6 January, 1950 to 4 January, 2001

Mietta O'Donnell and Tony Knox

Musical selections from the Requiem for Mietta (in MP3 format):

• MP3/SimpleGifts.mp3 Yvonne Kenny (2.0Mb)
  
• MP3/PieJesu.mp3 (3.6Mb)

Eulogy - Wendy Harmer

Hello everybody. It's wonderful to see so many of you here today. I know that Mietta loved nothing more than a full house. So that's great.

I'm speaking on behalf of Mietta's family today, and in accordance with their wishes I'm not going to speak about the professional milestones in her career, because I'm sure that we'll be reading about those for years as people come to understand and unravel her remarkable legacy.

Instead I'd like to offer a personal memoir about the woman I knew and loved dearly and then I'd like to talk about the privilege I enjoyed in having Tony and Mietta as my friends for the past 15 years or so.

Over the last few days I've read various newspaper articles about Mietta and I've often found it difficult to reconcile the woman I'm reading about and the woman I knew.

A Queen of Cuisine, a Grand Dame of dining, a cultural figure, an ambassador for Melbourne ... of course she was all these things ... but more than that ... quite simply ... Mietta was the most charming, warm, gentle and loving person you could ever wish to meet.

I have read that Mietta patrolled her domain in the upstairs dining room in expensive gowns, with a personal style variously described as aloof, austere or even forbidding ... but for those of us who watched Mietta night after night we came to understand that what we were seeing in her was actually pure concentration in the pursuit of absolute perfection ... and night after night after night after night, year after year that's exactly what she achieved. All around her was orderly and beautiful perfection.

Mietta had, I'm sure you know, an eye for detail which was extraordinary, it was almost like she had X-ray vision or extrasensory perception. She intuitively knew if the slightest thing was out of place.

Every evening she would walk through the room setting the stage ... straightening a napkin here, removing a speck of dust from a glass there, adjusting a flower until it was just so, and then the performance would begin ... the lamps would be turned on, the lights dimmed, music would swirl through that beautiful room and as the first diner arrived all the staff would strike up a symphony for the senses which was sustained until the last person departed.

No wonder Mietta understood the artistic temperament so well and surrounded herself with performers, actors and musicians ... because she, herself, was a maestro.

And in that way that all great artists have ... she lived every evening through the eyes of every member of her audience ... her aim was simply that every person who walked through the door should have a sublime experience.

And if you think about it ... why would Mietta want to dedicate her life to offering such an experience to people she had often not met before and would maybe never meet again?

Well certainly not for personal aggrandisement, but because I think Mietta understood that to experience beauty and perfection had the ability to uplift the human spirit; to feed the soul.

If we understand that the soul is nurtured by good food and music, wonderful conversation with genuine friends and memories which touch the heart ... then Mietta was a truly soulful person.

And when Miettas was alive with opera upstairs, jazz and cabaret downstairs and poetry in the bar ... and all around her was vibrant and humming with creative energy ... Mietta's soul sang.

As she says in her lovely book Mietta's Italian Family Recipes, it was her Italian grandparents who were her inspiration. She writes: "They gave me a glimpse of the sort of pleasure that can be given and gotten through true hospitality--when you give of yourself, of what you enjoy and what you like to surround yourself with. If that is, as it was in my grandparents case, art and music, fine food and wine, gardens and animals and family, it's not a bad life."

In the past few days I've had many conversations with friends about Mietta, and invariably they remember some great kindness that she showed. Perhaps it was a welcome home dinner or a birthday lunch, a farewell supper. Often I would get a phone call ... "I think so and so needs cheering up. I'm having a dinner. Can you come?"

And always you knew if you were lucky enough to be given such a treat that you would walk in the room to find exactly the people you wanted to see ... even if you had been away from town a long time. Just like today.

Except that today there is the profound sadness that Tony isn't here because ... always of course ... always when you saw Mietta ... there would be Tony.

What a remarkable double act, what an inspirational love story. If Mietta was the maestro then Tony was the architect who built the stage on which she performed.

Tony and Mietta, Mietta and Tony ... you always spoke about them as if they were the one person. It was hard to tell where one finished and the other began really. They moved as one. They were together 24 hours a day for 30 years and still fascinated by each other, still passionate about each other.

Of course they didn't always agree ... at the table it would be an exasperated "Oh come on Mietta, get real" or a firm "That will be enough Tony" and then it usually wasn't ... they usually kept going ... but then in the next breath it would be: "You know Mietta's absolutely right about that" or "Yes well ask Tony, he knows everything about that."

You know, in all the years I knew them I never saw them show any great physical affection ... no extravagant kisses or cuddles. Ah, but did you ever watch them eat? It was such a truly sensuous experience that you had to send the children out of the room. Sometimes you felt as if you were intruding as they spoon fed each other, passed tidbits back and forth and nodded and murmured in their own private language.

In fact after staying with them once I wanted to buy them a gift and I went though all the options ... wine, music, books, but I ended up buying them an antique silver set of salt and pepper shakers in the shape of two little wrens sitting on a branch with their heads together. That's what they reminded me of.

And here I'd like to share a story if I may ... it was the only time I ever got to cook for Mietta and Tony. Imagine the sort of terror that strikes into your heart ... you know to cook for Mietta. They were visiting my husband Brendan and I in Sydney and of course I was beside myself about what I was going to serve for lunch. I decided on chicken ravioli and I slaved over this exotic sauce and cheated on the ravioli and sent Brendan into town to buy the handmade gourmet ravioli from a particular little shop ... anyway I served up the dish and it wasn't until we cut into the pasta that we realised that the chicken had gone off snd it was totally rancid and vile, and it was only then that Brendan realised: "Oh that's what must have been in that package I found under the front seat of the car after he came from surfing for a couple of hours."

What an absolute disaster, we were mortified. However it also happened that on the table was a pile of our tomatoes, still warm from the garden which Mietta and Tony ate for lunch with a bit of bread and salt and declared it "just what they felt like and actually the best meal that they ever had".

And to this day I believe them, not only because it makes me feel better, but also because they could have been telling the truth. Tony and Mietta were two of the most unpretentious people that you'd ever meet. Wherever there was fellowship and conversation that's where they were happy to be ... whether it was in a five star French restaurant or fish and chips on the end of a pier.

And as friends they were always thinking about how to bring joy into your life, how to honour the friendship. In fact they travelled to Sydney on Tony's motorbike when our son was born and walked into the room when he was only hours old with a bottle of champagne. Tony brought his camera and took photographs of him breast feeding because he thought it would be good to record his first experience of fine dining. At a very upmarket establishment I might add. And I'll swear to God that Mietta took that motorcycle helmet off and her bloody hair was perfect. I don't know how she did it.

What an adventure they had ... what amazing things they achieved ... and what plans they had for the future!

Their partnership will always be remembered for it's physical and intellectual energy; commitment to community and dedication to social change. There was certainly nothing relaxed and comfortable about Tony and Mietta.

Another friend made a wonderful observation when he said that usually social change is affected by a movement ... but in this case, in the cultural life of Melbourne, and indeed Australia, change was affected by just two people ... Tony and Mietta Mietta and Tony. That's how dynamic and creative they were as a couple. That's how powerful and transforming true love can be.

And while they were all those things to the outside world ... dynamic, formidable, energetic and forceful ... to all those who loved them and were loved by them they were simply a blessing.

So today we close one chapter on a great love story ... I know it will inspire people for years and of course will never be over while Tony is alive.

And now it's time to say farewell to Mietta. I know that forever in my mind I will be walking through a door and I'll see her there, her hands gently clasped ... a perfect size eight in her little silk suit from Milan ... her hair just so and her golden Cretan bee earrings and pendant shining in the soft light of the lamps ... and that enigmatic smile ... a bit like the Mona Lisa now I come to think about it.

And I'm also thinking that at last they have in heaven someone who truly understands seating arrangements ... what an asset she is going to be.

Goodbye dear friend ... I don't expect to see your like ever pass this way again.

We will all miss you so much ... we do love you so.