Robert Drewe

Internationally reknowned author Robert Drewe was born in Melbourne in 1943, but grew up and was educated on the West Australian coast. The Swan River and Indian Ocean coast, where he learned to swim and surf, made an immediate and lasting impression on him. During his time as a journalist and editor of newspapers and magazines, he won two Walkley Awards for journalism. He has lived and worked in San Francisco and London and been writer-in-residence at the University of Western Australia, La Trobe University in Melbourne, the South Bank Centre at Royal Festival Hall, London, and at Brixton Prison in London. He has received an honorary doctorate in literature from the University of Queensland, and an honorary doctorate of letters from the University of Western Australia. Robert has served as a member of the Literature Board of the Australia Council and the management committees of the Australian Society of Authors, the Sydney Writers’ Festival and the Byron Bay Writers’ Festival.