| ![]() |  "Anne" |
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I graduated in Electrical Engineering from Melbourne University in 1954, and in February 1955 I took up a graduate apprenticeship with the English Electric Co at Rugby, UK, where I hoped to become an expert in atomic power. However I found that the company was positively medieval in it's outlook and methods, and the only atomic power station they ever built had failed disastrously not long before I arrived.
In July I managed to transfer to their Mechanical Engineering Laboratory at Whetstone, near Leicester, where I worked on governors for water turbines. I was still deeply troubled by the accidental destruction of my personal faith some years earlier, and now also by the realisation that I would never achieve my dream of becoming an expert in atomic power. There were no other Australians at Whetstone, and I was desperately lonely, but also seriously lacking in the social skills needed to form a lasting relationship. I got to know one of the girls in the office, and courted her with a desperate intensity, but inevitably I soon frightened her off, and this threw me into the depths of despair. Most of these poems were written between August 1955, when I first got to know her, and May 1956, when we finally separated. The last few poems were written in 1959, when I was studying German at Melbourne University part-time, and eventually found the inspiration to overcome my personal problems in Goethe's Urfaust.  Roger Riordan 2005.  (The Occasional Address I gave at Newcastle University in April 2005, when I was awarded an Honorary Degree, gives more information about this period in my life.) Tx_f__656: Line no = -1, Len_no = 12, Log:0: Tx_f__210: Line no = 0, Rcsv_lvl = 01: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 1: %p;;I graduated in Electrical Engineering from Melbourne University in 1954, and in February 1955 I took up a graduate apprenticeship with the English Electric Co at Rugby, UK, where I hoped to become an expert in atomic power.
, Table = 2: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 2: %p;;However I found that the company was positively medieval in it's outlook and methods, and the only atomic power station they ever built had failed disastrously not long before I arrived.
In July I managed to transfer to their Mechanical Engineering Laboratory at Whetstone, near Leicester, where I worked on governors for water turbines.
, Table = 3: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 3: %p;;I was still deeply troubled by the accidental destruction of my personal faith some years earlier, and now also by the realisation that I would never achieve my dream of becoming an expert in atomic power. There were no other Australians at Whetstone, and I was desperately lonely, but also seriously lacking in the social skills needed to form a lasting relationship.
, Table = 4: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 4: %p;;I got to know one of the girls in the office, and courted her with a desperate intensity, but inevitably I soon frightened her off, and this threw me into the depths of despair.
, Table = 5: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 5: %p;;Most of these poems were written between August 1955, when I first got to know her, and May 1956, when we finally separated. The last few poems were written in 1959, when I was studying German at Melbourne University part-time, and eventually found the inspiration to overcome my personal problems in Goethe's Urfaust.
, Table = 6: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 6: %p;h6;
, Table = 7: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 7: %p;p class="airtext";Roger Riordan 2005.
, Table = 8: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 8: %p;h5;
, Table = 9: Txf_218: Lvl = 0, Line 9: %p;p class="airtext";(The Occasional Address I gave at Newcastle University in April 2005, when I was awarded an Honorary Degree, gives more information about this period in my life.)
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