A.D. Hope
A Memoir of a Literary Friendship
A.D. (Alec) Hope (1907-2000) was one of the most significant Australian poets of the twentieth century: satirist, scholar, master at once of erotic verse and of the discursive mode, author of poems (‘Australia’, ‘The Death of the Bird’) that, along with the works of Patrick White, Judith Wright and Manning Clarke, scripted Australian thought for decades. David Brooks, forty-six years his junior, first met Hope when, as a student, the ANU asked him to photograph the poet for a building they’d just named after him. A friendship formed that lasted twenty-five years, saw Brooks become Hope’s editor, and eventually give the poet’s eulogy. Penetrating, surprising, and supported by an intimate knowledge both of the poetry and of the man himself, this memoir of their relationship is a must for readers of Hope and of Brooks alike.
David Brooks is a poet, novelist, short-fiction writer and essayist. He has taught literature at various Australian universities, and from 1999 until 2018 was co-editor of Southerly, Australia’s premier journal of Australian literature and new Australian writing. He is a vegan and animal rights advocate, and lives in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales. In 2014 he was awarded an Australia Council Fellow ship for his distinguished contribution to Australian and international literature.
