SHANE GOULD'S 1972 MUNICH DIARY, circa 37 pages, red calf, upper cover gilt-stamped with her name THE DIARY IS SIGNED AT THE FRONT BY 18 MEMBERS OF THE AUSTRALIAN SWIMMING TEAM, including Gail Neall, Bev Whitfield, Brad Cooper, Graham Windeatt, Narelle & Karen Moras, the coach Ursula Forbes and others. It commences with the excited departure of a 15 year old girl for Munich from Sydney on 11 August 1971 and ends, with gaps in 1974, with the return of a mature young woman. The diary is a remarkable and refreshingly frank document of the metamorphosis of a young elite athlete with every attendant pressure into an independent adult. At the games Gould is followed by the Press 'all of them are after me, but I've handled them well, they like me and I'm taking them well.' Observations of her team-mates are brief but succinct 'Bev a good kid, I like her.....Karen & Debra, high and mighty ones (not all the time. Karen's captaincy made her sly)'. The routine of training and occasional shopping for gifts to take home is interspersed with '17 Aug. Coach talked to us, rather lectured us; "we're the worst team he's been associated with for team morale!" Also about stealing and Helen's and Sharon's weight! She records her own weight daily. 'Had photo(s) taken with Mark Spitz for Time magazine'. She decides not to take part in the march past as it is too close to events. Her first gold medal is recorded on 2 lines 'GOLD MEDAL- Olympic and World record'. 'Bev [Whitfield] won 200 BS!! Very happy for her-cried for her! On 4 September she 'went to U.S quarters and slept night in Keena R's room [Keena Rothhammer, US gold medallist]. We went for a walk at 2 a.m. Only 3 hrs before 2 Israeli Olympians were killed by Arab guerillas!....6 Sept...the village was dead. No one felt like competing at all- Arab/Israeli doings.' She arrives back in Sydney on 18 September 'around the world in 38 days'. The diary continues with her trip to Los Angeles in February 1973. On 23rd February she addresses a revealing 4-page letter to herself 'I am going thru a stage of maturing- between the little girl and the independent woman. I figured it out that everyone needs someone for their own, special', she is still in crises over her weight 'I am 11lbs overweight. I ate incorrectly....because I felt unloved.' Another letter to herself on 22 June reveals ambivalent and awakening emotions towards male friends. The diary ends abruptly in August 1974 with a growing independence from her parents, an awakening spirituality together with Neil Innes her future husband