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My Story
On Wednesday 23 June 2010, with the government in turmoil, Julia Gillard asked then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd for a leadership ballot.
The next day, Julia Gillard became Australia’s 27th Prime Minister, and our first female leader. Australia was alive to the historic possibilities. Here was a new approach for a new time.
It was to last three extraordinary years.
This is Julia Gillard’s chronicle of that turbulent time – a strikingly candid self-portrait of a political leader seeking to realise her ideals. It is her story of what it was like – in the face of government in-fighting and often hostile media – to manage a hung parliament, build a diverse and robust economy, create an equitable and world-class education system, ensure a dignified future for Australians with disabilities, all while attending to our international obligations and building strategic alliances for our future. This is a politician driven by a sense of purpose – from campus days with the Australian Union of Students, to a career in the law, to her often gritty, occasionally glittering rise up the ranks of the Australian Labor Party.
Refreshingly honest, peppered with a wry humour and personal insights, Julia Gillard does not shy away from her mistakes, as well as detailing her political successes. Here is an account of what was hidden behind the resilience and dignified courage Gillard showed as prime minister, her view of the vicious hate campaigns directed against her, and a reflection on what it means – and what it takes – to be a woman leader in contemporary politics.
Here, in her own words, Julia Gillard reveals what life was really like as Australia’s first female prime minister.
The next day, Julia Gillard became Australia’s 27th Prime Minister, and our first female leader. Australia was alive to the historic possibilities. Here was a new approach for a new time.
It was to last three extraordinary years.
This is Julia Gillard’s chronicle of that turbulent time – a strikingly candid self-portrait of a political leader seeking to realise her ideals. It is her story of what it was like – in the face of government in-fighting and often hostile media – to manage a hung parliament, build a diverse and robust economy, create an equitable and world-class education system, ensure a dignified future for Australians with disabilities, all while attending to our international obligations and building strategic alliances for our future. This is a politician driven by a sense of purpose – from campus days with the Australian Union of Students, to a career in the law, to her often gritty, occasionally glittering rise up the ranks of the Australian Labor Party.
Refreshingly honest, peppered with a wry humour and personal insights, Julia Gillard does not shy away from her mistakes, as well as detailing her political successes. Here is an account of what was hidden behind the resilience and dignified courage Gillard showed as prime minister, her view of the vicious hate campaigns directed against her, and a reflection on what it means – and what it takes – to be a woman leader in contemporary politics.
Here, in her own words, Julia Gillard reveals what life was really like as Australia’s first female prime minister.
504 pages, Hardcover
First published September 24, 2014
About the author
Julia Gillard
8 books106 followersOn 24 June 2010 Julia Gillard became Australia's 27th Prime Minister and the first woman to hold the office. She was elected unopposed by the Parliamentary Labor Party.
Before becoming Prime Minister, she served as Deputy Prime Minister from 2007 to 2010 in Kevin Rudd's Labor government, where she was Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, Minister for Education, and Minister for Social Inclusion.
On 26 June 2013, Gillard was defeated in a leadership ballot by Rudd, who was sworn in as Prime Minister the following day, 27 June. She announced that she would not contest her seat at the forthcoming election and was retiring from politics.
She was the federal Member for Lalor (Victoria) and was first elected to Parliament in 1998.
Before becoming Prime Minister, she served as Deputy Prime Minister from 2007 to 2010 in Kevin Rudd's Labor government, where she was Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, Minister for Education, and Minister for Social Inclusion.
On 26 June 2013, Gillard was defeated in a leadership ballot by Rudd, who was sworn in as Prime Minister the following day, 27 June. She announced that she would not contest her seat at the forthcoming election and was retiring from politics.
She was the federal Member for Lalor (Victoria) and was first elected to Parliament in 1998.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 132 reviews
August 25, 2020
Julia Gillard was Australia's first, and so far is our only, female Prime Minister. For three years and three days during 2010 to 2013 she was PM. During her time in power, as leader of the Australian Labor Party (ALP), I liked what I saw which is the only reason I decided to listen to her autobiographical audiobook My Story. I somewhat shamefully confess to being apathetic when it comes to politics but there's a reason for this and that is I cannot stand the...well, the politics of it all. Most politicians come across as less than genuine, overly self absorbed, and unafraid of spinning the facts to suit the story they're selling. This was not at all the impression I took from Julia Gillard's story. Having listened to My Story I have a great deal of admiration and renewed respect for her. The words respect and politicians don't often go hand in hand in my book so I consider this high praise.
Not only was this easy to listen to, I was completely absorbed in the information she was imparting. If I could receive all my political messages in such a straight forward manner without all the argy bargy, muck raking and name calling we have to listen to in parliament and in the media pages, I'm sure I'd be much more interested and well informed and way less apathetic.
As with many autobiographical works I've read or listened to there were moments I questioned how impartial this story was. She was definitely painting herself in the most positive light. In many ways I was reminded of the self assessments I've been asked to complete in corporate workplaces in preparation for a performance review. These self assessments offer employees the opportunity to put a case forward for good work done during a set period. Listening to Julia's audiobook made me brutally aware of the overall insignificance of my own contributions and totally in awe of her contributions. She was motivated and worked tirelessly with purpose, and she achieved a great many goals which contributed to the betterment of the lives of vast numbers of Australians. She came across as highly intelligent and articulate. She appeared to be genuinely interested in all people and wanted the best, the fairest outcomes for all. The topics she covered were broad ranging and she spoke with intelligence and convincingly on each subject whether climate change, education, health and welfare, foreign policy, workplace relations, media influence, gender equality or any one of dozens of others.
Despite my momentary reservations about impartiality she regularly took ownership of her mistakes, admitted to things she should or could have done differently and she came across as genuine and open. Genuine and transparent in the way she levelled criticism against some individuals and heaped praise on others. In fact, some individuals were recipients of both her criticism and her praise and this too made it seem she was being honest and fair in her assessments.
Perhaps readers who are passionately dedicated to the ALP's opposition - the Liberal Party - may not think quite so highly of her nor rate her story. Perhaps readers who are less apathetic and more engaged in the Australian political landscape may not have accepted everything she was claiming so readily as I did. However, as with all my reviews I tell it how I found it and to my own very great surprise I found it excellent. For a snippet of modern Australian history try it. For a glimpse into Australian party politics or the political environment in general I'm sure you can't go wrong.
Not only was this easy to listen to, I was completely absorbed in the information she was imparting. If I could receive all my political messages in such a straight forward manner without all the argy bargy, muck raking and name calling we have to listen to in parliament and in the media pages, I'm sure I'd be much more interested and well informed and way less apathetic.
As with many autobiographical works I've read or listened to there were moments I questioned how impartial this story was. She was definitely painting herself in the most positive light. In many ways I was reminded of the self assessments I've been asked to complete in corporate workplaces in preparation for a performance review. These self assessments offer employees the opportunity to put a case forward for good work done during a set period. Listening to Julia's audiobook made me brutally aware of the overall insignificance of my own contributions and totally in awe of her contributions. She was motivated and worked tirelessly with purpose, and she achieved a great many goals which contributed to the betterment of the lives of vast numbers of Australians. She came across as highly intelligent and articulate. She appeared to be genuinely interested in all people and wanted the best, the fairest outcomes for all. The topics she covered were broad ranging and she spoke with intelligence and convincingly on each subject whether climate change, education, health and welfare, foreign policy, workplace relations, media influence, gender equality or any one of dozens of others.
Despite my momentary reservations about impartiality she regularly took ownership of her mistakes, admitted to things she should or could have done differently and she came across as genuine and open. Genuine and transparent in the way she levelled criticism against some individuals and heaped praise on others. In fact, some individuals were recipients of both her criticism and her praise and this too made it seem she was being honest and fair in her assessments.
Perhaps readers who are passionately dedicated to the ALP's opposition - the Liberal Party - may not think quite so highly of her nor rate her story. Perhaps readers who are less apathetic and more engaged in the Australian political landscape may not have accepted everything she was claiming so readily as I did. However, as with all my reviews I tell it how I found it and to my own very great surprise I found it excellent. For a snippet of modern Australian history try it. For a glimpse into Australian party politics or the political environment in general I'm sure you can't go wrong.
June 18, 2017
For three years and three days I was prime minister. Three years and three days of resilience. Three years and three days of changing the nation. Three years and three days to give me a unique perspective of our future. Three years and three days for you to judge.
History will judge Julia and her government far more kindly than her contemporaries have. This was an exceptional woman leading an exceptional government. A prime minister that sought to make wide sweeping changes that would shape Australia for decades to come. This she managed despite the instability caused by 'Kevin 07', the blatant misogyny from the Opposition, and leading a minority government.
Julia speaks of her time in government as having had 'purpose'. I call it vision. Vision for a better and fairer Australia. Vision realised through policies like Gonski, the NDIS, the ETS, and paid parental leave, to name just some of those close to my heart. Through this book it is clear that Julia's purpose is fuelled by passion. Passion for education and passion for work participation. This is complemented by her desire for Australia to be more environmentally sustainable. I don't agree with all her policies *cough* asylum seekers *cough*, but what I have after reading this book is an understanding of why she took the position on the issue she did.
As would be expected, as well as going through achievements she is particularly proud of, Julia mentions other politicians. Her thoughts on Krudd aren't going to surprise anyone, but interesting to read regardless. Although rating few mentions, I was surprised she spoke warmly of Bill Shorten - or 'Littlefinger' as I like to call him. I was further surprised by the very negative views she had of the Greens. I'll admit to some disappointment at a lack of ranting about Tony Abbott. What was disheartening was her demonstration of how petty politics can be, and how fuelled by self-interest.
What stays with me after finishing this book is such incredible sadness. The vision Julia had is the Australia I want to live in (albeit with some tweaking of policy around asylum seekers). This was the most visionary prime minister of my life time so far, and Australia has lost a leader that would have guided us to a better Australia. I could just cry.
*****
A phenomenal woman who exposed just how deeply misogyny runs in Australia still. I love you so much Julia that I'll even pay the outrageous $48 they are charging for your book.
History will judge Julia and her government far more kindly than her contemporaries have. This was an exceptional woman leading an exceptional government. A prime minister that sought to make wide sweeping changes that would shape Australia for decades to come. This she managed despite the instability caused by 'Kevin 07', the blatant misogyny from the Opposition, and leading a minority government.
Julia speaks of her time in government as having had 'purpose'. I call it vision. Vision for a better and fairer Australia. Vision realised through policies like Gonski, the NDIS, the ETS, and paid parental leave, to name just some of those close to my heart. Through this book it is clear that Julia's purpose is fuelled by passion. Passion for education and passion for work participation. This is complemented by her desire for Australia to be more environmentally sustainable. I don't agree with all her policies *cough* asylum seekers *cough*, but what I have after reading this book is an understanding of why she took the position on the issue she did.
As would be expected, as well as going through achievements she is particularly proud of, Julia mentions other politicians. Her thoughts on Krudd aren't going to surprise anyone, but interesting to read regardless. Although rating few mentions, I was surprised she spoke warmly of Bill Shorten - or 'Littlefinger' as I like to call him. I was further surprised by the very negative views she had of the Greens. I'll admit to some disappointment at a lack of ranting about Tony Abbott. What was disheartening was her demonstration of how petty politics can be, and how fuelled by self-interest.
What stays with me after finishing this book is such incredible sadness. The vision Julia had is the Australia I want to live in (albeit with some tweaking of policy around asylum seekers). This was the most visionary prime minister of my life time so far, and Australia has lost a leader that would have guided us to a better Australia. I could just cry.
*****
A phenomenal woman who exposed just how deeply misogyny runs in Australia still. I love you so much Julia that I'll even pay the outrageous $48 they are charging for your book.
October 23, 2014
I was prime minster for three years and three days. Three years and three days of resilience. Three years and three days of changing the nation. Three years and three days to give me a unique perspective of our future.
Three years and three days for you to judge.
This is a hard review to write because I suspect the way people will feel about this book depends on how they feel about Julia Gillard. Because I bought this book, quite obviously I like her. I wouldn’t shell out for a hardback on someone I didn’t like. When Julia Gillard became Prime Minister in 2010, we had just moved to her electorate of Lalor in Melbourne’s south-west. It’s a mix of older, working class suburbs and land reclaimed from market gardeners and farmers that is being redeveloped into housing estates to accommodate the growing population. We’re 35m from the city on a good day when no one has broken down or had a fender bender on the West Gate. House prices are cheap, because they’re in plentiful supply. At the same time, you can see that changing quickly. Soon the land will be gone, the house prices will increase and the development push will continue out to Rockbank and Sunbury. Julia Gillard had been the member for Lalor for over ten years when she went from being Deputy Prime Minister behind Kevin Rudd, to Prime Minister in a spill. The government had lost faith in Rudd, who clearly was buckling under the pressures of the job.
But what Gillard and probably the rest of the Labor party didn’t realise, was that there were many who didn’t take too kindly to the way she came into power. She wasn’t democratically elected by the people. Faced with an extremely hostile media presence, mostly publications owned by the incredibly right-wing Rupert Murdoch company NewsCorp, Gillard faced constant criticism about everything – including her personal life with partner Tim, her clothes, her hair, her lack of children, her past times, her manner of speech. It was open slather and the attacks and claims of upcoming leadership challenges in the Labor party were published every other day. She had to not only concentrate on running the nation and getting things done after the Rudd period of inactivity but she had to be strong in the face of adversity and personal attack. She was unmarried and an athiest. She didn’t have any children – and was referred to as “deliberately barren” and unfit for leadership because of that by a Liberal MP. And of course her partner is a hairdresser which must mean he’s a homosexual! That was actually put to Julia Gillard in a radio interview by Howard Sattler who was later sacked because of it. I don’t think I’m alone when I feel that this would never have been asked of a male PM – if their wife was really a lesbian and it was all a sham. Because Gillard was both female and in a de facto relationship rather than protected by the “sanctity” marriage, it seemed as if it gave license to ask her rude, personal questions.
The book is divided into two sections, to answer the two questions Gillard says she is asked most frequently. The first section is how she did it, revolving around the downfall of Rudd and also pulling together a minority government after the 2010 election. The second section is why she did it, which revolves around her vision and what she wanted to implement as well as what motivated her. One thing that absolutely stands out in this book is Gillard’s passion for education. She wants desperately for everyone to have access to excellent quality education, the way she and her sister were able to after her family moved here from a dirt-poor Welsh mining town. She talks at length and often, how important education is to her and how it was one of her big agendas. As someone who now has a child at school, I find myself taking much more of an interest in both state and federal funding and the vision for the future. I’m far more interested in my children’s education than I was in my own at the time and it takes hindsight and maturity to appreciate the opportunities we are afforded here.
I told my husband and someone I spoke to after reading this that this book reads like a conversation with Gillard where she answers the questions before you can ask them. You don’t have to participate as such, just absorb the answers. It showcases her personality, which I don’t think was presented in the best light when she was leader. Gillard is actually warm and funny, quite humorous and very down to earth. When I was walking back home from dropping my son off at school yesterday, I listened to a podcast of Julia Gillard at a literary lunch with Tony Delroy and she is sort of questioned about this and she admits that she’s far better off the cuff, in her own words. She can prepare for things and deliver well in a format like Q&A, or The 7:30 Report but has never been much good at delivering a prepared speech word for word. This was something that hurt her at the time I think, because it seemed that people couldn’t really connect with her, especially after the way she came to power. Listening to the podcasts and her interviews since leaving power and reading her book showcases the sort of personality she could’ve perhaps offered if not distracted by so much negativity – the media, the scare campaign the opposition ran and also within her own party, which was always being or attempting to be, destabilised. She says there was always a need to be stoic, to not ever be seen as emotional (probably lest the ‘hysterical female’ accusations appear) and perhaps that contributed too. She doesn’t have that need anymore, she is able to be freer in her expression
This book is quite frank about the mistakes she made as well – decisions that she made that didn’t turn out to be right, people she trusted that she perhaps shouldn’t have, ideas she had that weren’t ready to be implemented. But I think ultimately Gillard is very proud of the government she led and how much it achieved in the face of such adversity. So many people forget that they passed over 500 pieces of legislation and as she says, “many important pieces, not just tidying up”. She’s proud of the fact that whilst it may not have been easy for her, being the first woman Prime Minister of Australia, she hopes that it will be for the next one….and the next one….and the next one after that. I think like many others do, that history will be much kinder to Gillard than the years she reigned in were. In time, she’ll be remembered for her ideas and her strength, rather than the fact she was a woman who wore clothes the media found boring and didn’t have a husband.
Three years and three days for you to judge.
This is a hard review to write because I suspect the way people will feel about this book depends on how they feel about Julia Gillard. Because I bought this book, quite obviously I like her. I wouldn’t shell out for a hardback on someone I didn’t like. When Julia Gillard became Prime Minister in 2010, we had just moved to her electorate of Lalor in Melbourne’s south-west. It’s a mix of older, working class suburbs and land reclaimed from market gardeners and farmers that is being redeveloped into housing estates to accommodate the growing population. We’re 35m from the city on a good day when no one has broken down or had a fender bender on the West Gate. House prices are cheap, because they’re in plentiful supply. At the same time, you can see that changing quickly. Soon the land will be gone, the house prices will increase and the development push will continue out to Rockbank and Sunbury. Julia Gillard had been the member for Lalor for over ten years when she went from being Deputy Prime Minister behind Kevin Rudd, to Prime Minister in a spill. The government had lost faith in Rudd, who clearly was buckling under the pressures of the job.
But what Gillard and probably the rest of the Labor party didn’t realise, was that there were many who didn’t take too kindly to the way she came into power. She wasn’t democratically elected by the people. Faced with an extremely hostile media presence, mostly publications owned by the incredibly right-wing Rupert Murdoch company NewsCorp, Gillard faced constant criticism about everything – including her personal life with partner Tim, her clothes, her hair, her lack of children, her past times, her manner of speech. It was open slather and the attacks and claims of upcoming leadership challenges in the Labor party were published every other day. She had to not only concentrate on running the nation and getting things done after the Rudd period of inactivity but she had to be strong in the face of adversity and personal attack. She was unmarried and an athiest. She didn’t have any children – and was referred to as “deliberately barren” and unfit for leadership because of that by a Liberal MP. And of course her partner is a hairdresser which must mean he’s a homosexual! That was actually put to Julia Gillard in a radio interview by Howard Sattler who was later sacked because of it. I don’t think I’m alone when I feel that this would never have been asked of a male PM – if their wife was really a lesbian and it was all a sham. Because Gillard was both female and in a de facto relationship rather than protected by the “sanctity” marriage, it seemed as if it gave license to ask her rude, personal questions.
The book is divided into two sections, to answer the two questions Gillard says she is asked most frequently. The first section is how she did it, revolving around the downfall of Rudd and also pulling together a minority government after the 2010 election. The second section is why she did it, which revolves around her vision and what she wanted to implement as well as what motivated her. One thing that absolutely stands out in this book is Gillard’s passion for education. She wants desperately for everyone to have access to excellent quality education, the way she and her sister were able to after her family moved here from a dirt-poor Welsh mining town. She talks at length and often, how important education is to her and how it was one of her big agendas. As someone who now has a child at school, I find myself taking much more of an interest in both state and federal funding and the vision for the future. I’m far more interested in my children’s education than I was in my own at the time and it takes hindsight and maturity to appreciate the opportunities we are afforded here.
I told my husband and someone I spoke to after reading this that this book reads like a conversation with Gillard where she answers the questions before you can ask them. You don’t have to participate as such, just absorb the answers. It showcases her personality, which I don’t think was presented in the best light when she was leader. Gillard is actually warm and funny, quite humorous and very down to earth. When I was walking back home from dropping my son off at school yesterday, I listened to a podcast of Julia Gillard at a literary lunch with Tony Delroy and she is sort of questioned about this and she admits that she’s far better off the cuff, in her own words. She can prepare for things and deliver well in a format like Q&A, or The 7:30 Report but has never been much good at delivering a prepared speech word for word. This was something that hurt her at the time I think, because it seemed that people couldn’t really connect with her, especially after the way she came to power. Listening to the podcasts and her interviews since leaving power and reading her book showcases the sort of personality she could’ve perhaps offered if not distracted by so much negativity – the media, the scare campaign the opposition ran and also within her own party, which was always being or attempting to be, destabilised. She says there was always a need to be stoic, to not ever be seen as emotional (probably lest the ‘hysterical female’ accusations appear) and perhaps that contributed too. She doesn’t have that need anymore, she is able to be freer in her expression
This book is quite frank about the mistakes she made as well – decisions that she made that didn’t turn out to be right, people she trusted that she perhaps shouldn’t have, ideas she had that weren’t ready to be implemented. But I think ultimately Gillard is very proud of the government she led and how much it achieved in the face of such adversity. So many people forget that they passed over 500 pieces of legislation and as she says, “many important pieces, not just tidying up”. She’s proud of the fact that whilst it may not have been easy for her, being the first woman Prime Minister of Australia, she hopes that it will be for the next one….and the next one….and the next one after that. I think like many others do, that history will be much kinder to Gillard than the years she reigned in were. In time, she’ll be remembered for her ideas and her strength, rather than the fact she was a woman who wore clothes the media found boring and didn’t have a husband.
October 26, 2014
Having read Julia's side of the events leading up to her becoming Labor leader and Prime Minister, and her time as Prime Minister, all I can say is that I wouldn't want to be a politician.
This is a fascinating book, with many insights into what drove her into politics, what life as a minister involves and ultimately the dedication, strength and resolve the position of Prime minister requires. Along with the discussions on the big policy issues - education, aged care, disability care, environment and climate change, there are stories about world leaders and family, which bring a human touch to everything. In particular the story about visiting a school in Washington DC with President Obama really brings home the impact that an inspiring political leader can have.
In the book Julia is true to her friends and supporters, but fair to those who she disagreed with, including Kevin Rudd - though this must have tested her to her limits. As Australians though I guess we will all have our own opinions on the Julia v. Kevin war.
Having read this book, I come away as a greater admirer of her than before, and hopeful that she will continue tp participate in Australian public life going forward, as she has lots more to give.
This is a fascinating book, with many insights into what drove her into politics, what life as a minister involves and ultimately the dedication, strength and resolve the position of Prime minister requires. Along with the discussions on the big policy issues - education, aged care, disability care, environment and climate change, there are stories about world leaders and family, which bring a human touch to everything. In particular the story about visiting a school in Washington DC with President Obama really brings home the impact that an inspiring political leader can have.
In the book Julia is true to her friends and supporters, but fair to those who she disagreed with, including Kevin Rudd - though this must have tested her to her limits. As Australians though I guess we will all have our own opinions on the Julia v. Kevin war.
Having read this book, I come away as a greater admirer of her than before, and hopeful that she will continue tp participate in Australian public life going forward, as she has lots more to give.
July 29, 2016
For three years and three days I was prime minister. Three years and three days of resilience. Three years and three days of changing the nation. Three years and three days to give me a unique perspective of our future. Three years and three days for you to judge.
Political biographies are just not a thing I read. Not because I don't think they aren't or couldn't be good, but just for the fact there aren't many political figures who've interested me enough to convince me to read a book about them. And then Julia Gillard released one and I thought maybe I would like to read a political biography.
Julia Gillard was Australia's first female Prime Minister and remains the only one we've ever had. I personally found her to be an entertaining and effective political figure, and I was a huge supporter of so many of her policies (lots of which were later repealed, thanks Abbott) But her time in politics and the inner workings of the Labor party at that time seemed to catch not only mine, but Australia's attention as a whole. Gillard's reports of sexism within politics, both before and after she became Prime Minister were also interesting to me, and the female perspective of the political landscape is one we rarely see.
Overrall I found this really interesting. The first section is about her experiences, how she succeeded Rudd to become Prime Minister and stories of media defamation and sexism she endured whilst being PM. Section two is about her policies, reforms and the work that had to be done to implement them.
I found the whole thing quite refereshing and engaging. It was insightful and thoughtful, with an honest look into her own decision, the decision of the party and the outside forces at work. I found her wry sense of humour genuinely funny and I didn't feel like it was overly preachy, political or wordy.
I found the chapter about sexism the most interesting. The treatment of Gillard by the media, Opposition and public was so vastly different to the treatment of male PM's and this was obvious at the time, and even more so later. After all, Gillard's "Misogyny" speech went on to be infamous.
I am a politics major, so I didn't really find the political lingo hard to follow but I'm not sure if it was because it wasn't hard to follow or if I dedicate 5 days a week to this. For me, this was quite engaging - though a patch or two about certain reforms did become a bit of a drag.
I found Gillard's writing to be personable and friendly - I was struck often by her compliments and commentary on friends and supporters and her sense of gratitude toward friends, family and the opportunities given to her. I thought that she seemed genuine and wrote with integrity and heart.
I don't know if it's inspired me to read many more political memoirs, but it has been an interesting read to me. I found her writing and her story really interesting and it was a nice close to the chapter of chaotic Labor government I miss so much.
Political biographies are just not a thing I read. Not because I don't think they aren't or couldn't be good, but just for the fact there aren't many political figures who've interested me enough to convince me to read a book about them. And then Julia Gillard released one and I thought maybe I would like to read a political biography.
Julia Gillard was Australia's first female Prime Minister and remains the only one we've ever had. I personally found her to be an entertaining and effective political figure, and I was a huge supporter of so many of her policies (lots of which were later repealed, thanks Abbott) But her time in politics and the inner workings of the Labor party at that time seemed to catch not only mine, but Australia's attention as a whole. Gillard's reports of sexism within politics, both before and after she became Prime Minister were also interesting to me, and the female perspective of the political landscape is one we rarely see.
Overrall I found this really interesting. The first section is about her experiences, how she succeeded Rudd to become Prime Minister and stories of media defamation and sexism she endured whilst being PM. Section two is about her policies, reforms and the work that had to be done to implement them.
I found the whole thing quite refereshing and engaging. It was insightful and thoughtful, with an honest look into her own decision, the decision of the party and the outside forces at work. I found her wry sense of humour genuinely funny and I didn't feel like it was overly preachy, political or wordy.
"my mind was shouting, for fucks sake. After all the shit I have to put up with, now I have to listen to Abbott lecturing ME on sexism. For fucks sake!"
I found the chapter about sexism the most interesting. The treatment of Gillard by the media, Opposition and public was so vastly different to the treatment of male PM's and this was obvious at the time, and even more so later. After all, Gillard's "Misogyny" speech went on to be infamous.
What difference does a male dominance of the media make to the reporting of the work of the government I led and specific reporting about me? I honestly do not know. What I do know is that I was not a graduate of the boys drinking circles involving male editors, male reporters and male politicians.
I do know when I exhibited anger in a telephone call that the obligations of "off the record" were breached in relation to me and I was described as 'hysterical', the word men facing anger from a women so often choose.
... Even before becoming Prime Minister I had observed that if you are a women politician, it is impossible to win on the question of family. If you do not have children, then you are characterised as out of touch with 'mainstream lives' and if you do, then heavens! who is looking after them?
I am a politics major, so I didn't really find the political lingo hard to follow but I'm not sure if it was because it wasn't hard to follow or if I dedicate 5 days a week to this. For me, this was quite engaging - though a patch or two about certain reforms did become a bit of a drag.
I found Gillard's writing to be personable and friendly - I was struck often by her compliments and commentary on friends and supporters and her sense of gratitude toward friends, family and the opportunities given to her. I thought that she seemed genuine and wrote with integrity and heart.
I don't know if it's inspired me to read many more political memoirs, but it has been an interesting read to me. I found her writing and her story really interesting and it was a nice close to the chapter of chaotic Labor government I miss so much.
November 14, 2015
This is the first non-fiction I've reviewed, and it's overtly political. What could possibly go wrong...?
*dons flak jacket and face shield before continuing*
For those that don't know, Julia Gillard was Australia's first (and, to date, only) female prime minister. A member of the Labor party, our equivalent of the US Democrats, she came to power in controversial circumstances, replacing Kevin Rudd. Rudd seemed to present well interstate but here in Canberra, where the federal government is based, he had a reputation for being angry, disorganised and hell to work for. He did some good work with the GFC, but when he dropped the ball on environmental reform, his polling numbers tanked.
Consequently, I think Canberrans were among the least surprised when Gillard took his place as PM.
I was always fond of Gillard, especially when she was being fiery and speaking off the cuff (her canned speeches, on the other hand, were a cure for insomnia -- sorry, Jules, but they were). Some of that was because her politics broadly align with mine. A lot of it was because of the abhorrent way she was treated by the conservative media and the lunatic fringe. I felt a certain girl power solidarity, you know?
So, with that huge disclaimer, what did I think of My Story?
Bits of it, especially the first third, were riveting. Bits of it were, as the blurb says, wryly funny. Bits of it -- especially her insights into Rudd's behaviour after he was ousted -- filled me with righteous indignation. (Australia is in the grip of conservative government now, and it's fair to say that Rudd is largely responsible for that. Thanks very bloody much, Kevin.)
But bits of My Story were kind of a cure for insomnia too.
This is the first political memoir I've read, and it makes sense that politicians in these kinds of books will be keen to establish their legacy, in their own words. And while I enjoyed the personal anecdotes and the insights into negotiations, I really zoned out during the talk of numbers and budgets and something about nominal growth? What? If I'd been reading the paperback, I would've skimmed the middle section, but because I was listening to the audiobook I slogged through the whole thing while cooking dinner and colouring in. (Adulting is hard.)
Maybe if I'd paid more attention, I would've gotten more out of it. :p
Still, Julia was gracious in acknowledging where others had done good work -- even Rudd, in the early days. She was also honest about the places where the Labor government went wrong on certain policies and decisions, and accepted the blame where she had a role in those mistakes. I respect that, as well as her ferocious intellect and her resilience.
If you're on the centre/left of Australian politics, this is worth a read.
3.5 stars.
*dons flak jacket and face shield before continuing*
For those that don't know, Julia Gillard was Australia's first (and, to date, only) female prime minister. A member of the Labor party, our equivalent of the US Democrats, she came to power in controversial circumstances, replacing Kevin Rudd. Rudd seemed to present well interstate but here in Canberra, where the federal government is based, he had a reputation for being angry, disorganised and hell to work for. He did some good work with the GFC, but when he dropped the ball on environmental reform, his polling numbers tanked.
Consequently, I think Canberrans were among the least surprised when Gillard took his place as PM.
I was always fond of Gillard, especially when she was being fiery and speaking off the cuff (her canned speeches, on the other hand, were a cure for insomnia -- sorry, Jules, but they were). Some of that was because her politics broadly align with mine. A lot of it was because of the abhorrent way she was treated by the conservative media and the lunatic fringe. I felt a certain girl power solidarity, you know?
So, with that huge disclaimer, what did I think of My Story?
Bits of it, especially the first third, were riveting. Bits of it were, as the blurb says, wryly funny. Bits of it -- especially her insights into Rudd's behaviour after he was ousted -- filled me with righteous indignation. (Australia is in the grip of conservative government now, and it's fair to say that Rudd is largely responsible for that. Thanks very bloody much, Kevin.)
But bits of My Story were kind of a cure for insomnia too.
This is the first political memoir I've read, and it makes sense that politicians in these kinds of books will be keen to establish their legacy, in their own words. And while I enjoyed the personal anecdotes and the insights into negotiations, I really zoned out during the talk of numbers and budgets and something about nominal growth? What? If I'd been reading the paperback, I would've skimmed the middle section, but because I was listening to the audiobook I slogged through the whole thing while cooking dinner and colouring in. (Adulting is hard.)
Maybe if I'd paid more attention, I would've gotten more out of it. :p
Still, Julia was gracious in acknowledging where others had done good work -- even Rudd, in the early days. She was also honest about the places where the Labor government went wrong on certain policies and decisions, and accepted the blame where she had a role in those mistakes. I respect that, as well as her ferocious intellect and her resilience.
If you're on the centre/left of Australian politics, this is worth a read.
3.5 stars.
January 27, 2024
An excellent book by an inspirational woman. Nothing else really needs to be said.
April 24, 2017
A marathon read, as are most political memoirs. One of the better ones I have read, at least I finished this one, usually it is just dip in and sample because they are so long and boring. I think I finished this only because I was reading using my ears with an audio book.
All I can say is, who would ever want to be Prime Minister? What a job, for man or woman. And it was made harder by a huge measure purely because Ms Gillard was the first (and at this point only) woman to fill this position in Australia. And truly I feel there may be a generation of young woman so scared by Ms Gillards treatment that they have shied away from political life. The period of Ms Gillard as PM was a time that showed in a very public and shaming way the dirty under-belly of sexual prejudice that is still the reality in Australia.
The "Misogyny Speech" is one of those milestones of a time and maybe the one thing that is remembered as a positive of this turbulent political time.
I am not a supporter of any political party but I respect people who have genuine ideals and operate with honesty. It was interesting to get that sense of the genuine as I read through Ms Gillards thoughts on her life and actions and choices.
A down side of reading this an audio book is the sensitivity I developed to the word "I", being a memoir of course it is quite a dominant word.
All I can say is, who would ever want to be Prime Minister? What a job, for man or woman. And it was made harder by a huge measure purely because Ms Gillard was the first (and at this point only) woman to fill this position in Australia. And truly I feel there may be a generation of young woman so scared by Ms Gillards treatment that they have shied away from political life. The period of Ms Gillard as PM was a time that showed in a very public and shaming way the dirty under-belly of sexual prejudice that is still the reality in Australia.
The "Misogyny Speech" is one of those milestones of a time and maybe the one thing that is remembered as a positive of this turbulent political time.
I am not a supporter of any political party but I respect people who have genuine ideals and operate with honesty. It was interesting to get that sense of the genuine as I read through Ms Gillards thoughts on her life and actions and choices.
A down side of reading this an audio book is the sensitivity I developed to the word "I", being a memoir of course it is quite a dominant word.
November 1, 2014
The political autobiography is a disturbing genre. It is like turkeys writing about Christmas. It is never going to end well. I was looking forward to reading _My Story_. Julia Gillard has delivered one of the most famous speeches of the last ten years. It is rare that one person - one woman in particular - can 'go viral' with a speech delivered in parliament.
This should have been a great book. It has two parts. The second is better than the first, but the first contains the two best chapters: "The curious question of gender" and "Resilience."
The problem is perhaps mine as a reader, not the author or the book. I wanted this book to be different. I wanted a female prime minister to be different. I wanted this political autobiography to be different. Instead, it is more of the same: backstabbing, justification and denial.
Yet there are remarkable sentences and moments where distinctiveness peppers the prose. For example, Gillard states, “I am not haunted by regrets or doubts. Emotions do continue to be mixed.” Perhaps that is a pivot of Gillard's story. It is mixed. It is not her regrets or doubts that live in our present. What matters are the regrets and doubts of women who want Australia and Australian politics to become modern, respectful, professional and intelligent, rather than nasty, brutal and brutalizing.
This should have been a great book. It has two parts. The second is better than the first, but the first contains the two best chapters: "The curious question of gender" and "Resilience."
The problem is perhaps mine as a reader, not the author or the book. I wanted this book to be different. I wanted a female prime minister to be different. I wanted this political autobiography to be different. Instead, it is more of the same: backstabbing, justification and denial.
Yet there are remarkable sentences and moments where distinctiveness peppers the prose. For example, Gillard states, “I am not haunted by regrets or doubts. Emotions do continue to be mixed.” Perhaps that is a pivot of Gillard's story. It is mixed. It is not her regrets or doubts that live in our present. What matters are the regrets and doubts of women who want Australia and Australian politics to become modern, respectful, professional and intelligent, rather than nasty, brutal and brutalizing.
November 30, 2021
I really wanted to enjoy this. I’m not particularly politically minded, but I was interested in the experiences, and the motivations and personality behind, our first woman PM. For me, however, those interesting glimpses into this incredibly intelligent political powerhouse were few and far between. Instead, the book’s focus felt more “I said, they said” around a myriad of policy decisions. I’d like to read her next version that could be 80% “who I am, what I experienced” and only 20% “these are the policy discussions I had”, which is entirely opposite to this book. Also I still cannot believe Alan Jones suggested her father “died of shame”, I’m glad she put that in the book, it made me want to go and hug her.
February 3, 2020
This book is definitely not what I expected. I was hoping to get a small insight into Julia as a person, her likes and dreams and childhood fears. Instead I read a political dot point of all the ways Julia is able to toot her own horn whilst bagging out fellow political members and whinging about all the ways she feels she was mistreated by media. She comes across as a spoilt little brat who expects everyone to hail her as a saint. If anything this book has made me dislike Julia whereas I didn’t before picking up this book.
August 19, 2015
I got into this book really quickly. It started with her controversial takeover of the Labour Party leadership, which is interesting from her side. I slowed towards the middle of the book as she goes into significant detail about the policies of the Labour Party and international relations. Nonetheless I really enjoy reading this book and getting her perspective on what was going on at the time.
October 29, 2014
Was very interesting to read about Julia Gillard's insights into her government and how and why she came to power. I would have liked some more insight into her personal life to understand better what shaped her purpose.
May 31, 2018
I wanted to like this, I really did! But it draaaaaaged on. I enjoyed parts where I could hear Gillard's voice in her writing, but the rest read like a heavily edited press release. Gave up, disappointed with myself, somewhere in the middle.
March 26, 2016
Some chapters are brilliant, especially the saga with Rudd, but some are on the dull side - otherwise it would have for 4 stars.
October 16, 2022
On June 24th (my birthday) 2010, Julia Gillard became Australia's 27th Prime Minister, the first and so far only woman to hold the office. I picked up this read ten years on from her famous misogyny speech. My takeaway is that Australia and the Labor party did not deserve Julia Gillard.
Gillard held the office for three years and three days. This memoir was released a year after her departure from politics and was called by Kevin Rudd "A great contribution to Australian fiction".
It is brutally honest book and has got everything one wants in a political memoir. It is divided into two sections, the first section "how I did it" she goes through her perspective of how she did the 'coup' on Kevin Rudd. This section was juicy, filled with political score settling, dagger wielding and throwing people under the bus. Even more than a decade on this section was entertaining to read.
The second section "Why I did it" is the meat of the book. In a treatise of her political career, she goes through a list of policy issues one at a time and explains how she inherited it, the effort and deals done behind the scenes to progress the issue, and where the policy issue was at at the conclusion of her term.
Gillard did a good job defending her government. She successfully dispels a wildly held notion that Labor is bad at running the country. In reality, the media has a well observed right wing bias and holds a double standard when evaluating right and left wing politicians. In reality, most of the biggest life-changing leaps in Australian social welfare, health, education, mental care, homelessness, retirement, disability services and environmental protection happened under Labor watch. Personally, I have Gillard's educational infrastructure funding programme to thank for the SMART infrastructure building in the university of Wollongong (my alma mater), where many domestic and international students received a world class physics education.
She also successfully dispels the idea that Liberal is better at fiscal management. The reality is that Liberal were lucky to be in office in some of the best years for the Australian economy. It is easy to be 'good with money' in the good years. By contrast Gillard made the little she had after the GFC go a very long way.
It is clear that the biggest obstacle for not getting more good policy passed was that she had to contend with the never ending struggle of being a minority government. Her biggest mistake was not sacking Rudd after the coup and letting him hang around like a bad smell. That opened the door for endless speculation by the media and the public about inner party drama,
Gillard's policies were generally positive. The biggest exception is her utter bullsh*t stance on Israel.
Gillard held the office for three years and three days. This memoir was released a year after her departure from politics and was called by Kevin Rudd "A great contribution to Australian fiction".
It is brutally honest book and has got everything one wants in a political memoir. It is divided into two sections, the first section "how I did it" she goes through her perspective of how she did the 'coup' on Kevin Rudd. This section was juicy, filled with political score settling, dagger wielding and throwing people under the bus. Even more than a decade on this section was entertaining to read.
The second section "Why I did it" is the meat of the book. In a treatise of her political career, she goes through a list of policy issues one at a time and explains how she inherited it, the effort and deals done behind the scenes to progress the issue, and where the policy issue was at at the conclusion of her term.
Gillard did a good job defending her government. She successfully dispels a wildly held notion that Labor is bad at running the country. In reality, the media has a well observed right wing bias and holds a double standard when evaluating right and left wing politicians. In reality, most of the biggest life-changing leaps in Australian social welfare, health, education, mental care, homelessness, retirement, disability services and environmental protection happened under Labor watch. Personally, I have Gillard's educational infrastructure funding programme to thank for the SMART infrastructure building in the university of Wollongong (my alma mater), where many domestic and international students received a world class physics education.
She also successfully dispels the idea that Liberal is better at fiscal management. The reality is that Liberal were lucky to be in office in some of the best years for the Australian economy. It is easy to be 'good with money' in the good years. By contrast Gillard made the little she had after the GFC go a very long way.
It is clear that the biggest obstacle for not getting more good policy passed was that she had to contend with the never ending struggle of being a minority government. Her biggest mistake was not sacking Rudd after the coup and letting him hang around like a bad smell. That opened the door for endless speculation by the media and the public about inner party drama,
Gillard's policies were generally positive. The biggest exception is her utter bullsh*t stance on Israel.
July 19, 2022
A very in depth dive into the behind the scenes of how a prime minister and government operates. This book goes into detail about the nitty gritty of how politicians do what they do and Julia's passions of education and equality for all. It thoroughly explains the policy decisions that Julia and her government succeeded and failed on - and the many challenges that were faced during that process i.e. having a minority government, a former prime minister looking to regain leadership and the substantially negative media faced. Speaking of the media, the criticism that was directed at Prime Minister Julia Gillard was at a level of vitriol that we hadn't seen before and haven't seen since. Having a female prime minister was a great step forward for our nation and I hope we can all look back, learn and grow from the unfair additional criticism that was faced by Julia for being a woman - and hope that our next female prime minister will not have to go through the same.
Interesting read but can get a little dry at times of tax or in depth policy discussion. Really made me admire Julia and the role of the prime minister.
Interesting read but can get a little dry at times of tax or in depth policy discussion. Really made me admire Julia and the role of the prime minister.
January 19, 2022
I don’t agree with all of Julia’s views, but I admire her as a female leader. She is intelligent, resilient and hard-working, as demonstrated by her writing. The downside for me was that the political talk did get a bit dry and long-winded at times. I also thought timelines occasionally became somewhat convoluted and difficult to follow across the different policies discussed. However, overall, I think this book was informative, thought-provoking and a balanced reflection of her time as prime minister. She was often treated disrespectfully by the media/others in government, so it was good to hear her perspective.
July 3, 2022
I found Julia Gillard’s story to be informative, thought provoking and at times witty. Her story is one of hard work and huge battles she had to fight to implement various reforms. Regardless of political leanings it’s worth reading her story, which is one she is rightfully proud of.
December 15, 2018
This book is quite a saga, possibly a little too long, but most enjoyable nevertheless. Julia Gillard’s rise to Prime Minister of Australia was a tumultuous time in politics. The Australian Labor Party was failing miserably, due to the poisoned chalice handed to them by the Liberal/National Coalition (previous government); the global financial crises; the on-going issue of refugees; and a lack of good leadership and direction from the sitting Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd. Aside from all of this, the Labor Party had just overthrown their leader in favour of a new leader, a woman no less! The first woman to become Prime Minister of Australia. A woman who, while in a stable long-term personal relationship, was not married and was an atheist - heaven forbid!
While Julia Gillard tried to implement policies that would put both the Labor Party and Australia back on the ‘straight and narrow’; the media, shock jocks in radio, media moguls, the Opposition (Liberal Party) and some in her own political party would have none of it. The focus of attention was clearly on how she dressed, how her hair was done, did she have a big bottom! No attention was given to her extraordinary intelligence (a solicitor/lawyer) and a work ethic that would kill most of her counterparts.
Unfortunately, Julia Gillard was not allowed to be Prime Minister. It was not because she failed, it was because she was not given the opportunity or credibility to be the Prime Minister. Public opinion is easily manipulated by powerful sources who were determined to undermine her Prime Ministership.
A lost opportunity for Australia and a public airing of Australia’s unfortunate attitude to women in power.
A highly recommended book for those interested in Australian politics.
While Julia Gillard tried to implement policies that would put both the Labor Party and Australia back on the ‘straight and narrow’; the media, shock jocks in radio, media moguls, the Opposition (Liberal Party) and some in her own political party would have none of it. The focus of attention was clearly on how she dressed, how her hair was done, did she have a big bottom! No attention was given to her extraordinary intelligence (a solicitor/lawyer) and a work ethic that would kill most of her counterparts.
Unfortunately, Julia Gillard was not allowed to be Prime Minister. It was not because she failed, it was because she was not given the opportunity or credibility to be the Prime Minister. Public opinion is easily manipulated by powerful sources who were determined to undermine her Prime Ministership.
A lost opportunity for Australia and a public airing of Australia’s unfortunate attitude to women in power.
A highly recommended book for those interested in Australian politics.
March 20, 2021
The first part was the most interesting. The rest was ok but too long (note the four years between starting and nearly-finishing) and without the sense of a “whole” person I was hoping for. Too much like a press release.
October 10, 2019
Who would you believe - Julia Gillard, a values-driven compassionate leader with the drive and ability to become Australia's first female prime minister....or the Narcissistic meglomaniac Kevin Rudd.
My story is not just political memoir, it is Julia Gillard's CV that goes deep into pretty much every policy achievement and failure she was apart of throughout her career. What other Prime Minister/ Deputy PM achieved such significant policy achievements in such a short period of time? Some might say she is beyond bragging and overselling her achievements whereas i see strong women seeking to protect her legacy and give us insight to the complexity of each of the policy issues and the hard work put in, which frustratingly was hidden from public view due to a useless media and the effectiveness of her enemies.
If Julia had been a man, i have no doubt she may likely still be PM. The way she was treated is a national shame, but no one is more to blame than Tony Abbott. The fact that he was able to bring out the worst of the Australian Public to effectively ensure she would lose the next election shows Australia didn't deserve her in the first place. Hopefully one day we will mature enough to treat the next Female prime minister with the respect that sadly Julia never was shown.
My story is not just political memoir, it is Julia Gillard's CV that goes deep into pretty much every policy achievement and failure she was apart of throughout her career. What other Prime Minister/ Deputy PM achieved such significant policy achievements in such a short period of time? Some might say she is beyond bragging and overselling her achievements whereas i see strong women seeking to protect her legacy and give us insight to the complexity of each of the policy issues and the hard work put in, which frustratingly was hidden from public view due to a useless media and the effectiveness of her enemies.
If Julia had been a man, i have no doubt she may likely still be PM. The way she was treated is a national shame, but no one is more to blame than Tony Abbott. The fact that he was able to bring out the worst of the Australian Public to effectively ensure she would lose the next election shows Australia didn't deserve her in the first place. Hopefully one day we will mature enough to treat the next Female prime minister with the respect that sadly Julia never was shown.
October 9, 2014
A very interesting read by the first female Australian Prime Minister, and a lot of stories are shared of the behind-the-scenes catastrophes that the public may have been a little more forgiving of if they had been publicly aired. In the end, Labor was their own worst enemy, constantly shooting themselves in the foot with intrigues and scandals, while at the same time avoiding the doom-laden prophecies of a minority government and passing the bills they needed to pass.
That being said, I still don't think we're getting the full story here. I was hoping for some more insight, maybe even a mea culpa to the way refugees and gay rights issues were handled. There is no mea culpa to be found here. Gillard is still, in particular, sticking to her story that as a feminist she saw no need for marriage, and that she didn't think gays did either. The thing is, feminists aren't being stopped from marrying if they wish to. They have that choice. Gays don't.
And about the refugees - nothing is going to make up for this period in our history that will rightly be looked back with shame. Expect an official government apology in about 70 years.
That being said, I still don't think we're getting the full story here. I was hoping for some more insight, maybe even a mea culpa to the way refugees and gay rights issues were handled. There is no mea culpa to be found here. Gillard is still, in particular, sticking to her story that as a feminist she saw no need for marriage, and that she didn't think gays did either. The thing is, feminists aren't being stopped from marrying if they wish to. They have that choice. Gays don't.
And about the refugees - nothing is going to make up for this period in our history that will rightly be looked back with shame. Expect an official government apology in about 70 years.
August 3, 2021
I started this book thinking it would offer more about the difficulties women have in politics. Ms. Gillard did make multiple references to this through the book. However, the book is really just a play by play of her political life. The level of detail is staggering and more than once I felt a level of defensiveness from the author. There were also a number of instances when I thought the authors revelations of personal conversations with others and the details of their emotional state felt intrusive. I kept thinking about those people and how they would react reading her stories. The book is interesting if you are Australian and into politics but I came into it hoping for more about feminism and perhaps advice for women and men about making the political field more inclusive. I am from Canada so I can appreciate I wasn’t Ms. Gillard’s target audience.
February 8, 2020
I am already a massive Julia Gillard fan girl (with her famed Misogyny Speech being one of my favourite speeches to quote), and reading her autobiography just made me more of a fan. Julia Gillard was Australia’s first woman Prime Minister, from 2010 to 2013. The book mainly focused on her time in Parliament, particularly her time as Prime Minister. She describes all of her achievements, as well as exploring her missteps. It is saddening to be reminded of how misogyny severely affected her time as Prime Minister and her legacy, but it was interesting to read her perspective on it. Overall, a great and enlightening read!
January 14, 2017
I loved this book: all the insider information about the process of government - but also that despite all the obstacles and the game playing, it is still possible to achieve good things in politics. It's definitely a book that will be primarily of interest to Australians - and then mostly to those who at least have an open mind on Gillard.
January 5, 2015
She writes like she is talking to you, I hear her voice when I read it. Have a few chuckles here and there and try and speed read the boring political bits. Overall this book portrays Julia Gillard as a likeable, hard working, good natured leader and team player. She is finally true to herself!
July 26, 2021
An interesting person, but I found the book intensely from the perspective of one person.
May 27, 2016
Everything Julia Gillard achieved in her political career is because she is a member of the Labor Party. Everything wrong with her politics is because she is a member of the Labor Party.
Ms Gillard’s book is called My Story. It could just as easily have the sub-title, And I’m Sticking To It.
There is something intensely unrelenting as the book progresses into the detailed accounts of specific issues and policy campaigns. But first there is a softer sweep across the stories as we would remember them in headlines and daily dealings.
Softer?
Well we have all become so familiarised with violence that such comparisons are now only by degree.
Politics is a dirty game. In fact the allusion to games of various sorts throughout this book shows part of what is dirty about politics is that it is not one single game but a string of them. The trickiest know which game to pull in at which time to sideline their opponents. And of course every game has a betting element: the predictably unpredictable.
Better to say then, not that Julia Gillard is a Labor Party animal, better to say she is a politician. She knows the game of games. She quite distinctly points to “the politics” in issue after issue throughout this volume.
And so her language also reveals such things as “I demanded”, when in supposed negotiations with other politicians over some issue. For all her listening ability portrayed early, this sharp contrast of stickedness and double-guessing what terms would be acceptable for others in the room comes across as a kind of dictatorial over-intellectualism. It is scary.
That said, in the circumstances of politics it is also necessary.
It is important to know when you are certain in your thinking so that you can become certain in your actions. It is also important to be aware where you have room for improvement at the hands of others, rather than expecting to have all the answers yourself.
Julia Gillard seems to balance these qualities at times. But being fully human, and not just a politician, she also fails to recognise when those around her have a lesser intellectualism to draw upon and thus rely upon lesser political tactics in the hopes of making themselves look better – both than themselves and than those they perceive a threat because of this vulnerability.
So here we see the fallibility of any human being expected to lead because of their capabilities that others lack, and simultaneously lead because they can include the skills and abilities and experience of others while knowing they could not achieve those elements themselves.
The most remarkable thing about Julia Gillard is the nature of the supposed “minority government” that she lead. No government is a minority. Every member of the parliament is there by some form of majority within the community and the electoral system that we employ to “represent” us.
The concept of minority government used here is only based upon the distorting convenience of party politics. It is a limiting view of our country’s greatness. It is a diminishment of every unique capacity that each member of the community imbues into their chosen representative. It is further cut by the pretentious “parliamentary debate” procedure that assumes there is only one Position and one Opposition.
In Art every Position has many Oppositions. For up there is down, in has out, left-side opposes right-side to some degree, and then there are a whole array of angles from which to experience variations upon each and all of these themes.
Likewise the Art of Politics makes The Other, the Opposition, look weak by attacking through each of these channels its supposed fixedness of Position.
But as Julia Gillard points out with regard The Greens, their tactics of protest have limited ability to propose any Position, and only rely upon finessing a core that has first been weakened by full-frontal attack of a substantiated policy position.
Such tactics are not dissimilar than Labor Party politics over many years in Opposition to a Liberal or Coalition government. No wonder Ms Gillard recognises them so easily.
Such tactics are similarly employed in the marketplace when niche markets break apart the larger businesses that sweep up small firms and streamline their strengths into veritable Titanics of industry. For each collective process of business through cartels toward monopoly, there is a concomitant collectivisation of labour forces to gather within one factory, then across similar factories and eventually industrial unions to meet these forces with like forces.
A niche may wedge a division into a larger market-share of its own. Or a niche may eventually blend into the larger organisation adding much needed innovation in a way the larger organisation could less acceptably initiate it for itself.
None of these things is bad in itself. They are just tactics that have a range of applications.
Where our value judgment about good and bad tactics (politics) focus on people or resources comes into play is within regard to what we most hope for ourselves at any given time. And individually, like to admit it or not, we all prevaricate at some point to adjust to our own changing relationship to circumstances and other players within each of these fields.
So when mining magnates are all tarred with one brush we all fail to appreciate that they would not be the magnates they are without the collusion of the workers, shareholders, consumers and various other players with regard their access to the resources they manage and manipulate.
When journalists write with the same language of protest and opposition that the parliament seems to imply is necessary rather than “political discourse”, they are likewise falling into the illusion of party politics being “the game” and every other Opposition having no merit to add or tweak proposals put forward in Position Papers.
Whatever you might make of Julia Gillard’s Prime Ministership from My Story, the legacy for the rest of us will be different than what she defines it to be for herself. She may feel disappointed by my presentation of this fact, but it is the very history that she herself refers to:
The final test is: are you on the right side of history? And in my experience, the judgement of history has a way of speaking sooner than we expect.
History in politics is not necessarily that your position retains its merit over time as itself. History tells that a day in politics is a very long time, but that it then becomes no time at all. What remains from any particular policy tends to fragment over time and warp into all manner of dispositions from any given policy position that has already been negotiated into some other form by the time it is first adopted into law. To pretend anything different is pure revisionism, and revisionism is pure politics.
Whatever party wants to claim its own right to political history in Australia has to come to terms with all the other minor influences they have failed to include at an earlier time that have thus required constant revisions of laws to adjust anomalies and redress imbalances that the majority will never see affecting the minorities who are also part of this great country.
The devil may be in the detail, but it does not mean that the details are devils. It means that to tame the wildness of misconceptions and differences one needs to be wily enough to look out for them in innovative and niche-like (even Nietzsche-like) ways. Whatever your conception of God, however god-presence appears in your own life (or doesn’t seem to), there is a greater power “that passes all understanding” behind your capability to perceive it.
Thus religious difference, just as political difference, does not win by trying to reign over all those who are not of its persuasion. Ms Gillard’s atheism is not a question for the imposition of religious standards upon the rest of society, either through her education policies or by any other means.
Democracy demands something of humanity that no other political system yet devised demands: that each and every member of it understand their own place within it so that they can stand beside every other member within in.
Just as democracy demands this of each and every one of us who vote, it also demands our awareness of every other one of us whether they vote or not. That is a big ask, and we are continuing to ask it. There is no one answer for all times and all places. It is locally applicable under a universal principle of inclusion – mandated or not, franchised or not. Just because we haven’t written every possible clause of inclusion yet does not mean they do not yet apply.
It is because we are all essentially idealists – that is what our upright stance means – that we are each reaching to improve ourselves by learning what others offer that we cannot fulfil alone. It is because of this impulse that we seek economic relationships of, not just exchange one-for-another but, mutual efforts toward what none of us could achieve alone.
Our unity, that comes out of union of un-alikes, creates new embodiments (“corporations”) that require conscious replication and alteration of subconscious and pre-conscious conceptions and practices. To expect all of society to become “qualified” upon the same basis is to overlook the uniquely unrecognised and therefore unnamed to “compete” against the ever-growing mainstream Titanic of expectation. It is to squash the niche before it even forms into a viable entity to anyone other than the one carrying that seed.
The whole area of disability rights hinges on this transformation of recognition of ability rather than definition by dis-ability. It equalised all of us – not because it brings us down to “their standard”, but because it demands something more from each and every one of us to recognise that the difference in that single one asks an adjustment in each and every one else thus teaching them a newness of perspective that opens further possibilities and “mutations”.
In this way science and religion meet. God’s Perfect Plan then becomes an evolutionary one – revolutionary when it happens more quickly, but evolutionary nonetheless.
God may have rested on the seventh day, but then there was an eighth and a ninth. There is a difference between a fear and awe, between fearful and awful or awe-full. It is all about knowing our own little place. It is about allowing each other their own little place. And there are more gentle ways to cooperate and yet still feel challenged without having to turn every difference into “a competition”, “a game” to be won at any price.
In My Story Julia Gillard outlines “the politics” by making negotiations sound like deals in the market-place. A price on carbon overlooks the fact that we are a carbon-based life-form. It is merely a political play on an economic tactic of extraction to sell a product that is pealed away from all the background noise where it currently resides. It is the equivalent of saying what is the price on everyone’s head.
Once again Ms Gillard may feel I am deriding her in some way for this presentation, but she is not alone in such an outlook or she wouldn’t have been able to bring it to the community in the way she did. Personally I fell for it for a while too. But something didn’t feel right to me about the way people were turning on each other in these so-called “debates”. Then I noticed the whole concept of trading for falling below emissions targets, as if there is a failure to create enough pollution!
What is a target that you don’t want to meet?
This lead me to see myself as a Denihilist. I don’t want to wipe anyone else out, just as I don’t want to be wiped out. No matter how small I am I still count, as does every inadequate being like me that I come across on a daily basis.
Do I want to turn them into targets? No.
Do I want them to use me for target practice? Most certainly not. And yet this is how I feel I have been treated since running for local council as an independent candidate.
I don’t have all the answers, and I don’t even think I want them.
I do think we need to be asking ourselves better questions. And I think we need to be listening better to the questions others are asking because they may have some hints for us.
Then we need to do something that Julia Gillard did: spend some time alone to work out a personal position or understanding before tackling the many alternative positions (which may or may not be considered oppositions) so that we are clearer about what works personally within our most predictable and proximate spaces, and what requires more understanding from us towards others and their perspectives which we may never fully resolve on a personal basis.
What I see as the limitation to Julia Gillard’s process in this regard is her assumption, her dictatorship, of the positions that others are willing or likely to shift to. While political tactics are employed to only work with what is already known (because of the “nature of the beast” politics), environmental factors bring democracy to the resources around us in a way we have not previously considered in human history.
Pigmy possums are not ever likely to gain the vote. People assume their own position on the rights of animals, indeed of all species of plants and soil types and so on, just because they see their importance within their own lives, not as separate and distinct elements that need “a vote” too.
Thus it is the multiple relationships that people have, as family members, as workers or producers or shareholders in industry and the various combinations of all of those, that makes every vote seem a little restrictive if it is only presumed to be based upon the headline issues of the election campaign.
What we need in parliament are fully-evolved human beings who can and do represent all of us. Any person who feels they only have a responsibility to support a party line, as if the party has won over the humanity of the people within both the party and the society it is a part of, is never likely to be representative in the way democracy demands of them.
We need party politics to become more self-regulatory so that it matures into something worth continuing. Otherwise we need party politics to be fazed out so that individuals can step forward on equal footing within the chambers of the Houses of Parliament to stand side by side as the representatives they are of all the constituents in their own electorates. Then we can take the loser attitude out of politics. Then we can diminish the protest position and develop Positional Papers that reflect diversity within documentation beyond inclusionary and exclusionary cuts and abrasions.
Just as there have been good landlords and bad, good bosses and bad, good unions and bad marriages, so we each have the responsibility to shape ourselves beyond personal righteousness and into responding to and with and for each other. It is not so much about sticking to “it” as stepping together and apart in a dance that requires both our “sticks”, both self-understanding and respectful other understanding.
Julia Gillard has achieved many things for Australia and Australians. She has written a creditable page in history, and My Story allows the rest of us to undertake some of the self-reflection she has so capably demonstrated to us.
None of us has to rest on these laurels alone. Indeed, Ms Gillard points out a number of instances where she felt she made mistakes, and elaborates what she may have done differently. She may have been just as wrong in those alternatives. But she at least was in the position to make such choices and hard bargaining of others’ energy as well as her own to make such a mark.
The rest of us have to allow this history to work its way through us and inform us where we each could play a better part, not necessarily a bigger part. We each have to consider what others around us are doing, and in what way we may be diminishing their potential rather than encouraging their best. We have to listen with both ears and our hearts to find the wisdom required to overcome the cuts and abrasions of “knowledge” as if it were not a human and living thing.
Then Our Story will be a better read than this single volume.
Ms Gillard’s book is called My Story. It could just as easily have the sub-title, And I’m Sticking To It.
There is something intensely unrelenting as the book progresses into the detailed accounts of specific issues and policy campaigns. But first there is a softer sweep across the stories as we would remember them in headlines and daily dealings.
Softer?
Well we have all become so familiarised with violence that such comparisons are now only by degree.
Politics is a dirty game. In fact the allusion to games of various sorts throughout this book shows part of what is dirty about politics is that it is not one single game but a string of them. The trickiest know which game to pull in at which time to sideline their opponents. And of course every game has a betting element: the predictably unpredictable.
Better to say then, not that Julia Gillard is a Labor Party animal, better to say she is a politician. She knows the game of games. She quite distinctly points to “the politics” in issue after issue throughout this volume.
And so her language also reveals such things as “I demanded”, when in supposed negotiations with other politicians over some issue. For all her listening ability portrayed early, this sharp contrast of stickedness and double-guessing what terms would be acceptable for others in the room comes across as a kind of dictatorial over-intellectualism. It is scary.
That said, in the circumstances of politics it is also necessary.
It is important to know when you are certain in your thinking so that you can become certain in your actions. It is also important to be aware where you have room for improvement at the hands of others, rather than expecting to have all the answers yourself.
Julia Gillard seems to balance these qualities at times. But being fully human, and not just a politician, she also fails to recognise when those around her have a lesser intellectualism to draw upon and thus rely upon lesser political tactics in the hopes of making themselves look better – both than themselves and than those they perceive a threat because of this vulnerability.
So here we see the fallibility of any human being expected to lead because of their capabilities that others lack, and simultaneously lead because they can include the skills and abilities and experience of others while knowing they could not achieve those elements themselves.
The most remarkable thing about Julia Gillard is the nature of the supposed “minority government” that she lead. No government is a minority. Every member of the parliament is there by some form of majority within the community and the electoral system that we employ to “represent” us.
The concept of minority government used here is only based upon the distorting convenience of party politics. It is a limiting view of our country’s greatness. It is a diminishment of every unique capacity that each member of the community imbues into their chosen representative. It is further cut by the pretentious “parliamentary debate” procedure that assumes there is only one Position and one Opposition.
In Art every Position has many Oppositions. For up there is down, in has out, left-side opposes right-side to some degree, and then there are a whole array of angles from which to experience variations upon each and all of these themes.
Likewise the Art of Politics makes The Other, the Opposition, look weak by attacking through each of these channels its supposed fixedness of Position.
But as Julia Gillard points out with regard The Greens, their tactics of protest have limited ability to propose any Position, and only rely upon finessing a core that has first been weakened by full-frontal attack of a substantiated policy position.
Such tactics are not dissimilar than Labor Party politics over many years in Opposition to a Liberal or Coalition government. No wonder Ms Gillard recognises them so easily.
Such tactics are similarly employed in the marketplace when niche markets break apart the larger businesses that sweep up small firms and streamline their strengths into veritable Titanics of industry. For each collective process of business through cartels toward monopoly, there is a concomitant collectivisation of labour forces to gather within one factory, then across similar factories and eventually industrial unions to meet these forces with like forces.
A niche may wedge a division into a larger market-share of its own. Or a niche may eventually blend into the larger organisation adding much needed innovation in a way the larger organisation could less acceptably initiate it for itself.
None of these things is bad in itself. They are just tactics that have a range of applications.
Where our value judgment about good and bad tactics (politics) focus on people or resources comes into play is within regard to what we most hope for ourselves at any given time. And individually, like to admit it or not, we all prevaricate at some point to adjust to our own changing relationship to circumstances and other players within each of these fields.
So when mining magnates are all tarred with one brush we all fail to appreciate that they would not be the magnates they are without the collusion of the workers, shareholders, consumers and various other players with regard their access to the resources they manage and manipulate.
When journalists write with the same language of protest and opposition that the parliament seems to imply is necessary rather than “political discourse”, they are likewise falling into the illusion of party politics being “the game” and every other Opposition having no merit to add or tweak proposals put forward in Position Papers.
Whatever you might make of Julia Gillard’s Prime Ministership from My Story, the legacy for the rest of us will be different than what she defines it to be for herself. She may feel disappointed by my presentation of this fact, but it is the very history that she herself refers to:
The final test is: are you on the right side of history? And in my experience, the judgement of history has a way of speaking sooner than we expect.
History in politics is not necessarily that your position retains its merit over time as itself. History tells that a day in politics is a very long time, but that it then becomes no time at all. What remains from any particular policy tends to fragment over time and warp into all manner of dispositions from any given policy position that has already been negotiated into some other form by the time it is first adopted into law. To pretend anything different is pure revisionism, and revisionism is pure politics.
Whatever party wants to claim its own right to political history in Australia has to come to terms with all the other minor influences they have failed to include at an earlier time that have thus required constant revisions of laws to adjust anomalies and redress imbalances that the majority will never see affecting the minorities who are also part of this great country.
The devil may be in the detail, but it does not mean that the details are devils. It means that to tame the wildness of misconceptions and differences one needs to be wily enough to look out for them in innovative and niche-like (even Nietzsche-like) ways. Whatever your conception of God, however god-presence appears in your own life (or doesn’t seem to), there is a greater power “that passes all understanding” behind your capability to perceive it.
Thus religious difference, just as political difference, does not win by trying to reign over all those who are not of its persuasion. Ms Gillard’s atheism is not a question for the imposition of religious standards upon the rest of society, either through her education policies or by any other means.
Democracy demands something of humanity that no other political system yet devised demands: that each and every member of it understand their own place within it so that they can stand beside every other member within in.
Just as democracy demands this of each and every one of us who vote, it also demands our awareness of every other one of us whether they vote or not. That is a big ask, and we are continuing to ask it. There is no one answer for all times and all places. It is locally applicable under a universal principle of inclusion – mandated or not, franchised or not. Just because we haven’t written every possible clause of inclusion yet does not mean they do not yet apply.
It is because we are all essentially idealists – that is what our upright stance means – that we are each reaching to improve ourselves by learning what others offer that we cannot fulfil alone. It is because of this impulse that we seek economic relationships of, not just exchange one-for-another but, mutual efforts toward what none of us could achieve alone.
Our unity, that comes out of union of un-alikes, creates new embodiments (“corporations”) that require conscious replication and alteration of subconscious and pre-conscious conceptions and practices. To expect all of society to become “qualified” upon the same basis is to overlook the uniquely unrecognised and therefore unnamed to “compete” against the ever-growing mainstream Titanic of expectation. It is to squash the niche before it even forms into a viable entity to anyone other than the one carrying that seed.
The whole area of disability rights hinges on this transformation of recognition of ability rather than definition by dis-ability. It equalised all of us – not because it brings us down to “their standard”, but because it demands something more from each and every one of us to recognise that the difference in that single one asks an adjustment in each and every one else thus teaching them a newness of perspective that opens further possibilities and “mutations”.
In this way science and religion meet. God’s Perfect Plan then becomes an evolutionary one – revolutionary when it happens more quickly, but evolutionary nonetheless.
God may have rested on the seventh day, but then there was an eighth and a ninth. There is a difference between a fear and awe, between fearful and awful or awe-full. It is all about knowing our own little place. It is about allowing each other their own little place. And there are more gentle ways to cooperate and yet still feel challenged without having to turn every difference into “a competition”, “a game” to be won at any price.
In My Story Julia Gillard outlines “the politics” by making negotiations sound like deals in the market-place. A price on carbon overlooks the fact that we are a carbon-based life-form. It is merely a political play on an economic tactic of extraction to sell a product that is pealed away from all the background noise where it currently resides. It is the equivalent of saying what is the price on everyone’s head.
Once again Ms Gillard may feel I am deriding her in some way for this presentation, but she is not alone in such an outlook or she wouldn’t have been able to bring it to the community in the way she did. Personally I fell for it for a while too. But something didn’t feel right to me about the way people were turning on each other in these so-called “debates”. Then I noticed the whole concept of trading for falling below emissions targets, as if there is a failure to create enough pollution!
What is a target that you don’t want to meet?
This lead me to see myself as a Denihilist. I don’t want to wipe anyone else out, just as I don’t want to be wiped out. No matter how small I am I still count, as does every inadequate being like me that I come across on a daily basis.
Do I want to turn them into targets? No.
Do I want them to use me for target practice? Most certainly not. And yet this is how I feel I have been treated since running for local council as an independent candidate.
I don’t have all the answers, and I don’t even think I want them.
I do think we need to be asking ourselves better questions. And I think we need to be listening better to the questions others are asking because they may have some hints for us.
Then we need to do something that Julia Gillard did: spend some time alone to work out a personal position or understanding before tackling the many alternative positions (which may or may not be considered oppositions) so that we are clearer about what works personally within our most predictable and proximate spaces, and what requires more understanding from us towards others and their perspectives which we may never fully resolve on a personal basis.
What I see as the limitation to Julia Gillard’s process in this regard is her assumption, her dictatorship, of the positions that others are willing or likely to shift to. While political tactics are employed to only work with what is already known (because of the “nature of the beast” politics), environmental factors bring democracy to the resources around us in a way we have not previously considered in human history.
Pigmy possums are not ever likely to gain the vote. People assume their own position on the rights of animals, indeed of all species of plants and soil types and so on, just because they see their importance within their own lives, not as separate and distinct elements that need “a vote” too.
Thus it is the multiple relationships that people have, as family members, as workers or producers or shareholders in industry and the various combinations of all of those, that makes every vote seem a little restrictive if it is only presumed to be based upon the headline issues of the election campaign.
What we need in parliament are fully-evolved human beings who can and do represent all of us. Any person who feels they only have a responsibility to support a party line, as if the party has won over the humanity of the people within both the party and the society it is a part of, is never likely to be representative in the way democracy demands of them.
We need party politics to become more self-regulatory so that it matures into something worth continuing. Otherwise we need party politics to be fazed out so that individuals can step forward on equal footing within the chambers of the Houses of Parliament to stand side by side as the representatives they are of all the constituents in their own electorates. Then we can take the loser attitude out of politics. Then we can diminish the protest position and develop Positional Papers that reflect diversity within documentation beyond inclusionary and exclusionary cuts and abrasions.
Just as there have been good landlords and bad, good bosses and bad, good unions and bad marriages, so we each have the responsibility to shape ourselves beyond personal righteousness and into responding to and with and for each other. It is not so much about sticking to “it” as stepping together and apart in a dance that requires both our “sticks”, both self-understanding and respectful other understanding.
Julia Gillard has achieved many things for Australia and Australians. She has written a creditable page in history, and My Story allows the rest of us to undertake some of the self-reflection she has so capably demonstrated to us.
None of us has to rest on these laurels alone. Indeed, Ms Gillard points out a number of instances where she felt she made mistakes, and elaborates what she may have done differently. She may have been just as wrong in those alternatives. But she at least was in the position to make such choices and hard bargaining of others’ energy as well as her own to make such a mark.
The rest of us have to allow this history to work its way through us and inform us where we each could play a better part, not necessarily a bigger part. We each have to consider what others around us are doing, and in what way we may be diminishing their potential rather than encouraging their best. We have to listen with both ears and our hearts to find the wisdom required to overcome the cuts and abrasions of “knowledge” as if it were not a human and living thing.
Then Our Story will be a better read than this single volume.
January 2, 2018
I read this on the back of reading Kevin Rudd's new autobiography and I can say that the two vary completely in their formatting and styles. Kevin's started from the very beginning - from his young days living on his family farm right up until that triumphant 2007 election win. For Julia, she started hers on what happened in the lead up to the 2010 leadership coup and then went on to outline her policy and reforms that her government had achieved from then on. These two completely different styles, I think, gives you a bit of an inkling as to how their leadership was portrayed.
For one - Julia was constantly having to explain her prime ministership after overthrowing Kevin Rudd. The public never got a real explanation and therefore, didn't seem to truly accept her leadership. In doing so, the media was ferocious on her afterwards which I believe is the reason why she spends so much time on documenting her careful negotiations with her colleagues to pass the outstanding amount of legislation that she did in the parliament. In a way, I think she was having to get the reader to live through her parliamentary life in government, as it was never accurately represented by the cutthroat media.
Kevin Rudd, on the other hand, spent more time detailing his life history and lea the reader through his life as opposed to outlining what he did during his time in government (which may be in the works later on, I hear).
Julia certainly underlines the importance of purpose in her government, and purpose she did have. She achieved a lot in the form of healthcare and education reform, which sadly was not a focus for the media at the time. The book is very detailed on how these came into fruition. At times it can be quite dry, and I do think some basic level of economics is needed to understand some of what she is trying to say.
I certainly would recommend this book to anyone who was sceptical of the Gillard government or was one of those who believed everything in the media about her as a no-good backstabbing leader. She certainly achieved a lot and should be commended rightly so. I do hope history is kind to her, because the media, the public and some of her colleagues certainly weren't.
For one - Julia was constantly having to explain her prime ministership after overthrowing Kevin Rudd. The public never got a real explanation and therefore, didn't seem to truly accept her leadership. In doing so, the media was ferocious on her afterwards which I believe is the reason why she spends so much time on documenting her careful negotiations with her colleagues to pass the outstanding amount of legislation that she did in the parliament. In a way, I think she was having to get the reader to live through her parliamentary life in government, as it was never accurately represented by the cutthroat media.
Kevin Rudd, on the other hand, spent more time detailing his life history and lea the reader through his life as opposed to outlining what he did during his time in government (which may be in the works later on, I hear).
Julia certainly underlines the importance of purpose in her government, and purpose she did have. She achieved a lot in the form of healthcare and education reform, which sadly was not a focus for the media at the time. The book is very detailed on how these came into fruition. At times it can be quite dry, and I do think some basic level of economics is needed to understand some of what she is trying to say.
I certainly would recommend this book to anyone who was sceptical of the Gillard government or was one of those who believed everything in the media about her as a no-good backstabbing leader. She certainly achieved a lot and should be commended rightly so. I do hope history is kind to her, because the media, the public and some of her colleagues certainly weren't.
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