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Judith Beveridge

Biography

Judith Beveridge was born in London in 1956 and migrated to Australia in 1960. Her father was born in Scotland and her mother in England and she has one older brother. She attended primary and high schools in the western suburbs of Sydney before undertaking a BA (Communications) at UTS in 1975. After leaving school she decided all she wanted to do was write poetry and she read extensively, mainly in contemporary Australian, American and European poetry.

After finishing her degree she worked part-time in offices and libraries while she wrote her first book of poems, The Domesticity of Giraffes, which was published by Black Lightning Press in 1987. In 1988 it received the Dame Mary Gilmore Award, the NSW Premier’s Poetry prize and the Victorian Premier’s Poetry prize. Poems from that volume were subsequently put on the HSC curriculum. In 1995 she edited with Jill Jones and Louise Wakeling, A Parachute of Blue, an anthology of Australian poetry. She has also worked on the literary magazines Hobo and Kalimat.

In 1989 her son, Phillip, was born and she did not resume her poetry writing until 1992. She published her second volume, Accidental Grace, with UQP in 1996 which won the Wesley Michel Wright Award and was short-listed for other awards.

During 1991 and 1996 she travelled in India, England and Germany with her husband and son. On her return she worked at a number of part-time jobs including bush regeneration and library work. In 1999 she attended the International Poetry Festival in Medellin in Colombia, and in 2003 was one of ten poets invited to Berlin to participate in the poetry translation project. From 2001–2004 she was a member of the Literature Board of the Australia Council. Her poetry has been translated into several languages including Arabic, Chinese, German and Spanish.

In 2003 she published her third volume of poetry, Wolf Notes, with Giramondo Publishing. In 2004 it won the Judith Wright Calanthe Award for Poetry and the Victorian Premier’s Poetry Prize. Since 2002 she has been teaching poetry writing at postgraduate level at Sydney University, having also worked for a time at Newcastle University. She continues to read widely in poetry and has written reviews and articles for major literary journals. In 2005 she was awarded the Philip Hodgins Memorial Medal for excellence in literature and was appointed poetry editor of Meanjin.

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