"Watching Me as I Write": Performing Masculinity in John Hughes's "The Idea of Home"

In country towns, John Hughes's autobiographical essay on his father, he describes his reticent subject's talen on the rugby league field--a performance not personally witnessed, as his playing days predated the author's birth. As an important site for the performance of masculinity in Australian auto/biographical writing, the sporting arena is highly codified: different sports and particularly codes of football are ascribed differing degrees of masculinity. Among other things Mansfield shares that two major sites of performing masculinity discusses here are the pub and the sporting arena, though several minor ones will also explored, including the workplace, and domestic spaces as the garage and the verandah.