Stories from the Warm Zone

Born in Brisbane, Australia, Jessica Anderson lived mainly in Sydney, Australia. The cosmopolitan city has been the setting for much of her work, including her first novel, An Ordinary Lunacy (1963), which satirizes Sydney society. The Last Man's Head followed in 1970. Anderson's birthplace figures in her third novel, The Commandant (1975), which show more contains a vivid account of a penal settlement in the early nineteenth century. The historically based story focuses in part on how women fare in such a place, the role of women in society being a recurrent theme in Anderson's work. Her best-known book is Tirra Lirra by the River (1978), which retraces the life of a 70-year-old bedridden woman. The Impersonators (1980) examines the way money affects a Sydney family's outward lives. Anderson's novel Taking Shelter (1989), again examines Sydney society, this time in contemporary terms as the characters deal with their sexuality in the age of AIDS. Although Anderson did not begin to write novels until after she was 40 or so, she established herself as a major figure both in Australia and abroad. Anderson was noted for varied and exact characterization, spare narrative strategies, lyrical style, subtle irony, and truthfully rendered dialogue. She won the Miles Franklin Literary Award twice. Anderson died on July 9, 2010; she was 93 years old. (Bowker Author Biography) show less