'A Web of Friendship is a collection of Christina Stead's intimate correspondence with influential literary figures such as Stanley Burnshaw, Ettore Rella, Nettie Palmer, Clem Christesen, Elizabeth Harrower and A.D. Hope.
'These letters span the life of one of Australia's most illustrious writers, offering a rare insight into the relationships that influenced and sustained her work. They reveal Stead's reflections on the art of literature, the development of her political thought, and the significance of a handful of friendships that would endure throughout her life and career.
'The letters cover Stead's arrival in England in 1928, as well as her time abroad in Europe and the United States. They also detail her marriage to William Blake, their life in England where they settled in 1953, as well as her brief return to Australia and her final years in England following Blake's death.' (Publication summary)
Pymble : Angus and Robertson , 1992'Letter writing was a vital part of Christina Stead's creative life and it grew increasingly important in her last decade. It was how she engaged with the outside world and became the focus of her writing energies. Stead was a vivacious, funny, erudite, expansive and witty correspondent. It was a practice she enjoyed, answering all correspondence she received, including Elizabeth Harrower, Stanley Burnshaw, Dorothy Green and H C Coombs.
'Beginning in England in 1973, the letters in Talking into the Typewriter span her return to Australia in 1973 until her death in 1983. Politics, friends and family, literary accolades and achievements, pets and reminiscences are all dissected, canvassed and considered.'
Source: Publisher's blurb (MUP).
'Autobiographical account of the changes observed in Australian society in the years following World War II as experienced by the author and his family after leaving Hungary. The author's return to Budapest in 1990 prompts comparisons to the situation in Australia.' (Publication summary)
North Ryde : Angus and Robertson , 1992'The long idyllic summer of Jan Ruff-O'Herne's childhood in Dutch colonial Indonesia ended in 1942 with the Japanese invasion of Java. She was interned in Ambarawa Prison Camp, along with her mother and two younger sisters. In February 1944, when Jan was 21, her life was torn apart. Along with nine other young women, all of them virgins, she was plucked from the camp and her family, and enslaved into prostitution by the Japanese Imperial Army.' (Publisher)
Sydney : Editions Tom Thompson , 1994