Flora Eldershaw (1897–1956)

Flora Eldershaw was born in Sydney, Australia, and grew up in the agricultural Riverina District of New South Wales. She attended boarding school at a convent in Wagga Wagga, and then studied history and Latin at the University of Sydney. There she met Marjorie Barnard, with whom she later formed a writing duo under the name M. Barnard Eldershaw. Their first novel, A House is Built (1929) shared first prize in The Bulletin magazine's competition. The two women wrote four more novels, the last being a censored utopian novel, published in 1947 as Tomorrow and Tomorrow, and eventually reissued in its entirety in 1983 under its original title, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow.

Their collaboration, which lasted two decades, also produced histories, critical essays, lectures, and radio drama. Flora also worked as a teacher, first at a grammar school and then at Presbyterian Ladies' College, Croydon, where she became senior English mistress and head of the boarding school. In the 1930s, Flora and Marjorie rented a flat together that served as a sort of literary salon, where they entertained many of their literary peers.
Flora became a leading figure
in Sydney literary circles, becoming the first woman president of the Fellowship of Australian Writers (FAW). In 1941, Flora moved to Canberra to take up a government position, transferring in 1943 to Melbourne, where she worked for the Department of Labour and National Service. During World War II, many women, including Flora, were significant in book reviewing, held office in major literary societies, judged literary competitions, and edited anthologies.

In 1948, she left government service and started working as a private consultant in industrial welfare matters such as women's legal rights and equal pay, and extending her interests into the welfare of Aboriginal and migrant women.

With Barnard and Frank Dalby Davison, she worked hard through the FAW to protect writers and freedom of expression.