Madeleine: A Life of Madeleine St John (Helen Trinca, Text)

Helen Trinca draws on interviews with family and friends of Madeleine St John to compose this first biography of the Australian author, who wrote four novels, including The Women in Black and the Booker-shortlisted The Essence of the Thing. St John was born in Sydney in 1941 to lawyer and Liberal politician Ted St John and his wife Sylvette Cargher, a stylish Parisian with Romanian Jewish parents. St John’s childhood was not a happy one. Her mother suffered from alcoholism and suicidal depression, eventually killing herself in 1954. Her father remarried within a year, and the relationship between father and daughter worsened dramatically; throughout her life St John blamed her father for the death of her mother, and the deterioration of their relationship forms the core of this book. Trinca writes movingly of the author’s struggles, although she is also critical of St John’s behaviour, which could be cruel and irrational. Trinca also explores St John’s brief marriage, life in London, friendships with other expatriates such as Clive James and Bruce Beresford, experiences in an ashram, struggle with mental illness, lack of money and late development as a writer. While this book will appeal to fans of the author, it is more of a study of the effects of childhood trauma on a person than an analysis of the development of a writer.

Sue Bond is a writer and former bookseller

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Category: Reviews