Peter Carey (novelist) facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Peter Carey AO
Born	Peter Philip Carey (1943-05-07) 7 May 1943 (age 82) Bacchus Marsh, Victoria, Australia
Occupation	Novelist, creative writing teacher
Period	1974–present
Notable works	Oscar and Lucinda, True History of the Kelly Gang
Notable awards	Booker Prize 1988, 2001
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Peter Philip Carey AO (born 7 May 1943) is a famous Australian novelist. He writes exciting stories and has won many important awards for his books.

He is one of only five writers in the world to have won the Booker Prize twice. This is a very special award for the best novel written in English. Peter Carey won his first Booker Prize in 1988 for his book Oscar and Lucinda. He won it again in 2001 for True History of the Kelly Gang.

Carey has also won the Miles Franklin Award three times. This is one of Australia's most important literary awards. Many people think he might even win the Nobel Prize in Literature one day. Besides writing novels, he also helped write a movie script called Until the End of the World. He also taught creative writing at Hunter College in New York for many years.

Early Life and First Steps in Writing: 1943–1970

Peter Carey was born in Bacchus Marsh, Victoria, Australia, in 1943. His parents owned a car dealership. He went to school in Bacchus Marsh and then to Geelong Grammar School.

In 1961, he started studying science at Monash University in Melbourne. But he stopped his studies early after a car accident and because he wasn't very interested. At university, he met his first wife, Leigh Weetman.

In 1962, Peter Carey started working in advertising. He worked for different companies in Melbourne. This job helped him meet older writers. They introduced him to new books from Europe and America. He read many famous authors like Samuel Beckett and Franz Kafka.

During this time, he also started writing his own stories. He got his first rejection letter for a story in 1964. Over the next few years, he wrote five novels. None of these first novels were published.

His only published works in the 1960s were two short pieces. One was an extract from a novel, and the other was a short story. Towards the end of the 1960s, Carey and his wife moved to London. He continued to write advertising copy and his own stories there.

Becoming a Published Author: 1970–1990

Peter Carey came back to Australia in 1970. He continued to work in advertising in Melbourne and Sydney. He also kept writing his own stories. Slowly, his short stories started to be published in magazines and newspapers.

Many of these stories were put together in his first book, The Fat Man in History, published in 1974. In the same year, Carey moved to Balmain in Sydney for his advertising job.

In 1976, Carey moved to Queensland and joined a special community called Starlight. He lived there with his new partner, the painter Margot Hutcheson. He still worked for Grey Advertising, writing from Yandina for three weeks and then going to Sydney for one week. During this time, he wrote most of the stories for his book War Crimes (1979). He also wrote Bliss (1981), which was his first published novel.

Carey started his own advertising company in 1980. In 1981, he moved to Bellingen in northern New South Wales. There he wrote Illywhacker, which came out in 1985. That same year, he married theatre director Alison Summers. He also wrote a stage musical called Illusion.

The 1980s ended with his book Oscar and Lucinda (1988). This book won the Booker Prize and made him famous around the world. Carey said that living in Bellingen helped him get the idea for the novel. He saw a small church that was being moved. He imagined how a church might have arrived in the Australian landscape a long time ago.

I was living in Bellingen in the country. And the little church was down the road, and they wanted to take it away, zip: and I looked at that landscape and I thought – only 200 years ago this was a landscape that was full of Aboriginal stories. So I thought about a moment when that church that I knew, which was being removed from my landscape, might have arrived. I wanted it to arrive intact, whole. And I thought it would come on a barge. And, this is a totally irrational thought, it’s like a dream. I wanted this church, a wooden church, just what I saw, a church in that valley, to come along the Bellingen River on a barge gliding like a dream into the landscape.

Life and Writing in New York: 1990–Present

In 1990, Peter Carey sold his share of the advertising company. He moved to New York with Alison Summers and their son. He started teaching creative writing at New York University. He later said that moving to New York was his wife's idea. Carey and Summers divorced in 2005. Peter Carey is now married to Frances Coady, a publisher from Britain.

His first book finished in the United States was The Tax Inspector (1991). Then came The Unusual Life of Tristan Smith (1994). In this book, he explored the relationship between Australia and America. He often writes about Australia's history and people, even when living in the U.S.

One student told him that when you move to a new country, you "lose your peripheral vision." This means it's harder to see all the small, everyday details that make a place unique. So, he felt his view of America was still limited. He preferred to write about Australia because he knew it so well.

Periodically he has thought about writing an American-based novel, and he had started one dealing with litigation. But he put it aside for Ned Kelly. Explaining why he continues to set most of his books in Australia, he recalled that one of his students said, "When you change countries you lose your peripheral vision." In that sense, his view of America is still limited. Writing about Australia—its history and its heroes—his perspective is wide and deep.

After almost 20 years in the U.S., he finally wrote a novel set in America. It was called Parrot and Olivier in America (2010). This book was inspired by the life of Alexis de Tocqueville, a French writer who visited America a long time ago. Carey continues to write new and interesting stories, exploring different places and times.

Awards and Special Honors

Peter Carey has received many awards and special honors for his writing. He has been given three honorary degrees from universities. He is also a member of important literary groups, like the Royal Society of Literature and the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

In 2010, his picture appeared on two Australian postage stamps. This was part of a series honoring "Australian Legends." In 2012, he was named an Officer of the Order of Australia. This is a high honor for his great work in literature and for sharing Australian identity with the world.

Here are some of the many literary awards Peter Carey has won:

See also

In Spanish: Peter Carey para niños