Child of the Hurricane
What events shaped the life of renowned author, journalist, playwright, and political activist Katharine Susannah Prichard? Biographer Nathan Hobby takes us through Katharine’s early years:
Katharine’s political and writing prime is considered to be between the eventful years of 1919 and 1933. Nathan takes us through this time, including the many influences on her work and activism:
Take a tour of ‘Katharine’s Place’
The KSP Writer’s Centre invites you on a tour of the author’s house in Greenmount, Western Australia.
‘Katharine’s Place’ was the name her friends gave to the author’s Greenmount home. When the Katharine Susannah Prichard Foundation was established in 1985, it was decided to retain it’s already recognised name.
KSP Writer’s Centre
Further Reading:
You can find an extensive entry on the life of Katharine Susannah Prichard in the Dictionary of Literary Biography, volume 260: Australian Writers, 1915 – 1950. Edited by Selina Samuels, Layman Poupard Publishing (2002).
Nathan Hobby published a modified version of the second chapter of his biography of K.S.P. detailing her early years, in Westerly 60:2, “‘The memory of a storm’: The Wild Oats of Han and the childhood of Katharine Susannah Prichard, 1887 to 1895.” Purchase Nathan’s biography The Red Witch here.
K.S.P.’s son, Ric Throssell, wrote a biography of his mother in 1975, Wild Weeds and Windflowers. This has been reprinted and is available to purchase from Allen and Unwin.
Drusilla Modjeska’s Exiles At Home (A&R Classics, 2001 reprint), includes Katharine Susannah Prichard in her study of women writers from 1925 to 1945.
Lisa Hill runs a blog, ANZ Lit Lovers, and frequently reviews Katherine’s work. Read it here.
Listen to Katharine Susannah Prichard
Katharine Susannah Prichard initially worked as a journalist in the UK, listen to an interview of her experiences of reporting during WWI, recorded not long before she died in 1969, here:
ABC Radio National, 2010. ‘World War One Correspondents’. Produced by Michelle Rayner.
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Nathan Hobby is a writer, reader, and librarian living in Perth, Western Australia with his wife, Nicole and two young children. His novel, The Fur, won the T.A.G. Hungerford Award and was published by Fremantle Press in 2004. (Sadly, it is now out of print.) His is an honorary research fellow at the University of Western Australia and completed his PhD there in 2019, a biography of the early life of Katharine Prichard supervised by Tony Hughes D’Aeth and Van Ikin. He also holds a Master of Arts in Creative Writing.
Follow Nathan Hobby via his blog, and on Twitter under Nathan Hobby or Katharine Susannah Prichard.
The KSP Writers’ Centre exists to support writers at all levels of the craft. The Centre is managed by the Katharine Susannah Prichard (KSP) Foundation Inc, located in the beautiful Perth Hills region of Western Australia. The Foundation was formed in 1985 to preserve Katharine’s Place at 11 Old York Road and run it as a Centre dedicated to writing development, the promotion of writers and literature, and to preserve the home and legacy of celebrated Australian author Katharine Susannah Prichard.
Write to Katharine Susannah Prichard
Do you have a question for Katharine Susannah Prichard? Want to let her know what her books mean to you? Write her a letter! See how you can participate here.
