Brook Emery (born 24 July 1949) is an Australian poet, educator, and surf lifesaver. Described by Martin Duwell as "a major poet",Duwell, Martin (2022), "Brook Emery: Sea Scale: New and Selected Poems, Waratah, NSW: Puncher and Wattmann, 2022, 291pp.", Australian Poetry Review, 1 June 2022. and recipient of the 2011 $25,000 for Poetry Australian Council Literature Board Grant for Developing Writers,Grants for Developing Writers, AustLit. Emery has been the New South Wales editor of Blue Dog, the Journal of the Australian Poetry Centre. Along with Peter Minter, David Brooks, and Martin Harrison he was one of the founders of the Sydney Poetry Network. He has chaired the Australian Poetry Festival and the Poets Union, and is a mentor at the Australian Society of Authors.PF.1.
Family The son of Englishman Derek John Edward Emery (1914-1975)Derek Emery served overseas in the Second AIF (see: his father's Service Record and Nominal Roll details, and Brook's poem, "My Father's Eyes", Westerly, Vol.44, No.3, (Spring 1999), pp. 40-41.).He died at Dural, New South Wales on 14 August 1975 (Births, Deaths and Marriages New South Wales Deaths Registration no.22321/1975). and his Australian wife, Cecil Audrey "Pat" Westbrook (1921-1965),Births: Westbrooke (sic), The Sydney Morning Herald, (Saturday, 26 February 1921), p. 12.Engagements: Emery-Westbrook, The Sydney Morning Herald, (Saturday, 4 December 1943), p. 180.They were married at Woollahra, New South Wales on 24 April 1947 (Births, Deaths and Marriages New South Wales Marriages Registration no.14391/1947).Deaths: Emery, The Sydney Morning Herald, (Thursday, 16 December 1965), p. 24. Nigel Westbrook Emery, known as "Brook", was born at St. Margaret's Maternity Hospital, Darlinghurst, Sydney, New South Wales on 24 July 1949.Births: Emery, The Sydney Morning Herald, (Saturday, 30 July 1949), p. 30. His father, Derek Emery, was a prominent member of the Dajonian Repertory Society from 1936 to 1940."Dajonian Repertory Society", The Sydney Morning Herald, (Saturday, 25 January 1936), p. 12."Honours Easy", The (Sydney) Sun, Thursday, 30 January 1936), p. 36."Street Scene", The Sydney Morning Herald, (Saturday, 3 June 1939), p. 9."Plans Comedy Year", ", The (Sydney) Daily News, (Saturday, 6 April 1940), p. 6., and "Members of the cast of Baby Cyclone (photograph)", The (Sydney) Daily News, (Saturday, 6 April 1940), p. 6.
Brook had two siblings: a younger brother, Curtis Leigh Emery, known as "Leigh",Births: Emery, The Sydney Morning Herald, (Wednesday, 25 July 1951), p. 32. and a younger sister, Stephanie Gail Emery, later Stephanie Gail Rumball. He married Susan Jean Dixon, also a teacher, at Grafton, New South Wales in 1972;Births, Deaths and Marriages New South Wales Marriages Registration no.63291/1972). they had three children: a daughter, and twins (daughter and son).
Education Secondary Emery was a talented student; and, having won a New South Wales Government Bursary to commence his secondary studies in 1962 at Vaucluse High School,SMH.1.Emery makes special mention of the Vaucluse High School's motto Lumen Scientiae ('The light of knowledge') in his poem, "Self Portrait: Provisional Sketch" (Sea Scale: New & Selected Poems, pp. 15-22, at p. 15). he not only went on to pass in all five of his H.S.C. subjects in 1967 (the first year of the Higher School Certificate in New South Wales),SMH.3. but was also listed in the "Order of Merit" for his "meritorious performance in [his] attainment of passes at first level in the Higher School Certificate examination" in both English and Modern History.TCT.1.
Tertiary: undergraduate Emery attended the University of Sydney from 1968 to 1971, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.)UoS.1, p. 32. and a Diploma of Education (Dip.Ed.)UoS.1, p. 53. in 1972.
Tertiary: postgraduate He returned to study in the 1980s, graduating with a Master of Arts (M.A.) from the University of Sydney in 1983;UoS.2, p. 27. and then, later, he went on to study with the School of Language and Media at the University of Newcastle, graduating Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) on 19 April 2004.UoN.2, p. 36.
Surf lifesaver Swimming At 13, and competing in the 14 Years category, he swam for Vaucluse High School in the Combined Eastern Suburbs High Schools Swimming Carnival. Swimming in three different events on the same day, he came third in the 55 yards Butterfly, second in the 55 yards Breaststroke, and second in the longest distance contested in that age division, the 220 yards Freestyle.SMH.2. Both Emery brothers were accomplished surf swimmers.Brook was the Bondi Surf Bathers' Life Saving Club's Junior Surf champion in the 1964/1965 season (BSB.1, p. 13), and Leigh was a member of the Australian Surf Lifesaving Team for three years: 1970—1972 (BSB.9, p. 61).
Belt rescue
Gaining his Bronze Medallion from Surf Life Saving Australia in 1965, he was one of 20 members of the Bondi Surf Bathers' Life Saving Club to be awarded a Patrol Efficiency Pennant for his efforts during the 1964/1965 season.BSB.1, p. 8. He was a regular member of the Club's beach patrol teams over eight seasons (1964/1965 to 1971/1972). On 22 February 1969, a day when many of Sydney's beaches were closed because of "dangerous rips and high seas", Brook made a real-life belt rescue of a man who had been "carried 100 yards to sea by a strong rip" at Bondi Beach.TSH.2.
Rescue & Resuscitation (R & R) Rescue & Resuscitation (R & R) was a challenging competition involving a team of six, within which a rescue was simulated, with the designated "patient" (maybe 100 metres out to sea) and a "belt-man" wearing a harness connected to a life saving reel operated by another member of the team and the remaining three lifesavers in charge of the playing out the (cotton coated in beeswax) line as the rescuer ran from the beach, swam out to the "patient" and, with the assistance of their team-mates' line-pulling assistance, returning the "patient" to the shore (i.e., the "Rescue"). Then, with the "patient" lying on the beach, "Resuscitation" was simulated.See: for instance, "Surf Life Saving Reels", Pittwater Online News, No.77, (23-29 September 2012); and, for a description of the first-ever public demonstration, see: "Bondi Surf-Bathers' Life Saving Club", The Australian Town and Country Journal, (Wednesday, 24 April 1907), p. 27.
Over eight seasons Brook Emery was a regular member of the Bondi Club's R & R competition team: the Junior R & R team in 1964/1965,The Junior team, with Brook as a member, came fifth in the 1965 NSW State Championship (BSB.1, p 10). 1965/1966,The Junior team, with Brook as a member, came second in the 1966 NSW State Championship (BSB.2, p.18). and 1966/1967;The Junior team, with Brook as a member, came second in the 1967 NSW State Championship (BSB.3, p.16). and the Senior R & R team in 1967/1968,The Senior team, with both Brook and Leigh as members with Brook as "patient", and Leigh as "belt-man" (TSH.1, SMH.4) came first in the 1968 Sydney Metropolitan Championship, first in the 1968 NSW State Championship, and third in the 1968 Australian National Championships (BSB.4, p.20-21). 1968/1969,The Senior team, with both Brook and Leigh as members, came third in the 1969 NSW State Championship (BSB.5, p.19). 1969/1970,The Senior team, with both Brook and Leigh as members, came first in the 1970 NSW State Championship, and fourth in the 1970 Australian National Championships (BSB.6, pp.14, 18). 1970/1971,The Senior team, with both Brook and Leigh as members, came first in the 1971 NSW State Championship, and third in the 1971 Australian Inter-Club Championships (BSB.7, p.15). and 1971/1972, when the Senior team, with both Brook and Leigh as members, came first in the 1972 NSW State Championship, first in the 1972 Australian National Championships, and won the 1972 Australian Surf Life Saving Premiership (BSB.8, pp.3,7,8).
Club Captain In the 1970/1971 season Brook Emery was the Vice-Captain of the Bondi Surf Bathers' Life Saving Club (BSB.7, p.14); and, at the age of 22, he was the captain of the Club for the 1971/1972 season.Fox (1972), p. 77.BSB.8, pp. 2,11. He left the Club after the 1971/1972 season due to his posting to Grafton, in the far north-east of New South Wales, as a teacher.Allen (1972)Mossop (1973).
Educator
Following his graduation at Sydney University he served for 25 years as a specialist English and History teacher at several NSW high schools:UoN.1. viz., Grafton High School, Sydney Boys High School, Maroubra Bay High School, and Dover Heights High School.
Poet When interviewed in 2013, Emery not only observed that "much of my writing is about the sea", but also that "I've been a surfer all my life and both my books [viz., and dug my fingers in the sand (2000), and Misplaced Heart (2003)] are full of the sea and the surf"; and, in 2016,"Adapted for Land" (2016). he stressed that, as a surfer, he was "a body surfer rather than a boardrider".
Poems His first-ever published poem, "Tapping the Market", appeared in Education, the Journal of the New South Wales Teachers Federation in 1993.Verse: "Tapping the Market", Education: Journal of the New South Wales Public School Teachers Federation, Vol.74, No.11, (23 August 1993), p. 19. His poem, "Crossing the Border", which appeared in Southerly in 1994, was the first of his poems to be published in a literary journal.Emery, Brook (1994), "Crossing the Border", Southerly, Vol.54, No.4, (December 1994), p. 77. His poem, "Pinball Rider", which appeared in Spectrum, the Saturday Supplement to The Sydney Morning Herald, in 1997, was the first of his poems to be published in a newspaper.Emery, Brook (1997), "Pinball Rider", Spectrum (supplement to the Sydney Morning Herald), (Saturday, 9 August 1997), p. 10. His poem, "Death at Birth", which appeared (p.26) in Helen Annand's (1998) The Second Worst Thing: Poems on Surviving the Death of a Child, was the first of his poems to be published in an anthology.Annand, Helen (ed.) (1998), The Second Worst Thing: Poems on Surviving the Death of a Child, Bendigo, Vic: Helen Annand, 1998.
Publications In addition to Education, Southerly, Spectrum, and The Second Worst Thing, his poems have been published in a wide range of publications.For extensive list, see:
Anthologies