Kate Grenville
Encyclopedia
Kate Grenville is one of Australia's best-known authors. She's published nine novels, a collection of short stories, and four books about the writing process.
Her books have been awarded many prizes in Australia, as well as the Commonwealth Writers' Prize
and Britain's Orange Prize
. The Secret River
was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize
.
Her novels have been published all over the world and been translated into many languages. Two have been made into feature films. For more information about her life and her books, see kategrenville.com.
In 2006 she was awarded a Doctorate of Creative Arts by the University of Technology, Sydney
under the supervision of Associate Professors Glenda Adams
and Paula Hamilton.
In 2010 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of New South Wales
.
Kate Grenville lives in Sydney with her husband, son and daughter. Her leisure activities include learning to play the cello and performing in an amateur orchestra.
Lilian's Story was her first published novel (1985) and won the The Australian/Vogel Literary Award
. It has become one of Australia's best-loved novels and was filmed (starring Ruth Cracknell
and Toni Collette
).
Dreamhouse followed in 1986, appearing as the film Traps a few years later. Joan Makes History - the recipient of an Australian Bicentennial Commission - was published in 1988.
In 1994 Grenville returned to the characters and setting of Lilian's Story with a companion novel - Dark Places
- that re-tells the events of the earlier novel from the point of view of Lilian's incestuous father. Dark Places won the Victorian Premier's Literary Award
in 1995. (In the US this novel is titled Albion's Story.)
The Idea of Perfection
appeared in 2000 and won the Orange Prize for Fiction, at the time Britain's richest literary award.
In 2006 The Secret River
was published, the first of Grenville's books that take Australia's colonial past, and relations with Australia's indigenous people, as its subject. The Secret River was inspired by the story of her own great-great-great grandfather, a convict sent to Australia from London in 1806. This book won the Commonwealth Prize, the Christina Stead Award, and the NSW Premier's Community Relations Prize, and was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize
.
Searching for The Secret River (2006) is a memoir about the research and writing of the novel, tracing the journey of her increasing awareness of how Australia's colonial past informs its present.
The Lieutenant (2008) is set thirty years earlier than The Secret River. Based on the historical notebooks of Lieutenant William Dawes, it tells the story of the friendship between a soldier with the First Fleet and a young Gadigal girl. These two novels together explore something of the complexity of black-white relations in Australia's past.
Sarah Thornhill (2011) is the sequel to The Secret River and takes up the story of William Thornhill's youngest daughter. It can be read as a stand-alone novel, without having read The Secret River.
Grenville has also written or co-written several books about the writing process which are widely used in Creative Writing workshops and in schools and universities: The Writing Book; Writing from Start to Finish; and Making Stories ( co-written with Sue Woolfe).
Grenville has been awarded fellowships from the International Association of University Women and from the Literary Arts Board of the Australia Council
. Her novels have all been published in the UK and US as well as Australia and have been translated into many languages, including German, Swedish, French, Hebrew and Chinese.
Grenville's website is kategrenville.com and her Facebook fan page is www.facebook.com/kategrenville
Lilian's Story, set in the early twentieth century, takes as its subject a woman who rejects her middle-class background and the conventional future that's expected of her. Instead she chooses to live as a street person, making a living by offering recitations from Shakespeare. At the end of her life she declares joyously : "Drive on, George. I am ready for whatever comes next."
Joan Makes History is a satirical re-writing of Australia's history, foregrounding the women rather than the men. Joan is an Everywoman character who in various guises lives through all the iconic moments of Australia's past. She "makes history" both by simply living her life, and by (re)making history by writing it.
Dreamhouse is a black comedy about a marriage on the rocks. It explores themes of both men and women freeing themselves from stereotypes to accept their true selves. Both partners in the marriage are attracted to their own sex: the wife is prepared to acknowledge that and act on it while the husband refuses to.
The Idea of Perfection is about people haunted by the impossible ideal of perfection. The two main characters are both middle-aged and frumpish, and consider themselves unlovably flawed. The journey they make is to recognise that to be "imperfect" is simply to be human, and carries its own power. As the epigraph from da Vinci asserts : "An arch is two weaknesses that together make a strength".
The Secret River is set in early nineteenth century Australia and is based on the story of one of Grenville's convict ancestors, a London boatman transported for theft. She takes that story as a means of exploring a wider theme: the dark legacy of colonialism, especially its impact on Australia's Aboriginal peoples. The title comes from the anthropologist WEH Stanner, who wrote about a "secret river of blood flowing through Australia's history" : the story of white Australia's relationship with the Aboriginal people.
The Lieutenant is the story of one of the very earliest moments of black-white relationship in Australia, at the time of first settlement in 1788. Based on a historical source - the Gadigal-language notebooks of Lieutenant William Dawes - the novel tells the story of a unique friendship. In learning the Gadigal language from a young girl, Dawes wrote down word-for-word parts of their conversations. Grenville has used these fragments as the basis for a novel exploring how it might be possible for two people to reach across the gulfs of language and culture that separate them, and arrive at a relationship of mutual warmth and respect. She has described it as a "mirror-image" of "The Secret River".
Sarah Thornhill is a sequel to The Secret River. It tells the story of one of the children of the main character in the earlier book. Sarah Thornhill grows up knowing nothing of the dark secret in her family's past, and when she has to confront it, the direction of her life and her thinking is changed. It's a story about secrets and lies, and how to deal with a dark legacy from the past. Grenville has said that the book is set in the nineteenth century, but is as much about the ugly secrets in Australian history that her own generation inherited.
These three books form a loose trilogy - "The Colonial Trilogy" - about the first three generations of white settlement in Australia, and what that shared black/white history means for contemporary Australians. The themes of the three books reach beyond Australia: all are widely read in other countries where colonialism has left a problematic legacy.
Grenville frequently does extensive research for her novels, often using historical or other sources as the starting-point for the work of the imagination. She says of her books that they are "sometimes inspired by historical events, but they are imaginative constructs, not an attempt to write history."
Her books have been awarded many prizes in Australia, as well as the Commonwealth Writers' Prize
Commonwealth Writers' Prize
Commonwealth Writers is an initiative by the Commonwealth Foundation to unearth, develop and promote the best new fiction from across the Commonwealth. It's flagship are two literary awards and a website...
and Britain's Orange Prize
Orange Prize for Fiction
The Orange Prize for Fiction is one of the United Kingdom's most prestigious literary prizes, annually awarded to a female author of any nationality for the best original full-length novel written in English, and published in the United Kingdom in the preceding year...
. The Secret River
The Secret River
The Secret River, written by Kate Grenville in 2005, is a historical fiction about an early 19th century Englishman transported to Australia for theft. The story explores what may have happened when Europeans colonised land already inhabited by Aboriginal people. The book is also one of careful...
was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize
Man Booker Prize
The Man Booker Prize for Fiction is a literary prize awarded each year for the best original full-length novel, written in the English language, by a citizen of the Commonwealth of Nations, Ireland, or Zimbabwe. The winner of the Man Booker Prize is generally assured of international renown and...
.
Her novels have been published all over the world and been translated into many languages. Two have been made into feature films. For more information about her life and her books, see kategrenville.com.
Life
Kate Grenville was born in 1950. She has worked as an editor of documentary films at Film Australia, a sub-editor of subtitles at SBS Television, and a teacher of Creative Writing.In 2006 she was awarded a Doctorate of Creative Arts by the University of Technology, Sydney
University of Technology, Sydney
The University of Technology Sydney is a university in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. The university was founded in its current form in 1981, although its origins trace back to the 1870s. UTS is notable for its central location as the only university with its main campuses within the Sydney CBD...
under the supervision of Associate Professors Glenda Adams
Glenda Adams
Glenda Emilie Adams was an Australian novelist and short story writer, probably best known as the winner of the 1987 Miles Franklin Award for Dancing on Coral...
and Paula Hamilton.
In 2010 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of New South Wales
University of New South Wales
The University of New South Wales , is a research-focused university based in Kensington, a suburb in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia...
.
Kate Grenville lives in Sydney with her husband, son and daughter. Her leisure activities include learning to play the cello and performing in an amateur orchestra.
Career
Kate Grenville's reputation as a short story writer was made by the publication in 1984 of her collection Bearded Ladies On its publication, Peter Carey wrote "Here is someone who can really write."Lilian's Story was her first published novel (1985) and won the The Australian/Vogel Literary Award
The Australian/Vogel Literary Award
The Australian/Vogel Literary Award is an Australian literary award for unpublished manuscripts by writers under the age of 35. The prize money, currently A$20,000, is the richest and most prestigious award for an unpublished manuscript in Australia...
. It has become one of Australia's best-loved novels and was filmed (starring Ruth Cracknell
Ruth Cracknell
Ruth Cracknell AM was an Australian theatre and television character actress who appeared in many comedy roles. She was known variously as "Crackers", "Dame Crackers" and "Dame Ruth" throughout a career spanning 56 years....
and Toni Collette
Toni Collette
Antonia "Toni" Collette is an Australian actress and musician, known for her acting work on stage, television and film as well as a secondary career as the lead singer of the band Toni Collette & the Finish....
).
Dreamhouse followed in 1986, appearing as the film Traps a few years later. Joan Makes History - the recipient of an Australian Bicentennial Commission - was published in 1988.
In 1994 Grenville returned to the characters and setting of Lilian's Story with a companion novel - Dark Places
Dark Places (novel)
Dark Places is a mystery novel by Gillian Flynn published in 2009. The novel deals with class issues in rural America, intense poverty and the Satanic cult hysteria that swept the United States in the 1980s...
- that re-tells the events of the earlier novel from the point of view of Lilian's incestuous father. Dark Places won the Victorian Premier's Literary Award
Victorian Premier's Literary Award
The Victorian Premier's Literary Awards were created by the Victorian Governmentwith the aim of raising the profile of contemporary creative writing and Australia's publishing industry....
in 1995. (In the US this novel is titled Albion's Story.)
The Idea of Perfection
The Idea of Perfection
The Idea of Perfection is a 1999 novel by Australian author Kate Grenville.-Notes:*"Dedication: For Tom and for Alice with love"*"Epigraph: 'An arch is two weaknesses which together make a strength.' - Leonardo da Vinci "-Reviews:...
appeared in 2000 and won the Orange Prize for Fiction, at the time Britain's richest literary award.
In 2006 The Secret River
The Secret River
The Secret River, written by Kate Grenville in 2005, is a historical fiction about an early 19th century Englishman transported to Australia for theft. The story explores what may have happened when Europeans colonised land already inhabited by Aboriginal people. The book is also one of careful...
was published, the first of Grenville's books that take Australia's colonial past, and relations with Australia's indigenous people, as its subject. The Secret River was inspired by the story of her own great-great-great grandfather, a convict sent to Australia from London in 1806. This book won the Commonwealth Prize, the Christina Stead Award, and the NSW Premier's Community Relations Prize, and was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize
Man Booker Prize
The Man Booker Prize for Fiction is a literary prize awarded each year for the best original full-length novel, written in the English language, by a citizen of the Commonwealth of Nations, Ireland, or Zimbabwe. The winner of the Man Booker Prize is generally assured of international renown and...
.
Searching for The Secret River (2006) is a memoir about the research and writing of the novel, tracing the journey of her increasing awareness of how Australia's colonial past informs its present.
The Lieutenant (2008) is set thirty years earlier than The Secret River. Based on the historical notebooks of Lieutenant William Dawes, it tells the story of the friendship between a soldier with the First Fleet and a young Gadigal girl. These two novels together explore something of the complexity of black-white relations in Australia's past.
Sarah Thornhill (2011) is the sequel to The Secret River and takes up the story of William Thornhill's youngest daughter. It can be read as a stand-alone novel, without having read The Secret River.
Grenville has also written or co-written several books about the writing process which are widely used in Creative Writing workshops and in schools and universities: The Writing Book; Writing from Start to Finish; and Making Stories ( co-written with Sue Woolfe).
Grenville has been awarded fellowships from the International Association of University Women and from the Literary Arts Board of the Australia Council
Australia Council
The Australia Council, informally known as the Australia Council for the Arts, is the official arts council or arts funding body of the Government of Australia.-Function:...
. Her novels have all been published in the UK and US as well as Australia and have been translated into many languages, including German, Swedish, French, Hebrew and Chinese.
Grenville's website is kategrenville.com and her Facebook fan page is www.facebook.com/kategrenville
Style and subject matter
Grenville's early fiction presented characters trying to free themselves from social and gender stereotypes. Bearded Ladies is a collection of short stories about women trying to free themselves from the gender stereotypes of their society: metaphorically although not literally they are the "bearded ladies" of the title.Lilian's Story, set in the early twentieth century, takes as its subject a woman who rejects her middle-class background and the conventional future that's expected of her. Instead she chooses to live as a street person, making a living by offering recitations from Shakespeare. At the end of her life she declares joyously : "Drive on, George. I am ready for whatever comes next."
Joan Makes History is a satirical re-writing of Australia's history, foregrounding the women rather than the men. Joan is an Everywoman character who in various guises lives through all the iconic moments of Australia's past. She "makes history" both by simply living her life, and by (re)making history by writing it.
Dreamhouse is a black comedy about a marriage on the rocks. It explores themes of both men and women freeing themselves from stereotypes to accept their true selves. Both partners in the marriage are attracted to their own sex: the wife is prepared to acknowledge that and act on it while the husband refuses to.
The Idea of Perfection is about people haunted by the impossible ideal of perfection. The two main characters are both middle-aged and frumpish, and consider themselves unlovably flawed. The journey they make is to recognise that to be "imperfect" is simply to be human, and carries its own power. As the epigraph from da Vinci asserts : "An arch is two weaknesses that together make a strength".
The Secret River is set in early nineteenth century Australia and is based on the story of one of Grenville's convict ancestors, a London boatman transported for theft. She takes that story as a means of exploring a wider theme: the dark legacy of colonialism, especially its impact on Australia's Aboriginal peoples. The title comes from the anthropologist WEH Stanner, who wrote about a "secret river of blood flowing through Australia's history" : the story of white Australia's relationship with the Aboriginal people.
The Lieutenant is the story of one of the very earliest moments of black-white relationship in Australia, at the time of first settlement in 1788. Based on a historical source - the Gadigal-language notebooks of Lieutenant William Dawes - the novel tells the story of a unique friendship. In learning the Gadigal language from a young girl, Dawes wrote down word-for-word parts of their conversations. Grenville has used these fragments as the basis for a novel exploring how it might be possible for two people to reach across the gulfs of language and culture that separate them, and arrive at a relationship of mutual warmth and respect. She has described it as a "mirror-image" of "The Secret River".
Sarah Thornhill is a sequel to The Secret River. It tells the story of one of the children of the main character in the earlier book. Sarah Thornhill grows up knowing nothing of the dark secret in her family's past, and when she has to confront it, the direction of her life and her thinking is changed. It's a story about secrets and lies, and how to deal with a dark legacy from the past. Grenville has said that the book is set in the nineteenth century, but is as much about the ugly secrets in Australian history that her own generation inherited.
These three books form a loose trilogy - "The Colonial Trilogy" - about the first three generations of white settlement in Australia, and what that shared black/white history means for contemporary Australians. The themes of the three books reach beyond Australia: all are widely read in other countries where colonialism has left a problematic legacy.
Grenville frequently does extensive research for her novels, often using historical or other sources as the starting-point for the work of the imagination. She says of her books that they are "sometimes inspired by historical events, but they are imaginative constructs, not an attempt to write history."
Prizes
- 1984 – The Australian/Vogel Literary AwardThe Australian/Vogel Literary AwardThe Australian/Vogel Literary Award is an Australian literary award for unpublished manuscripts by writers under the age of 35. The prize money, currently A$20,000, is the richest and most prestigious award for an unpublished manuscript in Australia...
for Lilian's Story - 1995 The Victorian Premier's Prize for Fiction for "Dark Places"
- 2001 – Orange Prize for FictionOrange Prize for FictionThe Orange Prize for Fiction is one of the United Kingdom's most prestigious literary prizes, annually awarded to a female author of any nationality for the best original full-length novel written in English, and published in the United Kingdom in the preceding year...
for The Idea of PerfectionThe Idea of PerfectionThe Idea of Perfection is a 1999 novel by Australian author Kate Grenville.-Notes:*"Dedication: For Tom and for Alice with love"*"Epigraph: 'An arch is two weaknesses which together make a strength.' - Leonardo da Vinci "-Reviews:... - 2006 – Commonwealth Writers' PrizeCommonwealth Writers' PrizeCommonwealth Writers is an initiative by the Commonwealth Foundation to unearth, develop and promote the best new fiction from across the Commonwealth. It's flagship are two literary awards and a website...
for The Secret RiverThe Secret RiverThe Secret River, written by Kate Grenville in 2005, is a historical fiction about an early 19th century Englishman transported to Australia for theft. The story explores what may have happened when Europeans colonised land already inhabited by Aboriginal people. The book is also one of careful... - 2006 – New South Wales Premier's Literary AwardsNew South Wales Premier's Literary AwardsThe New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards were established in 1979 by the New South Wales Premier Neville Wran. Commenting on its purpose, Wran said: "We want the arts to take, and be seen to take, their proper place in our social priorities...
, Christina Stead Prize for fiction for The Secret RiverThe Secret RiverThe Secret River, written by Kate Grenville in 2005, is a historical fiction about an early 19th century Englishman transported to Australia for theft. The story explores what may have happened when Europeans colonised land already inhabited by Aboriginal people. The book is also one of careful... - 2006 – New South Wales Premier's Literary AwardsNew South Wales Premier's Literary AwardsThe New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards were established in 1979 by the New South Wales Premier Neville Wran. Commenting on its purpose, Wran said: "We want the arts to take, and be seen to take, their proper place in our social priorities...
, Community Relations Commission Award for The Secret RiverThe Secret RiverThe Secret River, written by Kate Grenville in 2005, is a historical fiction about an early 19th century Englishman transported to Australia for theft. The story explores what may have happened when Europeans colonised land already inhabited by Aboriginal people. The book is also one of careful...
Shortlisted
- 2006 – The Secret RiverThe Secret RiverThe Secret River, written by Kate Grenville in 2005, is a historical fiction about an early 19th century Englishman transported to Australia for theft. The story explores what may have happened when Europeans colonised land already inhabited by Aboriginal people. The book is also one of careful...
– Miles Franklin AwardMiles Franklin AwardThe Miles Franklin Literary Award is an annual literary prize for the best Australian ‘published novel or play portraying Australian life in any of its phases’. The award was set up according to the will of Miles Franklin , who is best known for writing the Australian classic My Brilliant Career ...
and the Man Booker PrizeMan Booker PrizeThe Man Booker Prize for Fiction is a literary prize awarded each year for the best original full-length novel, written in the English language, by a citizen of the Commonwealth of Nations, Ireland, or Zimbabwe. The winner of the Man Booker Prize is generally assured of international renown and...
.
Novels
- Lilian's Story (1985) ISBN 1-86448-284-2
- Dreamhouse (1986) ISBN 0-7022-1959-2
- Joan Makes History: A Novel (1988) ISBN 0-7022-2174-0
- Dark Places (1994) ISBN 0-330-33549-9 (alternative title: Albion's Story)
- The Idea of PerfectionThe Idea of PerfectionThe Idea of Perfection is a 1999 novel by Australian author Kate Grenville.-Notes:*"Dedication: For Tom and for Alice with love"*"Epigraph: 'An arch is two weaknesses which together make a strength.' - Leonardo da Vinci "-Reviews:...
(1999) - The Secret RiverThe Secret RiverThe Secret River, written by Kate Grenville in 2005, is a historical fiction about an early 19th century Englishman transported to Australia for theft. The story explores what may have happened when Europeans colonised land already inhabited by Aboriginal people. The book is also one of careful...
(2005) - The Lieutenant (2008)
- Sarah Thornhill (sequel to The Secret River)] 2011
Non-fiction
- The Writing Book: A Manual for Fiction Writers (1990) ISBN 0-04442124-9
- Making Stories: How Ten Australian Novels Were Written (1993), with Woolfe, Sue ISBN 1-86373316-7
- Writing from Start to Finish: a Six-Step Guide (2001)
- Searching for the Secret River (2006) ISBN 1-921145-39-0
Translations
Grenville's work has appeared in: Swedish, Dutch, German, French, Italian, Czech, Bulgarian, Spanish, Portuguese, Hebrew, Norwegian, Greek, and Mandarin.External links
- Kate Grenville - Allen and Unwin Book Publishers
- Podcast of Kate Grenville discussing The Secret River on the BBC's World Book ClubWorld Book ClubWorld Book Club is a radio programme on the BBC World Service. Each edition of the programme, which is broadcast on the first Saturday of the month with repeats into the following Monday, features a famous author discussing one of his or her books, often the most well-known one, with the public...
- VIDEO: Kate Grenville at the Melbourne Festival of Ideas, talking about Artists, Writers and Climate Change on ABC Fora
- Transcript of interview with Ramona KovalRamona KovalRamona Koval is an Australian broadcaster, writer and journalist.Her parents were Yiddish-speaking survivors of the Holocaust who arrived in Melbourne from Poland in 1950....
, The Book ShowThe Book ShowThe Book Show is an Australian ABC radio program for the discussion of everything relating to the written word. It is broadcast live around Australia on Radio National with a daily weekday morning show which is then replayed nightly and also has a Sunday evening show. The show is hosted by Ramona...
, ABC Radio National, 1 October 2008. - Kate Grenville's Home Page
- Interview with Kate Grenville speaking about her book The Idea of Perfection from the Interviews Archive
- AustLit Resource Author Entry.
- Kate Grenville's site by Canongate
- Online interview from CBC Words at Large