survive and help his family. For future generations tracing his story, that left very little to go on. When I could find time and not be exhausted from the day’s spinning circuit of time-framed schedule, I would chip away on research on his life and times. We connected with our Wiradjuri Elder Aunty June Murray and family, but due to colonisation’s decimation of family, culture, and language, so much was lost of family, our First Nations history, and events.

Again, it was time for me to visit speculative fiction. This time, I was opening a new door, writing a novel, a first-person narrative, time travel story.

My documentary The Panther Within uncovered what I could learn about grandpop, but I was not able to get all the details to give me satisfaction in terms of understanding his life, and connection to my home Country. However, in writing a work of speculative fiction, my horizon was opened a lot more because rather than worrying about specific events in my grandfather’s life, I went on a journey of really drilling down into the time and understanding the historical context of his life. I didn’t worry too much about, is my grandfather in this town or that town? Did he have this or that background? Did he wear these or those clothes? I researched what was generally happening for Aboriginal people in this period; attitudes towards women and men, fashion, depression living, hobbies, social activity, songs and music, money, financial transactions and payments, and food. I could start to create ideas of what my grandfather’s life might have been using speculative fiction. This was liberating and gave me a fuller understanding of the times.

Developing the story, researching original sources that underpin my creative work, I found pieces that informed the narratives, settings, atmosphere, imagery and symbolism, social and historical context, and character development. A lot of the issues faced by Aboriginal people in the early to mid-1900s, such as loss of identity, being caught between two worlds but belonging to neither because of being displaced by settlers, are just as relevant now. I also drew on my own family history—I interviewed my Aunty June Murray—to flesh out and explore these themes. Scholar Kate Warner has noted that ‘Speculative genres…give more freedom for the creators to present effective representations of the historical past.’

My manuscript Finding Billy Brown is about disconnection from culture, Country and family. The story’s protagonist, Aboriginal AFL champ and boxer Billy Brown, is hit by a passing car and wakes up in 1931—the year his great-grandfather Tommy Roy won a boxing championship. Billy realises the only way back to present day to be reunited with his wife and child is to find his home Country and tap into the spiritual energy of his Aboriginal language and Songlines. He must find Country through his great-grandfather, who refuses to let him know where Country is, unless he earns it by fighting him in the ring for the championship. I take my readers there. I give them front row seats ringside for the action—boxing bouts, amazing spectacles inspired by a 1932 newspaper report about Joe. It mentions he did a song and dance before the first bout, and the second down, boxed ten rounds in the main event, and wins to a thunderous applause as he dances victorious.

My time travel story raises comparisons of the 1930s with the present day. It explores and examines the past impacting the present. Developing my story has helped me become stronger in my identity, clearer about my history, and owning my history. I am a First Nations man in Australia, trying to understand how my history influences my place in the world now and what we Aboriginal people who have been displaced from home Country and culture have experienced. What does owning your history look like or mean?

I am a First Nations man in Australia, trying to understand how my history influences my place in the world now. What does owning your history look like or mean?

My storytelling journey, communicating our stories to a broad audience, is a pathway many more First Nations creatives are taking due to the power and appeal of film.

I take my audience into the experience of my grandfather fleeing from racist Whites who are rampaging unchecked in a country town. While I can’t be certain my grandfather went through this experience, it’s certainly one that many First Nations people have faced.

The speculative fiction medium has helped me recalibrate my life. Driven by my deep personal quest for further understanding, cultural connection, and knowledge, not just for my own family but for our collective national story, I have come a long way. I am a firm believer in the power of storytelling to achieve some sense of justice, voice and active agency for First Nations Australians.

As per my trusted way of processing thoughts, once more I grab my guitar and channel a stream of consciousness, for a speculative fiction-style song that captures the journey and my hope for the future.

When I first started this journey
I thought that I would be left adrift
Bereft
But in a most difficult time
I found an island
Called speculative fiction

I developed my skills
I managed to stay afloat
At the height of that scary
What the hell am I doing here feeling
At the scale of when the hell is this going to end
It is much clearer
The way forward seems safer

And perhaps some time in the near or distant future
When my novel is published
And made into a film or TV series
I will look forward to a celebration
Perhaps like Dionysus and wine
Where grapes bubble over a large tub as naked bodies
Splash, squash and squish the nectar

And from under the grape filled blanket a trumpet arises
Jazz notes playing as a naked nymphet strides forth vamping the trumpet sonnet
Two sticks tap a beat on the side of the tub
Feet join the beat.
My wine song grows and grows
And faces shine

Yes, I made it
I am a survivor
I am strong
Always was
Always will be

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​​This piece was commissioned and edited by KYD First Nations Editor-in-Residence Bianca Valentino, in partnership with State Library of Queensland’s black&write! Indigenous Writing and Editing project.

Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander writers can submit pitches to KYD’s First Nations Editors-in-residence here.