My Longest Round

'I've been fighting since the day I was born. No, I've been fighting from the time I was curled up inside my mother's belly. The day my father shot himself in the head, that's when my fight started'

Wally 'Wait-a-While' Carr is an Australian and Commonwealth champion boxer who held twelve titles in six divisions. From featherweight to heavyweight, one of the last of the fifteen-rounders, he fought an astonishing 101 professional bouts in his fifteen-year boxing career.

Growing up in 1950s and '60s rural New South Wales, it wasn't until he moved to Sydney at the age of sixteen that he began to understand what racism was all about. My Longest Round is an Aboriginal man's perspective on inner-city life; the two-up games, the gangsters, and the way working-class neighbourhoods looked out for each other. From hunting goannas, Jimmy Sharman's boxing tents, rugby league, professional boxing and the first Aboriginal Tent Embassy, to present-day struggles and lifestyles, Wally's story offers a vital snapshot of Aboriginal and Australian history.

Retiring from boxing in 1986, Wally faced a sudden void. The triumphs and glory, the thrill of the roaring crowds, the women and high life were replaced by loneliness and despair.

Wally's inspiring story is also about his courage in overcoming alcoholism and drug addiction, of a great love for his children, pride in his Aboriginality and an incredible determination to survive and live with dignity.

'This is a raw, confronting account of one man's struggle inside and outside the ring. Wally Carr pulls no punches!' Roy Masters, Sydney Morning Herald

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