Cirrus@Austlit

Born in North Sydney in 1949, Nigel Krauth was educated at the universities of Newcastle and Queensland and the ANU, and has taught English at several universities, including the University of Papua New Guinea. His research interests lie in Australian Literature, Creative Writing, Children's Literature and South Pacific Literatures.

In 1982, Krauth was co-winner of the Australian/Vogel Literary Award, with his novel Matilda, My Darling which is a fictional investigation of events surrounding the composition of 'Waltzing Matilda'. This novel became a best-seller in Australia and was later published in the US. His second novel, The Bathing Machine Called the Twentieth Century, published in 1988, was short listed for two awards and was also published in the US. He won the prestigious Christina Stead prize for fiction with his third novel JF Was Here (1990).

Krauth has published many short stories and articles in Australian and overseas magazines, and his play, Muse of Fire, commissioned by the South Australian Theatre Company, was first performed in 1985 and published by Currency Press in the same year. He has edited a collection of prose and poetry titled New Guinea Images in Australian Literature (1982). In 1995 he co-edited, with Robyn Sheahan, an anthology of short stories Paradise to Paranoia: New Queensland Writing. His 1999 novel Freedom Highway is a thriller, set in Thailand in the late 1950s, depicting corruption in high places.

With his wife Caron Krauth (q.v.) as co-author, Krauth has published three novels for young people: Sin Can Can (1987); Rack Off, Rachmaninoff (1989) and I Thought You Kissed With Your Lips (1990). These novels focus on daughters in adolescence striking out from home towards independent lives.

Krauth has been Associate Professor and Lecturer in Literary Studies at the Gold Coast University College of Griffith University, where he has taught creative writing, popular fiction and mass culture, Australian literature and children's literature. He has also been an editor of the creative-writing journal TEXT.