Antonella Gambotto-Burke
Encyclopedia
Antonella Gambotto-Burke (née Antonella Gambotto, born 19 September 1965) is an Australian author
and journalist
.
Gambotto-Burke has written one novel, The Pure Weight of the Heart
, two anthologies, Lunch of Blood
and An Instinct for the Kill
, and a memoir, The Eclipse: A Memoir of Suicide, which has been published in four languages. Her best known comic interview - with Warwick Capper
, a retired Australian footballer, and his wife - is included in The Best Australian Profiles (Black Inc., 2004). "The best profiles lodge deep in the public mind, such as ... Antonella Gambotto's cheerfully dopey Warwick and Joanne Capper, which presaged by years the arrival of Kath & Kim
", Matthew Ricketson wrote in 2005. The Sydney Morning Herald named her as a high-profile member of Mensa International
. She is a teetotaler, has never owned a television, and has a bat tattoo on her right shoulder. "I was going to have the Harley Davidson logo, but [the tattooist] convinced me I'd regret it," she explained.
, the first child and only daughter of the late Giancarlo Gambotto, whose High Court win against WCP Ltd. changed Australian corporate law, made the front pages of The Australian Financial Review
and The Australian
, is still featured in corporate law exams, and was the subject of a book edited by Ian Ramsay, Professor of Law at Melbourne University.
Raised a Roman Catholic, she attended Lindfield East Primary School and Killara High School
, where she distinguished herself through debate and academic achievement and was dux of her year in 1980. She also consistently came first in English and, in 1980, French. In 1982, she was selected to partake in the State Debating Trials a year early. Her team's first speaker was Senator Richard Alston
's former Chief of Staff and now Liberal Member of Parliament
, Paul Fletcher
. Gambotto-Burke was first published in The Sydney Morning Herald
at the age of fifteen - a satire of poet Les Murray
's "An Absolutely Ordinary Rainbow", later included in Michele Field's anthology Shrinklit (1983). She was first published in The Australian at the age of eighteen. Her first short story was published in literary magazine Billy Blue Magazine in July 1982.
, where she was employed as a music critic by NME
and where, on the advice of an editor, she wrote under the pseudonyms Antonella Black and Ginger Meggs
. Her review of Cliff Richard
's concert inspired him to sue the music journal. She also wrote "A Man Called Horse", an unflattering cover story of alternative rock star Nick Cave
, in which she documented his heroin-induced stupor (in retaliation, he wrote a song about her and British journalist Mat Snow entitled "Scum"; a photograph of Gambotto-Burke and Snow was published with Snow's account of the story in The Guardian
). Gambotto-Burke wrote about the experience most recently in September 2006, and the interview has been reprinted for the third time in Nick Cave: Sinner, Saint. The Cave interview, and the story behind it, are also included in her book Lunch of Blood
, while Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
included a version of "Scum" on their 2005 box set, B-Sides And Rarities.
Gambotto-Burke won UK Cosmopolitan
magazine's New Journalist of the Year Award in 1988. That same year, she became engaged to the UK GQ editor Michael VerMeulen
. In 1989 she returned to Sydney, after the demise of her relationship with VerMeulen, who died from a cocaine
overdose at the age of 38 in 1995. Before leaving London, Gambotto-Burke wrote for The Independent on Sunday, notably a cover story on cardiothoracic surgeons.
In 1989, she returned to Sydney, where she resumed contributing to The Weekend Australian as a feature profile writer and literary critic, and also began writing for The South China Morning Post, The Globe and Mail
in Canada, Harper's Bazaar
, Men's Style Australia, and other international publications. Channel Nine
Entertainment Director Richard Wilkins
noted that "if you're on her wavelength, the interview is a most enjoyable experience. If not, it could be quite disconcerting. The key is to be open and honest with her."
observed that Gambotto-Burke's "command of language is delicious to the point where one wonders which came first, her wish to display her ability or the desire to share her impressions." In 1997, An Instinct for the Kill, her second anthology, was published to mixed reviews by HarperCollins. (Age critic Katherine Wilson singled out the Capper interview as "laugh-out-loud" funny.)
The introduction to Gambotto-Burke's work in The Best Australian Profiles reads: "Gambotto is probably the closest Australia has come to having a profile writer who is a celebrity in their own right ... and from the early 1990s readers became as interested in Gambotto as they were in the people she profiled."
Edward De Bono
, who wrote the foreword to An Instinct for the Kill
, tells of her philosophical position: "Antonella is not afraid of words, ideas, her own opinions or the opinions of others. Perception is personal so truth is also personal. This is much more like Protagoras
than like Plato
. For Protagoras, perception was the only truth - but it was changeable. For Plato, the fascist, truth was what you had reached when you thought it was the absolute."
In Undercover Agent, Murray Waldren noted that "an interview with [Gambotto-Burke] often has the studied savagery of the corrida amid the crystal cruet ambience of high tea at the Ritz. Such ritualistic disembowelling, highly entertaining and in stark contrast to the asinine, PR-driven pap of most modern profiles, leave the gored stirred and very shaken."
, Gail Cork described Gambotto's contribution as "outstanding" and in Who (magazine), Margaret Smith noted its "darkly sinister" overtones. "The Astronomer," a short story presaging many of the themes in her first novel, was published in 1989. Eight years later, Gambotto-Burke's first novel, The Pure Weight of the Heart
(also featuring an astronomer), was published by Orion Publishing in London, and went to number six on the Sydney Morning Herald's bestseller list. It was also Tatler
s book of the month. Author Matthew Condon
elaborated in The Age
: "Her razor eye for the architecture of pretension and her ability to record untidied dialogue, especially the way it can betray the human mind and soul, have made her an object of fear and derision. To have been 'Gambottoed' is to have had a vein opened."
and in tongue-in-cheek shoots for fashion magazines and newspapers. Literary editor Andrew Clark opened his 1999 Melbourne Writers' Festival report with his account of her performance with British crime writer P. D. James
: "Antonella Gambotto leaned towards the microphone, fluttered her eyelids, examined the audience with studied poise, started talking about football, then asked: 'What do you people in Melbourne call it?'"
In The Sydney Morning Herald
, English professor Don Anderson played along, quoting Tennyson
and writing her what he described as a "sub-William Carlos Williams poem":
"THIS IS JUST TO SEND
69 long-stemmed white roses
tied with a white ribbon
and which you were probably
hoping
were coming."
In a Sydney Weekly cover story, Gambotto-Burke noted: "People have a very strange idea of what I'm like."
and her engagement to, and the death of, late British GQ editor Michael VerMeulen
. In a November 2003 interview with a British magazine, she said: "I wanted to explain depression as a valid emotional response rather than as a disease ... I am not ashamed of my brother, and I do not see death as tragic - deliberate ignorance and fear are tragedies, not death."
In a 2004 review section cover story for The Weekend Australian, Murray Waldren wrote that Gambotto-Burke used to be "upfront in other ways, being acerbic and self-deprecatory while displaying trip-wire intellect and romantic girlishness ... But the past ten years have been a whirl of small triumphs, deep sorrows and much death, and they have left Gambotto bruised, saddened, and now, resolutely remade."
), which premiered at the Adelaide Festival in 2008. In an essay, she noted that, "As scripts are founded on what Alan Alda calls the 'subsurface tectonics of emotion,' the result can sometimes be a psychic slam dunk." Director Bromley described the film as "like a kaleidoscope of images and it is run by my poetry and short stories by Antonella. And it has a large animation component."
. Their daughter Bethesda Natalina was born in December 2005, and baptized in 2007 by Bishop John Shelby Spong
.
has been syndicated around the world, and she has become a vocal opponent of cyber pornography and pornography as a whole. Blog critics describe her as shrilly denouncing pornography, but her work on pornography has been published internationally, most recently in Men's Style, The Weekend Australian and The South China Morning Post. Asked for her opinion on the literary vogue for callgirl memoirs, she noted: "Prostitutes are not sexual experts, but expert in profiting from dysfunctional sexuality. There is a very significant difference."
She is also a widely-published literary critic and essayist. Gambotto-Burke specializes in reviewing nonfiction - memoir, psychology, philosophy, and popular culture - and continues to address controversial topics such as paternal infanticide and mental illness in her essays. The Sydney Morning Herald critic Doug Anderson
described her book reviews as having "the silken sting of iced nylons." In 2006, Gambotto-Burke told Vogue that "Language shapes consciousness and from consciousness, our world is shaped."
Her choice of interviewees remains eclectic. Recent interviewees include Marilyn Manson
, Bette Midler
, David Sedaris
, Chelsea Handler
, Sarah Silverman
, and her interview with actor Eric Bana
was the cover story for Live, The Mail on Sunday
's weekend magazine. She has critiqued authors as disparate as American playwright David Mamet
, Neil Gaiman
and Michael Chabon
, and has written a number of lead news stories for The Australian
's business pages, most recently about lawyers and legal issues.
In July 2009, she announced that a book contract had been signed. She did not mention the title, only that it would be published in 2011.
(Channel Ten, Foxtel
), The Midday Show (Channel 9
), Meet the Press
(SBS
), and performed cameos on Paul Fenech
's SBS sitcom Pizza.
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
and journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
.
Gambotto-Burke has written one novel, The Pure Weight of the Heart
The Pure Weight of the Heart
The Pure Weight of the Heart is Antonella Gambotto-Burke's first novel and third book. It peaked at number six on The Sydney Morning Herald bestseller list. Published by Orion Publishing in London in 1998, it was translated into German by Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag in 2000...
, two anthologies, Lunch of Blood
Lunch of Blood
Lunch of Blood is Antonella Gambotto-Burke's first book and first anthology. The title was inspired by a Saul Bellow poem:"Mice hide when hawks are high;Hawks shy from airplanes;Planes dread the ack-ack-ack; Each one fears somebody....
and An Instinct for the Kill
An Instinct for the Kill
An Instinct for the Kill is the second of Antonella Gambotto-Burke's books and her second anthology. It was dedicated to investment banker Mark Burrows. In his introduction to the book, Edward de Bono writes: "Antonella is not afraid of words, ideas, her own opinions or the opinions of others....
, and a memoir, The Eclipse: A Memoir of Suicide, which has been published in four languages. Her best known comic interview - with Warwick Capper
Warwick Capper
Warwick Capper is a retired high profile professional Australian rules football full-forward who played with the Sydney Swans with a short stint at the Brisbane Bears in the VFL ....
, a retired Australian footballer, and his wife - is included in The Best Australian Profiles (Black Inc., 2004). "The best profiles lodge deep in the public mind, such as ... Antonella Gambotto's cheerfully dopey Warwick and Joanne Capper, which presaged by years the arrival of Kath & Kim
Kath & Kim
Kath & Kim is a Logie Award-winning character-driven Australian television situation comedy series. The series was created by, and is written by Jane Turner and Gina Riley who play the title characters: a suburban mother and daughter with a dysfunctional relationship...
", Matthew Ricketson wrote in 2005. The Sydney Morning Herald named her as a high-profile member of Mensa International
Mensa International
Mensa is the largest and oldest high-IQ society in the world. It is a non-profit organization open to people who score at the 98th percentile or higher on a standardised, supervised IQ or other approved intelligence test...
. She is a teetotaler, has never owned a television, and has a bat tattoo on her right shoulder. "I was going to have the Harley Davidson logo, but [the tattooist] convinced me I'd regret it," she explained.
Early years
Gambotto-Burke was born and raised in East Lindfield on Sydney's North ShoreNorth Shore (Sydney)
The North Shore is an informal term used to describe the primarily residential area of northern metropolitan Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. The term usually refers to the suburbs located on the north shore of Sydney Harbour between Middle Harbour and the Lane Cove River, up to...
, the first child and only daughter of the late Giancarlo Gambotto, whose High Court win against WCP Ltd. changed Australian corporate law, made the front pages of The Australian Financial Review
The Australian Financial Review
The Australian Financial Review is a leading business and finance newspaper in Australia.Fairfax Media publishes it in a compact format six days a week, Monday to Saturday....
and The Australian
The Australian
The Australian is a broadsheet newspaper published in Australia from Monday to Saturday each week since 14 July 1964. The editor in chief is Chris Mitchell, the editor is Clive Mathieson and the 'editor-at-large' is Paul Kelly....
, is still featured in corporate law exams, and was the subject of a book edited by Ian Ramsay, Professor of Law at Melbourne University.
Raised a Roman Catholic, she attended Lindfield East Primary School and Killara High School
Killara High School
Killara High School is a co-educational public secondary school, located on Koola Avenue in East Killara, Sydney. Established in 1970, Killara High School is one of the highest performing comprehensive non-selective public schools in the state...
, where she distinguished herself through debate and academic achievement and was dux of her year in 1980. She also consistently came first in English and, in 1980, French. In 1982, she was selected to partake in the State Debating Trials a year early. Her team's first speaker was Senator Richard Alston
Richard Alston
Richard Alston may refer to:*Richard Alston *Richard Alston , Australian High Commissioner to the UK and former Australian senator...
's former Chief of Staff and now Liberal Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
, Paul Fletcher
Paul Fletcher
Paul Fletcher is the name of:* Paul Fletcher * Paul Fletcher , Liberal member of the Australian House of Representatives* Paul Fletcher...
. Gambotto-Burke was first published in The Sydney Morning Herald
The Sydney Morning Herald
The Sydney Morning Herald is a daily broadsheet newspaper published by Fairfax Media in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1831 as the Sydney Herald, the SMH is the oldest continuously published newspaper in Australia. The newspaper is published six days a week. The newspaper's Sunday counterpart, The...
at the age of fifteen - a satire of poet Les Murray
Les Murray (poet)
Leslie Allan Murray, AO , known as Les Murray, is an Australian poet, anthologist and critic. His career spans over forty years, and he has published nearly 30 volumes of poetry, as well as two verse novels and collections of his prose writings...
's "An Absolutely Ordinary Rainbow", later included in Michele Field's anthology Shrinklit (1983). She was first published in The Australian at the age of eighteen. Her first short story was published in literary magazine Billy Blue Magazine in July 1982.
Initial journalistic success and controversy
In 1984, she moved to LondonLondon
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, where she was employed as a music critic by NME
NME
The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...
and where, on the advice of an editor, she wrote under the pseudonyms Antonella Black and Ginger Meggs
Ginger Meggs
Ginger Meggs, a popular long-run Australian comic strip, was created in the early 1920s by Jimmy Bancks. The strip follows the escapades of a red-haired prepubescent mischief-maker who lives in an inner suburban working-class household....
. Her review of Cliff Richard
Cliff Richard
Sir Cliff Richard, OBE is a British pop singer, musician, performer, actor, and philanthropist who has sold over an estimated 250 million records worldwide....
's concert inspired him to sue the music journal. She also wrote "A Man Called Horse", an unflattering cover story of alternative rock star Nick Cave
Nick Cave
Nicholas Edward "Nick" Cave is an Australian musician, songwriter, author, screenwriter, and occasional film actor.He is best known for his work as a frontman of the critically acclaimed rock band Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, established in 1984, a group known for its eclectic influences and...
, in which she documented his heroin-induced stupor (in retaliation, he wrote a song about her and British journalist Mat Snow entitled "Scum"; a photograph of Gambotto-Burke and Snow was published with Snow's account of the story in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
). Gambotto-Burke wrote about the experience most recently in September 2006, and the interview has been reprinted for the third time in Nick Cave: Sinner, Saint. The Cave interview, and the story behind it, are also included in her book Lunch of Blood
Lunch of Blood
Lunch of Blood is Antonella Gambotto-Burke's first book and first anthology. The title was inspired by a Saul Bellow poem:"Mice hide when hawks are high;Hawks shy from airplanes;Planes dread the ack-ack-ack; Each one fears somebody....
, while Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds are an Australian alternative rock band, formed in Melbourne in 1983. The band is fronted by Nick Cave and has featured international personnel throughout their career.-Formation and early releases :...
included a version of "Scum" on their 2005 box set, B-Sides And Rarities.
Gambotto-Burke won UK Cosmopolitan
Cosmopolitan (magazine)
Cosmopolitan is an international magazine for women. It was first published in 1886 in the United States as a family magazine, was later transformed into a literary magazine and eventually became a women's magazine in the late 1960s...
magazine's New Journalist of the Year Award in 1988. That same year, she became engaged to the UK GQ editor Michael VerMeulen
Michael VerMeulen
Michael VerMeulen was an American magazine editor.Born in [Lake Forest, Illinois], VerMeulen was a journalist and editor, who came into contact during his late adolescence with playwright David Mamet and the circle of actors surrounding him in Chicago at that time...
. In 1989 she returned to Sydney, after the demise of her relationship with VerMeulen, who died from a cocaine
Cocaine
Cocaine is a crystalline tropane alkaloid that is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant. The name comes from "coca" in addition to the alkaloid suffix -ine, forming cocaine. It is a stimulant of the central nervous system, an appetite suppressant, and a topical anesthetic...
overdose at the age of 38 in 1995. Before leaving London, Gambotto-Burke wrote for The Independent on Sunday, notably a cover story on cardiothoracic surgeons.
In 1989, she returned to Sydney, where she resumed contributing to The Weekend Australian as a feature profile writer and literary critic, and also began writing for The South China Morning Post, The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail is a nationally distributed Canadian newspaper, based in Toronto and printed in six cities across the country. With a weekly readership of approximately 1 million, it is Canada's largest-circulation national newspaper and second-largest daily newspaper after the Toronto Star...
in Canada, Harper's Bazaar
Harper's Bazaar
Harper’s Bazaar is an American fashion magazine, first published in 1867. Harper’s Bazaar is published by Hearst and, as a magazine, considers itself to be the style resource for “women who are the first to buy the best, from casual to couture.”...
, Men's Style Australia, and other international publications. Channel Nine
Nine Network
The Nine Network , is an Australian television network with headquarters based in Willoughby, a suburb located on the North Shore of Sydney. For 50 years since television's inception in Australia, between 1956 and 2006, it was the most watched television network in Australia...
Entertainment Director Richard Wilkins
Richard Wilkins (TV presenter)
Richard Stephen Wilkins is a television presenter.Wilkins is currently the Nine Network's Entertainment editor for Today.- Career :...
noted that "if you're on her wavelength, the interview is a most enjoyable experience. If not, it could be quite disconcerting. The key is to be open and honest with her."
Anthologies
Lunch of Blood (Random House, 1994), her first book and first anthology, peaked at number six on the bestseller lists. The Newcastle HeraldThe Newcastle Herald
The Newcastle Herald is a local tabloid newspaper published daily, Monday to Saturday, in Newcastle, New South Wales, the largest non-capital city in Australia. It is the only local newspaper that serves the entire Hunter and Central Coast regions six days a week...
observed that Gambotto-Burke's "command of language is delicious to the point where one wonders which came first, her wish to display her ability or the desire to share her impressions." In 1997, An Instinct for the Kill, her second anthology, was published to mixed reviews by HarperCollins. (Age critic Katherine Wilson singled out the Capper interview as "laugh-out-loud" funny.)
The introduction to Gambotto-Burke's work in The Best Australian Profiles reads: "Gambotto is probably the closest Australia has come to having a profile writer who is a celebrity in their own right ... and from the early 1990s readers became as interested in Gambotto as they were in the people she profiled."
Edward De Bono
Edward de Bono
Edward de Bono is a physician, author, inventor, and consultant. He originated the term lateral thinking, wrote a best selling book Six Thinking Hats and is a proponent of the deliberate teaching of thinking as a subject in schools.- Biography :Edward Charles Francis Publius de Bono was born to...
, who wrote the foreword to An Instinct for the Kill
An Instinct for the Kill
An Instinct for the Kill is the second of Antonella Gambotto-Burke's books and her second anthology. It was dedicated to investment banker Mark Burrows. In his introduction to the book, Edward de Bono writes: "Antonella is not afraid of words, ideas, her own opinions or the opinions of others....
, tells of her philosophical position: "Antonella is not afraid of words, ideas, her own opinions or the opinions of others. Perception is personal so truth is also personal. This is much more like Protagoras
Protagoras
Protagoras was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher and is numbered as one of the sophists by Plato. In his dialogue Protagoras, Plato credits him with having invented the role of the professional sophist or teacher of virtue...
than like Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
. For Protagoras, perception was the only truth - but it was changeable. For Plato, the fascist, truth was what you had reached when you thought it was the absolute."
In Undercover Agent, Murray Waldren noted that "an interview with [Gambotto-Burke] often has the studied savagery of the corrida amid the crystal cruet ambience of high tea at the Ritz. Such ritualistic disembowelling, highly entertaining and in stark contrast to the asinine, PR-driven pap of most modern profiles, leave the gored stirred and very shaken."
Fiction
She was a contributor to the late Peter Blazey's anthology of short stories Love Cries: Cruel Passions, Strange Desires (1995); in The Sydney Morning HeraldThe Sydney Morning Herald
The Sydney Morning Herald is a daily broadsheet newspaper published by Fairfax Media in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1831 as the Sydney Herald, the SMH is the oldest continuously published newspaper in Australia. The newspaper is published six days a week. The newspaper's Sunday counterpart, The...
, Gail Cork described Gambotto's contribution as "outstanding" and in Who (magazine), Margaret Smith noted its "darkly sinister" overtones. "The Astronomer," a short story presaging many of the themes in her first novel, was published in 1989. Eight years later, Gambotto-Burke's first novel, The Pure Weight of the Heart
The Pure Weight of the Heart
The Pure Weight of the Heart is Antonella Gambotto-Burke's first novel and third book. It peaked at number six on The Sydney Morning Herald bestseller list. Published by Orion Publishing in London in 1998, it was translated into German by Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag in 2000...
(also featuring an astronomer), was published by Orion Publishing in London, and went to number six on the Sydney Morning Herald's bestseller list. It was also Tatler
Tatler
Tatler has been the name of several British journals and magazines, each of which has viewed itself as the successor of the original literary and society journal founded by Richard Steele in 1709. The current incarnation, founded in 1901, is a glossy magazine published by Condé Nast Publications...
s book of the month. Author Matthew Condon
Matthew Condon
-Biography:Educated at the University of Queensland and the Goethe Institute, Bremen, Germany, he is the author of ten novels and short story collections, including The Lulu Magnet, A Night at the Pink Poodle, The Motorcycle Cafe, The Pillow Fight and, most recently, The Trout Opera, an epic novel...
elaborated in The Age
The Age
The Age is a daily broadsheet newspaper, which has been published in Melbourne, Australia since 1854. Owned and published by Fairfax Media, The Age primarily serves Victoria, but is also available for purchase in Tasmania, the Australian Capital Territory and border regions of South Australia and...
: "Her razor eye for the architecture of pretension and her ability to record untidied dialogue, especially the way it can betray the human mind and soul, have made her an object of fear and derision. To have been 'Gambottoed' is to have had a vein opened."
Public persona
Despite describing herself as "very suburban", Gambotto-Burke mocked her public persona by appearing (clothed) in FHMFHM
FHM, originally published as For Him Magazine, is an international monthly men's lifestyle magazine.- History :The magazine began publication in 1985 in the United Kingdom under the name For Him and changed its title to FHM in 1994 when Emap Consumer Media bought the magazine, although the full For...
and in tongue-in-cheek shoots for fashion magazines and newspapers. Literary editor Andrew Clark opened his 1999 Melbourne Writers' Festival report with his account of her performance with British crime writer P. D. James
P. D. James
Phyllis Dorothy James, Baroness James of Holland Park, OBE, FRSA, FRSL , commonly known as P. D. James, is an English crime writer and Conservative life peer in the House of Lords, most famous for a series of detective novels starring policeman and poet Adam Dalgliesh.-Life and career:James...
: "Antonella Gambotto leaned towards the microphone, fluttered her eyelids, examined the audience with studied poise, started talking about football, then asked: 'What do you people in Melbourne call it?'"
In The Sydney Morning Herald
The Sydney Morning Herald
The Sydney Morning Herald is a daily broadsheet newspaper published by Fairfax Media in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1831 as the Sydney Herald, the SMH is the oldest continuously published newspaper in Australia. The newspaper is published six days a week. The newspaper's Sunday counterpart, The...
, English professor Don Anderson played along, quoting Tennyson
Tennyson
Alfred, Lord Tennyson, the first Baron Tennyson, was an English poet.Tennyson may also refer to:-People:* Baron Tennyson, the barony itself** Alfred, Lord Tennyson , poet...
and writing her what he described as a "sub-William Carlos Williams poem":
"THIS IS JUST TO SEND
69 long-stemmed white roses
tied with a white ribbon
and which you were probably
hoping
were coming."
In a Sydney Weekly cover story, Gambotto-Burke noted: "People have a very strange idea of what I'm like."
Bereavement
After her brother Gianluca, a Macquarie Bank executive, committed suicide in 2001, Gambotto-Burke changed. She began reading obsessively on death and on suicide, "trying to make sense of the experience, trying to become big enough to let go of my brother. That’s what bereavement is about – surrendering the memory, the relationship." To this end, she relocated to Byron Bay, where she wrote The Eclipse: A Memoir of Suicide, a book about her brother's suicideSuicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
and her engagement to, and the death of, late British GQ editor Michael VerMeulen
Michael VerMeulen
Michael VerMeulen was an American magazine editor.Born in [Lake Forest, Illinois], VerMeulen was a journalist and editor, who came into contact during his late adolescence with playwright David Mamet and the circle of actors surrounding him in Chicago at that time...
. In a November 2003 interview with a British magazine, she said: "I wanted to explain depression as a valid emotional response rather than as a disease ... I am not ashamed of my brother, and I do not see death as tragic - deliberate ignorance and fear are tragedies, not death."
In a 2004 review section cover story for The Weekend Australian, Murray Waldren wrote that Gambotto-Burke used to be "upfront in other ways, being acerbic and self-deprecatory while displaying trip-wire intellect and romantic girlishness ... But the past ten years have been a whirl of small triumphs, deep sorrows and much death, and they have left Gambotto bruised, saddened, and now, resolutely remade."
Film
Gambotto-Burke was commissioned to write the core love stories of artist David Bromley's series of films, I Could Be Me (narrated by Hugo WeavingHugo Weaving
Hugo Wallace Weaving is a Nigerian born, English-Australian film actor and voice artist. He is best known for his roles as Agent Smith in the Matrix trilogy, Elrond in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, "V" in V for Vendetta, and performances in numerous Australian character dramas.-Early...
), which premiered at the Adelaide Festival in 2008. In an essay, she noted that, "As scripts are founded on what Alan Alda calls the 'subsurface tectonics of emotion,' the result can sometimes be a psychic slam dunk." Director Bromley described the film as "like a kaleidoscope of images and it is run by my poetry and short stories by Antonella. And it has a large animation component."
Marriage and Motherhood
She was a regular contributor to My Child magazine. Her column, Raising Bethesda, concerned life with her husband, Alexander Gambotto-Burke, an arts and business journalist, and their baby. She wrote about his marriage proposal in the July 2008 issue of VogueVogue (magazine)
Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine that is published monthly in 18 national and one regional edition by Condé Nast.-History:In 1892 Arthur Turnure founded Vogue as a weekly publication in the United States. When he died in 1909, Condé Montrose Nast picked up the magazine and slowly began...
. Their daughter Bethesda Natalina was born in December 2005, and baptized in 2007 by Bishop John Shelby Spong
John Shelby Spong
John Shelby "Jack" Spong is a retired American bishop of the Episcopal Church. He was formerly the Bishop of Newark . He is a liberal Christian theologian, religion commentator and author...
.
Recent work
Gambotto-Burke has in recent years changed her journalistic focus. Her writing about human traffickingHuman trafficking
Human trafficking is the illegal trade of human beings for the purposes of reproductive slavery, commercial sexual exploitation, forced labor, or a modern-day form of slavery...
has been syndicated around the world, and she has become a vocal opponent of cyber pornography and pornography as a whole. Blog critics describe her as shrilly denouncing pornography, but her work on pornography has been published internationally, most recently in Men's Style, The Weekend Australian and The South China Morning Post. Asked for her opinion on the literary vogue for callgirl memoirs, she noted: "Prostitutes are not sexual experts, but expert in profiting from dysfunctional sexuality. There is a very significant difference."
She is also a widely-published literary critic and essayist. Gambotto-Burke specializes in reviewing nonfiction - memoir, psychology, philosophy, and popular culture - and continues to address controversial topics such as paternal infanticide and mental illness in her essays. The Sydney Morning Herald critic Doug Anderson
Doug Anderson
Doug Anderson is a columnist and writer for The Sydney Morning Herald, who specialises in film and television. He has served as an adjudicator at the Banff Television Festival.-External links:...
described her book reviews as having "the silken sting of iced nylons." In 2006, Gambotto-Burke told Vogue that "Language shapes consciousness and from consciousness, our world is shaped."
Her choice of interviewees remains eclectic. Recent interviewees include Marilyn Manson
Marilyn Manson
Marilyn Manson may refer to:* Marilyn Manson , an American rock musician* Marilyn Manson , the American rock band led by the singer of the same name...
, Bette Midler
Bette Midler
Bette Midler is an American singer, actress, and comedian, also known by her informal stage name, The Divine Miss M. She became famous as a cabaret and concert headliner, and went on to star in successful and acclaimed films such as The Rose, Ruthless People, Beaches, and For The Boys...
, David Sedaris
David Sedaris
David Sedaris is a Grammy Award-nominated American humorist, writer, comedian, bestselling author, and radio contributor....
, Chelsea Handler
Chelsea Handler
Chelsea Joy Handler is an American stand-up comedian, humorist, television host, actress, model and best-selling author. She currently hosts a late-night talk show titled, Chelsea Lately on the E! Cable Television Network. In 2009 she won a Bravo A-List Award...
, Sarah Silverman
Sarah Silverman
Sarah Kate Silverman is a Jewish American comedian, writer, actress, singer and musician. Her satirical comedy addresses social taboos and controversial topics such as racism, sexism, and religion....
, and her interview with actor Eric Bana
Eric Bana
Eric Bana is an Australian film and television actor. He began his career as a comedian in the sketch comedy series Full Frontal before gaining critical recognition in the biopic Chopper...
was the cover story for Live, The Mail on Sunday
The Mail on Sunday
The Mail on Sunday is a British conservative newspaper, currently published in a tabloid format. First published in 1982 by Lord Rothermere, it became Britain's biggest-selling Sunday newspaper following the closing of The News of the World in July 2011...
's weekend magazine. She has critiqued authors as disparate as American playwright David Mamet
David Mamet
David Alan Mamet is an American playwright, essayist, screenwriter and film director.Best known as a playwright, Mamet won a Pulitzer Prize and received a Tony nomination for Glengarry Glen Ross . He also received a Tony nomination for Speed-the-Plow . As a screenwriter, he received Oscar...
, Neil Gaiman
Neil Gaiman
Neil Richard Gaiman born 10 November 1960)is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, graphic novels, audio theatre and films. His notable works include the comic book series The Sandman and novels Stardust, American Gods, Coraline, and The Graveyard Book...
and Michael Chabon
Michael Chabon
Michael Chabon born May 24, 1963) is an American author and "one of the most celebrated writers of his generation", according to The Virginia Quarterly Review....
, and has written a number of lead news stories for The Australian
The Australian
The Australian is a broadsheet newspaper published in Australia from Monday to Saturday each week since 14 July 1964. The editor in chief is Chris Mitchell, the editor is Clive Mathieson and the 'editor-at-large' is Paul Kelly....
's business pages, most recently about lawyers and legal issues.
In July 2009, she announced that a book contract had been signed. She did not mention the title, only that it would be published in 2011.
Anthologies
- An Instinct for the KillAn Instinct for the KillAn Instinct for the Kill is the second of Antonella Gambotto-Burke's books and her second anthology. It was dedicated to investment banker Mark Burrows. In his introduction to the book, Edward de Bono writes: "Antonella is not afraid of words, ideas, her own opinions or the opinions of others....
(HarperCollins Australia, 1997) - Lunch of BloodLunch of BloodLunch of Blood is Antonella Gambotto-Burke's first book and first anthology. The title was inspired by a Saul Bellow poem:"Mice hide when hawks are high;Hawks shy from airplanes;Planes dread the ack-ack-ack; Each one fears somebody....
(Random House Australia, 1994)
Memoirs
- Untitled (2011).
- The Eclipse: A Memoir of Suicide (Broken Ankle Books Australia, 2003)
As a contributor
- Nick Cave: Sinner, Saint: The True Confessions, 30 Years of Essential Interviews, edited by Mat Snow (Plexus Publishing, 2011).
- My Favourite Teacher, edited by Robert MacklinRobert MacklinRobert Victor Macklin is an Australian author and journalist.Macklin was born in 1941 and began his writing career for the Brisbane Courier Mail, later moving to The Age in Melbourne and then The Canberra Times in Canberra. In 1967 he became press secretary to Deputy Prime Minister John McEwen...
(University of New South Wales Press, 2011). - Your Mother Would Be Proud: True Tales of Mayhem and Misadventure,, edited by Tamara Sheward and Jenny Valentish (Allen & Unwin, 2009).
- What Is Mother Love?, edited by Selwa Anthony (Penguin, 2008).
- Some Girls Do ... My Life as a Teenager, edited by Jacinta TynanJacinta TynanJacinta Tynan has been a news presenter and journalist for more than 12 years, she is currently a news presenter on Sky News Australia, where she has been since 2005....
(Allen & Unwin, 2007). - The Best Australian Profiles, edited by Matthew Ricketson (Black Inc., 2004).
- The Thoughts of Chairman Stan, by Stan ZemanekStan ZemanekStan Zemanek was an Australian radio broadcaster who presented a popular night time show on 2UE Sydney and which was networked across parts of Australia via Southern Cross....
(HarperCollins Australia, 1998): afterword by Gambotto-Burke. - Love Cries: Cruel Passions, Strange Desires, edited by Peter Blazey (HarperCollins Australia, 1995).
- This I Believe: 100 Eminent Australians Explore Life's Big Question, edited by John Marsden (writer)John Marsden (writer)John Marsden is an Australian writer, teacher and school principal. Marsden has had his books translated into nine languages including Swedish, Norwegian, French, German, Dutch, Danish, Italian and Spanish....
(Random House Australia, 1996). - ShrinkLit, edited by Michele Field (Penguin, 1983).
Television appearances
Gambotto-Burke has appeared on programs such as Beauty & The BeastBeauty and the Beast (talk show)
Beauty and the Beast is an Australian panel television show that has appeared in numerous versions since the early days of Australian television. The first version began in 1963 on the Seven Network with host Eric Baume as the "Beast". Baume was later replaced by presenters including John Laws,...
(Channel Ten, Foxtel
Foxtel
Foxtel is an Australian pay television company, operating cable, direct broadcast satellite television and IPTV services. It was formed in 1995 through a joint venture established between Telstra and News Corporation....
), The Midday Show (Channel 9
Nine Network
The Nine Network , is an Australian television network with headquarters based in Willoughby, a suburb located on the North Shore of Sydney. For 50 years since television's inception in Australia, between 1956 and 2006, it was the most watched television network in Australia...
), Meet the Press
Meet the Press
Meet the Press is a weekly American television news/interview program produced by NBC. It is the longest-running television series in American broadcasting history, despite bearing little resemblance to the original format of the program seen in its television debut on November 6, 1947. It has been...
(SBS
Special Broadcasting Service
The Special Broadcasting Service is a hybrid-funded Australian public broadcasting radio and television network. The stated purpose of SBS is "to provide multilingual and multicultural radio and television services that inform, educate and entertain all Australians and, in doing so, reflect...
), and performed cameos on Paul Fenech
Paul Fenech
Paul Fenech is a film maker, television and film actor and writer from Sydney, Australia, best known for his role in Pizza and Swift and Shift Couriers .-Career:...
's SBS sitcom Pizza.