Back Chat. "Spooling Through: An Irreverent Memoir" by Tim Bowden. [review]

Abstract

Anyone who remembers the amiable host of the ABC’s television show "Backchat", which he compèred for eight years from 1986, will not be surprised to learn that Tim Bowden has written a breezily readable memoir. Its pages seem to turn of their own volition. Like many an autobiographer before him, Bowden sometimes overestimates how much one wants to know of the japesy aspects of his early life or of escapades that may have been fun at the time but which belong to the 'you probably had to be there' category for full appreciation. The overall effect is chronological-anecdotal, rather than more eloquently shaped. It is a life worth the telling, professionally useful and privately fulfilling. And you can scarcely take exception to a man who could play tunes on his teeth - and who did so on national television.