Born at Tsitsihar, Manchuria, on the Trans-Siberian Railway, Lexi MacHugh came to Australia with her family when she was six years old, and for ten years lived in the Callide Valley, going to school in Thangool, Queensland. When she was nine, a library was established at the little school, and this, she says, opened a new world for her. Her father was a composer, choir conductor and an impresario, her mother was a lead singer, so she was introduced to Russian culture at an early age. MacHugh studied music at the Sydney Conservatorium. In 1965 she and her husband joined the Poetry Society of Australia, she mainly as a a ballad singer (with guitar) for their Ballad Evenings. Encouraged by its then secretary, Ella Turnbull (q.v.), MacHugh started to write.
Her first poem, 'The Peacock', was accepted by Poetry Magazine a year after she joined the Society, and she later published in other arts magazines and journals.
After the breakup of her marriage MacHugh found more time for writing and began directing her energies to fiction, which she self-published. She has also published poetry on internet newsgroups.
