It’s nearing the end of 2017 and I’ve only noticed three Australian literary biographies published. I counted five last year, and thought that a low number; perhaps it was actually a bumper crop. The three I’ve noticed are Bernadette Brennan’s A Writing Life: Helen Garner and Her Work (Text); Kerrie Davies’ A Wife’s Heart: The Untold Story of Bertha and Henry Lawson (UQP); and Janelle McCulloch Beyond the Rock: the Life of Joan Lindsay and the Mystery of Picnic at Hanging Rock (Echo). What have I missed?
I haven’t read any of these yet but even at only three titles, they represent a good spread of Australian literature. Lawson must be the most covered biographical subject of any Australian writer, but Davies’ focus on Bertha is a new angle and apparently an innovative approach. The biography of Joan Lindsay gives us a solidly twentieth century writer; the title suggests the challenge of approaching (and marketing) a writer remembered for one book. And then Brennan’s biography is of a contemporary writer and sounds from the reviews as a work of biographical criticism, making it more possible to write while the subject is well and truly alive.
Nathan Hobby, a biographer in Perth 
I read/reviewed Bertha’s bio of Henry (pub. 1943, I think) this year, I might have to have a shot at Davies’ account.
LikeLike
Your TBR is always growing, but you wouldn’t have it any other way!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Would you include Looking for Rose Paterson? It’s about Banjo Paterson’s mother but it includes aspects of his life too: https://anzlitlovers.com/2017/05/27/looking-for-rose-paterson-how-family-life-nurtured-banjo-the-poet-by-jennifer-gall/
Also, I checked my shelves: Our Man Elsewhere (Alan Moorehead) came out in paperback this year; would you count that one? (I haven’t read it yet).
LikeLike
I knew you’d have another for me! I would include Looking for Rose Paterson – sounds similar to the Bertha Lawson work. I included Our Man Elsewhere in last year’s tally – but I only read it this year and I think it’s brilliant.
LikeLike
Yes, I was going to suggest Rose Paterson, though she herself is not the literary person. I can’t think of anything else off the top of my head, I’m afraid.
LikeLiked by 1 person