When Di Morrissey published her first novel in 1991 at the age of 48, it was the culmination of years of dreaming and yearning. It began when she was growing up on the shores of Pittwater, NSW, in the late 1940s and ’50s. Seven-year-old Di had strayed into the overgrown garden of Dorothea Mackellar and announced boldly, when asked what she was doing, that she was hunting for fairies. An amused Dorothea invited Di in for a glass of milk.
“She was quite imperious,” Di recalls of the writer best known for her sweeping poem that begins I love a sunburnt country. “When you say something as a kid, and someone takes you quite seriously and listens, you want to elaborate.”
Di told Dorothea that she loved to read and would make up her own stories, because money was tight and new books were rare treats. Dorothea said Di must write her stories down so other people can read them.
“I came home and said, ‘I’m going to write books! I could put my stories down and other people are going to like them.’ My mother said, ‘Go and shell the peas for dinner’.” Di laughs.
You don’t leave school and become a novelist, Di discovered, so her uncle, ABC correspondent Jim Revitt, suggested she start with journalism.
Di spent time as an eager copy girl and later cadet at before working in London. A romance with an American diplomat who “looked like a Kennedy”, Peter Morrissey, led to years of globetrotting and motherhood, which kept Di busy. But she always harboured a desire to write fiction. Eventually, Di told Peter she wanted
