Bruce Dawe

Donald Bruce Dawe (15 February 1930 – 1 April 2020) was an Australian poet and academic.

Some critics consider him one of the most influential Australian poets of all time.

Dawe received numerous poetry awards in Australia and was named an Officer of the Order of Australia.

He taught literature in universities for over 30 years.

Dawe's poetry collection, Sometimes Gladness, sold over 100,000 copies in several printings.

Bruce Dawe was born in 1930 in Fitzroy, Victoria.

Dawe's paternal ancestors originated in Wyke Regis in Dorset, England.

In 1953, Dawe completed his adult matriculation by part-time study.

In 1954, he enrolled at Melbourne University on a teaching scholarship.

However, at the end of 1954, he moved to Sydney, working as a labourer in a glass factory and later in a factory manufacturing batteries.

Also during 1954, Dawe converted to Catholicism.

In 1956, Dawe returned to Melbourne, where he worked as a postman for two years and as a self-employed gardener.

In 1959, Dawe joined the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), initially as a trainee telegraphist but remustered as an education assistant.

After completing his recruit training at RAAF Base Rathmines, he was posted to Ballarat, Victoria.

On commencing duties as an education assistant, Dawe was posted to RAAF Base Wagga, Victoria Barracks Melbourne and Toowoomba, Queensland.

In 1966, Dawe was posted to Malaysia for six months.

During this posting, Dawe wrote the lyrics for the school song of the RAAF School on Penang.

Leaving the RAAF in 1968, Dawe began teaching at Downlands College, a Catholic boys college in Toowoomba, Queensland.

After teaching English and history at the secondary level for two and a half years, he became a tertiary lecturer in English literature at the Darling Downs Institute of Advanced Education (DDIAE) in Toowoomba.

In 1971, Dawe was appointed as a lecturer at DDIAE.

In 1980, he became a senior lecturer at DDIAE.

This song was used until the school’s closing in 1988.

After leaving Malaysia, Dawe returned to Melbourne.

In 1988, Dawe received the inaugural DDIAE Award for Excellence in Teaching.

In 1992, when DDIAE became the University of Southern Queensland (USQ), Dawe was appointed associate professor.

In 1993, Dawe retired from full-time teaching and was appointed as the first honorary professor of USQ.

He then taught University of the Third Age classes.

Dawe would achieve four university degrees (BA, MLitt, MA, PhD), all completed by part-time study.

In 1999, Dawe endowed the Bruce Dawe National Poetry Prize of $2,500 to be awarded annually to an Australian poets.

The endowment is held in trust by the University of Southern Queensland and administered by its Faculty of Arts, judged by the English Literature staff.

Dawe wrote poetry about ordinary people in modern Australia, their interests in cars, novels, films and other popular items.

The family moved to Australia in the mid-19th century.

His mother was of Lowland Scottish ancestry - she often recited Scottish poems from her childhood.

Dawe's parents came from farming families in Victoria.

Dawe was the only one in his family to complete primary school.

His parents and four siblings always encouraged him to write poetry (his youngest sister also wrote poetry).

As a child, Dawe attended six schools.

At age 16, he dropped out of Northcote High School in Melbourne without completing his Leaving Certificate.

He then worked as a clerk, a labourer, a sales assistant, an office boy in an advertising agency and a copy boy at The Truth and The Sun News-Pictorial.

Dawe also worked as a labourer in the Public Works Department, as a tailer-out in various Melbourne saw-mills and as a farm-hand in the Cann River valley.