The Kangaroo Farm

Born and educated in England, Martin Harrison (1949-2014) emigrated to Australia in the late 1970s after a period living in New Zealand. He had already published a slim collection with Ferry Press, and further chapbooks with Hawk Press in New Zealand. His first full-scale poetry collection, The Distribution of Voice (University of Queensland Press), was published in 1993. Throughout the 1980s Harrison worked as a literary journalist and reviewer, as well as a producer for ABC Radio. The first edition of The Kangaroo Farm (Paper Bark Press, 1997) was shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Award, and the follow-up, Summer (Paper Bark Press, 2001), won the Wesley Michel Wright Prize in Poetry from the University of Melbourne. His new and selected poems, Wild Bees, was published by the University of Western Australia Press in Perth, and by Shearsman Books in the UK in 2008. The Australian edition was shortlisted for two major Australian prizes. UWA went on to publish his posthumous collection, Happiness, in 2015. Martin Harrison also wrote essays on Australian literature, some of which were collected in Who Wants to Create Australia? (Halstead Press), a volume which was a Times Literary Supplement book of the year selection for 2004.