Amanda Lohrey

Amanda Lilian Lohrey (née Howard, 1947), writer and teacher of writing, was born and educated in Hobart and Cambridge University. She has taught creative writing, guest-edited Island magazine in 1994, and has published short fiction, political essays and four novels, becoming a nationally significant figure. Her novels are The morality of gentlemen (1984), an account of the Hursey waterfront confrontation of the 1950s, portraying the Cold War and the ideological tensions of the Labor split; The reading group (1987), a complex narrative of Left politics in the post-Vietnam era; Camille's bread (1995), where contemporary Australians try to wrest freedom from necessity, in the public service and New Age lifestyles; and The philosopher's doll (2004), a complex narrative of contemporary social and sexual lives. Prizes include the Victorian Premier's Prize for Fiction (1996) and the Australian Literature Society Gold Medal (1996).

Further reading: A Lohrey, 'Australia Day', RePublica 1, 1994; A Lohrey, 'Ground-swell', Quarterly Essay 8, 2002; S Knight, 'A writable future', Scripsi 5/2, 1989.

Philip Mead