Thea Astley
APA Portrait of author Thea Gregson (née Astley) / 1966.
Photograph by Curly Fraser of Australian Photographic Agency for Thea Gregson
Call no. APA-23824
Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales
Thea Astley was born on 25 August 1925 in Brisbane. She was educated at the University of Queensland. For many years she worked as a teacher. She worked in Queensland and New South Wales schools until 1967. From 1968 to 1960 she taught at Macquarie University in Sydney.
Astley’s first novel, Girl with a Monkey appeared in 1958. Her fiction in general shows a particular interest in the history and locales of North Queensland as well as the role of Catholicism in everyday life and the place of women in society. With a keen eye for egoism and exploitation and a talent for social comedy, Astley frequently writes from the point of view of the vulnerable outsider, destined if not for tragedy then at least for failure. Violence is endemic to her work and her narratives are often freighted with an increasing burden of impending, irreversible disaster. The bleak action of her novels often destablises Australian national myths such as mateship, rural solidarity, the ‘fair go’ and egalitarianism.
Astley won the Miles Franklin Award four times – for The Well Dressed Explorer in 1962, The Slow Natives in 1965, The Acolyte in 1972 and Drylands in 2000. In 1989 she won the Patrick White Award and was granted an honorary doctorate from the University of Queensland. She was made AO in 1992 and a Creative Fellow of the Australia Council in 1993.
- Homage to Thea Astley, ABC Radio National’s Books and Writing program 22/8/2004 (transcript): http://www.abc.net.au/rn/arts/bwriting/stories/s1182874.htm
- ‘Thea’s Typer’ – UQ’s Fryer Library’s Treasure of the Month: http://www.library.uq.edu.au/fryer/treasures/thea_astley/thea.html
Biographical summary derived from:
The Oxford Companion to Australian Literature, William H. Wilde, Joy Hooton and Barry Andrews eds, Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1985.
AustLit: The Australian Literature Resource (www.austlit.edu.au). AustLit is freely available at many libraries, universities and schools. For further details see: www.austlit.edu.au/subscription
