Narrabeen Boys' High School Choir - 1963

Narrabeen Boys' High School Choir

1963

In this photo of the Narrabeen Boys’ High School choir taken in 1963, that's me, Kerry Wright, in the second row from the front, fifth from the left (click on the image to enlarge it). For the most part, I felt safe in the choir. It offered me a place of sanctuary from the rampaging, pint-sized thugs in the schoolyard. I was a boy soprano. Come to think of it, we were all boy sopranos! That year, our choir joined with other school choirs from throughout New South Wales to form a combined schools’ choir, which performed with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra in Sydney Town Hall as part of Education Week celebrations. The concert was filmed for television and I remember watching it on our black and white set at home. Among other pieces, we sang excerpts from Henry Purcell’s opera, “Dido and Aeneas”, which I have loved ever since. To this day, its sublimely beautiful and deeply lachrymose aria, “Dido’s Lament”, remains one of my all-time favourite pieces of music. Click on this link to see Jessye Norman performing it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jOIAi2XwuWo

Following a devastating conflagration some years ago, the incinerated Narrabeen Boys’ High School ceased to be and has subsequently risen from the ashes as Narrabeen Sports High School.

Kerry Wright - 1961

Kerry Wright

1961

This portrait of me was taken in late 1961. I was in my final year at Narrabeen Lakes Primary School, prior to progressing to high school in 1962. I had just turned 12. 

I’m wearing my new high school uniform. That school’s motto, “Enitere ad Finem” (“Strive to the End”), is indelibly emblazoned upon my psyche, conjuring nightmare flashbacks of brutality, cruelty and wanton bastardization. I was repeatedly and systematically bullied, physically and psychologically, throughout my six years at Narrabeen Boys’ High School. Why? Probably because I was sensitive, artistic, gentle and caring. It didn’t help any that I had absolutely no interest in sport – a blasphemy in the eyes of my tormentors. 

But worst of all, I was pretty! The feral little thugs at my alma mater soon took to referring to me in the feminine gender, usually with accompanying kicks and punches and wails of derisive laughter, as I cowered and begged them to “Go away”. They travelled in packs, shrieking “Fu**ing poofter!” as they attacked. Somehow they seemed to know I was gay even before I did! 

Dad tried taking me to boxing lessons but I was far too timid to attend, so I simply had to accept my fate and “strive to the end” of those six hate-filled years as best I could. 

This all sounds like just another pathetic, self-indulgent, victim’s tale of woe, I know. It’s cringesome - even I can see that. Lots of kids were bullied at school, you’re thinking. Get over it and move on! But I’m simply recounting the facts here. I’m not looking for sympathy. This was my experience. Certainly, if nothing else, it taught me how to be internally tough and resilient. And it taught me how to survive.