Dad and me and creativity
Do you have a muse? Many ongoing muses?
Who or what inspires your creativity?
Dad and me
My original muse was my Dad, David Swain. Dad made a life of writing, cartooning and mentoring other creative sparks.
His first book, The Cantbeworried Tales, came out when I was seven. He gently satirised Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales in cartoon and verse. This little book made a big impact on his world and mine.
The Cantbeworried Tales
David Swain’s first book
When I was eleven,
my Dad initiated Australia’s first professional writing degree course. He was a natural born mentor, encourager, inspirer.
My first book, Great Housewives of Art, came out when I was thirty. 1988. It appeared on international bestseller lists along with Peter Carey’s Oscar and Lucinda and Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses. Mrs Degas and friends led me on a not-always-merry dance to Darwin and New York exhibitions, Belgian postcard books, San Francisco T-shirts, Chinese feminist treatises, spin-offs, rip-offs and more.
Great Housewives of Art
original 1988 edition
(Grafton, HarperCollins, UK). Other editions followed.
Great Housewives of Art
Norwegian edition
Several years after that, I initiated Art and Soul – offering group and individual support for people to creatively blossom.
One day, I sat down. I looked at Cantbeworried. I looked at Great Housewives. Both slim volumes – turn them sideways and they disappear. Both books of words and pictures. Both humorous. Both composed of a series of types.
I realised. I am my father’s daughter. How could I have not seen the influence he had on me and my art?
Dad and me
Today, on the fifth anniversary of my Dad’s death, I miss him. I’m not done with honouring David Swain – my original muse.
Art and Soul Space 
Such a touching and beautiful story that speaks volumes and cannot be contained or done justice by the width of a book’s spine. xo
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Thank you, kindly. You have touched my heart in turn.
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He was my Dad and my muse, too! And recently Ruby (his granddaughter) has been getting out his ‘how to draw cartoons’ books – which he collected over a few distinctly styled decades – and has been inspired to create her own humorous words and pictures.
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Hurrah! Jennie! The other daughter and musette. What’s the word for a muse recipient? Musee? A-mused one?
Anyways, I am so glad you are here speaking out.
And let’s celebrate Ruby – next generation musee. I have on my wall a cartoon she drew at age four, inspired by a ‘Free Women’ cartoon in one of Dad’s books. I love this.
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Jen – are you willing to share a story of how Dad A-Mused you? A little one?
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