Geordie Williamson was a reviewer for The Australian newspaper, before becoming that publication's chief literary critic. He studied English at The University of Sydney. The winner of the Pascal Prize for criticism in 2011, he published The Burning Library, essays on neglected Australian writers, in 2012.
He became the fiction editor for Island magazine in 2014. In May 2016, Williamson was appointed publisher of Pan Macmillan's Picador imprint.