- Helen Garner
Infobox Writer
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name = Garner, Helen
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birthdate = Birth date and age|1942|11|7|df=y
birthplace = Geelong
deathdate =
deathplace =
occupation = Novelist and short story writer, Social commentator/nonfiction writer, Journalist
nationality = Australian
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website =Helen Garner (born
7 November 1942 ) is an award-winning Australiannovelist , short story writer, screenwriter andjournalist .Life
Garner was born in Geelongcite web |title= Helen Garner Brief Biography |publisher= Perry Middlemiss, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia |url= http://www.middlemiss.org/lit/authors/garnerh/garnerh.html |accessdate= 2007-07-24] , the eldest of six children.Goldsworthy (1996) p. ix] She attended Manifold Heights State School, Ocean Grove State School and then The Hermitage in Geelong. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree from the
University of Melbourne Wyndham (2006)] , with majors in English and French.Between 1966 and 1972 Garner worked as a high-school teacher at various Victorian high schools. During this time, in 1967, she also travelled overseas and met Bill Garner, whom she married in 1968 on their return to Australia. Her only child, the actor, musician and writer
Alice Garner , was born in 1969, and her marriage ended in 1971.In 1972, she was sacked by the Victorian Department of Education for "giving an unscheduled sex-education lesson to her 13-year old students at Fitzroy High School". The case was widely publicised in Melbourne bringing Garner a degree of notoriety.
Garner married two more times: Jean-Jacques Portail (1980–1985) and Australian writer
Murray Bail (1992–?). She is no longer married.cite news|last=Legge|first=Kate|title=Truly Helen|date=2008-03-29|url=http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,23458847-5012694,00.html|work=The Australian |publisher=News Limited |accessdate=2008-04-16]In 2003 a portrait of Helen Garner, titled "True Stories", painted by
Jenny Sages , was a finalist in theArchibald Prize .Fiction writing
Garner came to prominence at a time when Australian writers were relatively few in number, and Australian women writers were themselves something of a novelty. Australian academic and writer, Kerryn Goldsworthy, writes that "From the beginning of her writing career Garner was regarded as, and frequently called, a stylist, a realist, and a feminist".Goldsworthy (1996) p. 1]
Her first novel, "Monkey Grip" (1977), relates the lives of a group of welfare recipients living in student-style accommodation in
Melbourne . Years later she stated that she had adapted it directly from her personal diaries. The book was very successful: it won the National Book Council Award in 1978 and was turned into a film in 1982. In fact, Goldsworthy suggests that the success of "Monkey Grip" may well have helped revive the careers of two older but largely ignored Australian women writers,Jessica Anderson andThea Astley .Goldsworthy (1996) p. 14] Thea Astley wrote of the novel that "I am filled with envy by someone like Helen Garner for instance. I re-read "Monkey Grip" a while ago and it's even better second time through". [Goldsworthy (1996) p. 15]In subsequent books, she has continued to adapt her personal experiences. Her later novels are: "The Children's Bach" (1984) and "Cosmo Cosmolino" (1992). In 2008 she returned to fiction writing with the publication of "
The Spare Room ", a fictional treatment of caring for a dying cancer patient, based on the illness and death of Garner's friend Jenya Osborne. She has also published several short story collections: "Honour & Other People's Children: two stories" (1980), "Postcards from Surfers" (1985) and "My Hard Heart: Selected Fictions" (1998).In 1984, Australian academic and critic, Don Anderson, wrote of "The Children's Bach": "There are four perfect short novels in the English language. They are, in chronological order, Ford Maddox Ford's "The Good Soldier", Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby", Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises" and Helen Garner's "The Children's Bach"." [cited by McPhee (2001) p. 243] The Australian composer
Andrew Schultz wrote an opera of the same name which premiered in 2008.Helen Garner said, in 1985, that writing novels was like "trying to make a patchwork quilt look seamless. A novel is made up of scraps of our own lives and bits of other people's, and things we think of in the middle of the night and whole notebooks full of randomly collected details". [cited by McPhee (2001) p. 244–5]
Not all critics have liked Garner's work. Goldsworthy writes that "It is certainly the case that Garner is someone whose work elicits strong feelings ... and people who dislike her work are profoundly irritated by those who think she is one of the best writers in the country". [Goldsworthy (1996) p. 20] Novelist and reviewer,
Peter Corris wrote in his review of "Monkey Grip" that Garner "has published her private journal rather than written a novel" while Peter Pierce wrote in "Meanjin " of "Honour and Other People's Children" that Garner "talks dirty and passes it off as realism". [both cited by Goldsworthy (1996) p. 18–19] Goldsworthy suggests that these two statements imply that she is not really a writer. Craven, though, argues that her novella, "The Children's Bach", "should put paid to the myth of Helen Garner as a mere literalist or reporter", [Craven (1985) p. 209] arguing, in fact, that it "is light years away from any sprawling-tell-it-all naturalism, [that] it is concentrated realism of extraordinary formal polish and the amount of tonal variation which it gets from its seemingly simple plot is multifoliate to the point of being awesome". [Craven (1985) p. 213]Themes
Most of her novels address "sexual desire and the family", exploring "the relationship between sexual behaviour and social organisation; the anarchic nature of desire and the orderly force of the institution of 'family'; the similarities and differences between collective households and nuclear families; the significance and the language of housework; [and] the idea of 'the house' as image, symbol, site and peace." [Goldsworthy (1996) p. 28]
Craven comments that Garner is "always an extremely "accurate" writer in terms of the emotional states she depicts". [Craven (1985) p. 210]
creen writing
She has written three screenplays: "Monkey Grip" (1982), written with and directed by
Ken Cameron ; "Two Friends" (1986), directed byJane Campion for TV; and "The Last Days of Chez Nous " (1992), directed byGillian Armstrong .Critic Peter Craven writes that "Two Friends" is arguably the most accomplished piece of screenwriting the country has seen and it is characterised by a total lack of condescension towards the teenage girls at its centre". [Craven (1985) p. 9]
Non-fiction writing
Garner has written non-fiction from the beginning of her career as a writer. In 1972 she was fired from her teaching job after publishing in "The Digger", a counter-culture magazine, an anonymous account of frank and extended discussions she had with her students about sexuality and
sexual activities . She wrote for this magazine from 1972 to 1974. In 1993, she won a Walkley Award for her "TIME " magazine account of a murder trial following the death of a toddler at the hands of his stepfather.One of her most famous and controversial books is "
The First Stone " (1995), an account of a 1992 sexual harassment scandal at Ormond College. This book was a best-seller in Australia, but also attracted considerable criticism. Garner's other non-fiction books are: "" (1996), "The Feel of Steel " (2001) and "Joe Cinque's Consolation " (2004). She also contributed to "La Mama, the Story of a Theatre " (1988).Awards and nominations
* 1978 — National Book Council award for "Monkey Grip"
* 1986 —South Australian Premier's Awards for "The Children's Bach"
* 1986 —New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards , Christina Stead Prize for Fiction for "Postcards from Surfers "
* 1987 —New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards , Television Writing Award for "Two Friends"
* 1983 — Shortlisted for theMiles Franklin Award for "Cosmo Cosmolino"
* 1993 —Walkley Award for Best Feature Writing for "Did Daniel Have to Die?", published inTime Magazine cite web |title= The Walkley Awards |publisher= The Walkleys |url= http://www.walkleys.com/component/option,com_dbquery/Itemid,29/task,ExecuteQuery/qid,2/ |accessdate= 2007-07-23]
* 1997 —Nita Kibble Literary Award for "True Stories: Selected Non-fiction"
* 2005 —Ned Kelly Awards joint winner for Best True Crime for "Joe Cinque's Consolation"cite web |title= Ned Kelly Awards |publisher= Australian Crime Fiction Database |url= http://www.crimedownunder.com/nedkellyawards.html |accessdate= 2007-09-15]
* 2006 — Melbourne Prize for Literature
* 2008 — Victorian Premier's Literary Awards,Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction for "The Spare Room"cite web| url = http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/09/01/2352534.htm| title = Garner wins Vic Premier's literary prize| date = 2008-09-01| accessdate = 2008-09-02| publisher = http://www.abc.net.au/Australian Broadcasting Corporation ]
* 2008 — Queensland Premier's Literary Awards Fiction Book Award for "The Spare Room"cite web| url = http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/09/16/2366448.htm| title = Garner wins Qld Premier's literary award| date = 2008-09-16| accessdate = 2008-09-02| publisher = http://www.abc.net.au/Australian Broadcasting Corporation ]Bibliography
Novels
*"Monkey Grip" (1977)
*"The Children's Bach" (1984)
*"Cosmo Cosmolino" (1992)
*"The Spare Room " (2008)Short Story Collections
*"Honour & Other People's Children: Two Stories" (1980)
*"Postcards from Surfers" (1985)
*"My Hard Heart: Selected Fictions" (1998)Non-Fiction
*"The First Stone " (1995)
*"True Stories: Selected Non-Fiction" (1996)
*"The Feel of Steel" (2001)
*"Joe Cinque's Consolation " (2004)
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