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A Fence Around the Cukoo by Ruth Park

book cover for A Fence Around the Cuckoo



The following information has been taken from the Penguin Books Australia website.

Description:

Written as vividly as any of her novels, Ruth Park's autobiography is a moving, passionate, often funny account of the people and places which influenced her early years. Her isolated childhood in the rainforests of New Zealand fed her fertile imagination; her convent education encouraged her love of words and writing, and the bitter years of the Depression exposed her to poverty and injustice.

About the Author:

Born in New Zealand, Ruth Park came to Australia in 1942 to continue her career as a journalist. She married the writer D'Arcy Niland and travelled with him through the north-west of New South Wales before settling in Sydney where she became a full-time writer.

She has written over fifty books, and her many awards include the prestigious Miles Franklin Award for Swords and Crowns and Rings; the Australian Children's Book of the Year Award and the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award (USA) for Playing Beatie Bow and The Age Book of the Year Award for A Fence Around the Cuckoo.

She was made a Member of the Order of Australia in 1987 and in 1994 was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Letter from the University of New South Wales. Ruth Park passed away in December 2010.
 

For more information, see Ruth Park: A Celebration from the National Library of Australia.


Awards:

Winner of the Age Book of the Year Award for non-fiction 1992

Winner of the Colin Roderick Award, presented with the H.T. Priestley Medal (Townsville Foundation for Australian Literary Studies Award) 1992

Winner of the the Tilly Aston Award for Braille Book of the Year 1993

Winner of the Talking Book of the Year Award (Royal Blind Society) 1993

Shortlisted for NBC Banjo Awards, NBC Banjo Award for Non-Fiction, 1993

Author Interviews:

Love and Chance: a tribute to Ruth Park, from ABC Radio National

Reviews:

For more information, see Ruth Park: A Celebration from the National Library of Australia.