Call of the Reed Warbler—Charles Massy

Occasionally, too rarely, a book falls into your hands that sets you back on your heels, and suddenly in your mind lights are flashing and bells are ringing. Alarm bells and hallelujah bells. The voice is not strident, but a lyrical, humble and learned tone, and, as I discovered, a voice with an unmistakable Aussie twang and slow drawl of a thoughtful farmer.

Charles (Charlie) Massy is a fifth-generation farmer from the Monaro. He is also an academic attached to the ANU, having returned to university in his late fifties a few years back, to pursue a PhD in Human Ecology. Now, further down the track, he has become a voice, a writer, of immense gentle power and erudite persuasion.