Biography

I was born in Naples, Italy of Hungarian parents who emigrated to Australia when I was a baby. I was educated in the western suburbs of Sydney then moved to the inner city. I lived in Malaya with my parents as a teenager for two years, and began my adult travels with a trip to Bali in the late 1970s.

I began publishing short prose fiction in small-press and then main-stream anthologies in the early 1980s. My first novel Between Careers was published in 1989 although it had been completed years earlier. The short prose collection The Saddest Pleasure (1989) and the novel Pagan (1990) followed, and finishing The Edge of Bali (1992) marked the end of 40 years based in Sydney (including travels in South-East Asia, Europe, Morocco and India). During that time I also wrote material for several theatre pieces produced in Sydney, including Zen and Now.

I went to Papua New Guinea with Australian Volunteers Abroad in 1992 (the subject of Rascal Rain: a year in Papua New Guinea (1994)).

I lived in Far North Queensland for the next few years, in Cairns and then Torres Strait Islands. In 1997 Sheila Power was published. During this time I also spent time in the USA, mostly New York City, with a stay in 1995 at Yaddo, the artists’ colony in Saratoga Springs, and in India, where I have been several times to study yoga. Other trips to India have included a period as writer-in-residence at the University of Madras (2001) and a Literature Residency granted by Asialink (2002). India is the setting for my novel, Neem Dreams (2003) and was first published there. In 2006 I taught Creative Writing in Chennai. My latest novel With The Tiger also has its first publication in India in 2008.

At the start of 1998 I moved to South-East Queensland. I continued to travel every year. In 2006 I returned to New York and Europe, and gave several lectures in universities in Spain.

In 2007 I moved to Europe to spend five months at Binger Film Lab in Amsterdam then to take up a residency at the BR Whiting Library in Rome, granted by the Australia Council.

I taught writing since 1989 in a range of contexts, including universities, community groups, prisons and mentorship schemes. In 2003 I was awarded a Doctor of Philosophy in Writing by Griffith University.

In 2004 the reprint anthology Three Sydney Novels [Pagan, Between Careers and Sheila Power] was self-published.

Sun square moon: writings on yoga and writing has been published in various editions, the latest being from Writers Workshop Kolkata.

Several published short stories, essays and reviews are uncollected; some of them, as well as book chapters, can be read in the Uncollected category to your right.

I am currently working on screenplays, fiction, memoir and essays.

My news blog will update my publications and activities.