Beverley Farmer | |
Birth Name: | Beverley Anne Farmer |
Birth Date: | 7 February 1941 |
Birth Place: | Windsor, Victoria, Australia |
Occupation: | Novelist and short story writer |
Language: | English |
Nationality: | Australian |
Awards: | New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards — Christina Stead Prize for Fiction |
Years Active: | 1968-2017 |
Beverley Anne Farmer (also known as B. Christou) (7 February 1941 – 16 April 2018) was an Australian novelist and short story writer.[1]
Beverley Farmer was born in Melbourne. She was educated at Mac.Robertson Girls' High School and at the University of Melbourne, where she graduated with a BA in 1960.
She worked in various jobs, mainly secondary-school teaching and running a restaurant, before becoming a professional writer.[2] She was married to a Greek migrant, Christos Talihmanidis, for thirteen years 1965-78, three of them spent in Greece. They returned to Australia for their son to be born in 1972 and they were subsequently divorced.
Farmer's autobiographical novella Alone (1980) reworked a story which had appeared in Westerly (1968). It was published by the firm of Sisters and "gives a sensitive portrayal of the breakup of a lesbian relationship."[2] While she is best known for her fiction, Farmer also wrote essays, poetry, reviews and criticism. Her writing appeared in several magazines, journals and newspapers, including Overland, Westerly, Meanjin, Island Magazine, and The Bulletin.
Loss features as a central theme in Farmer's stories. She described it as the "touchstone" of her work.[3] The "experience of being foreign" was also favoured.[4] Several stories in her 1985 book Home Time show growing awareness of the relation between life and fiction, writers and readers. She was an admirer of her fellow Australian novelist Marjorie Barnard.[2]
Beverley Farmer died on 16 April 2018, aged 77.[5] [6]
Web site: Rowe . Josephine . After Images: Encountering the Work of Beverley Farmer . LitHub.com . 11 March 2021 . 12 March 2021 . Web site: Jacobs . Lyn . Against The Grain: Beverley Farmer's Writing. beverleyfarmer.com.au . Against The Grain: Beverley Farmer's Writing. St. Lucia: University of Queensland Press, 2001. Critical Study in UQP Studies in Australian Literature, which includes biographical material, analysis of novels, short stories and poetry.
Web site: Jacobs . Lyn . Beverley Farmer 1941-2018: A Tribute Archetypes and fluency in This Water: Five Tales. beverleyfarmer.com.au . JASAL: Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature. JACOBS: Beverly Farmer, Archetypes and Fluency Editor: Tony Simoes da Silva
Web site: Vale Beverley Farmer, Tributes in Memoria . beverleyfarmer.com.au . 1 July 2023 .