The Australian Women's Register

Beginning with three members in 1980, the group grew to include seven female Canberra-based writers by 1984. They were founding member Dorothy Johnston (1948- ), Margaret Barbalet (1949- ), Sara Dowse (1938- ), Suzanne Edgar (1939- ), Marian Eldridge (1936-1997), Marion Halligan (1940- ) and Dorothy Horsfield (1948- ).

Members’ published works include short stories, novels, children’s literature, non-fiction, articles and reviews, and in diverse ways their writing vividly portrays life ‘beneath the surface of Canberra’.

Collectively the group authored Canberra Tales in 1988, later republished as The Division of Love in 1996, an anthology of short stories about life in Canberra. This was considered a landmark publication for Canberra fiction and received an ACT Bicentennial Award.

Seven Writers raised the profile of Canberra-based authors, and in 1995 a photographic portrait of the group appeared in the National Library of Australia exhibition, Beyond the Picket Fence.

After the death of Marian Eldridge in 1997, the group did not meet again for one year. Sara Dowse relocated to Canada in 1998. She returned to Australia in 2004. The members are still friends but no longer meet formally to critique one another’s work.