{{Short description|Author of 'The Fringe Dwellers' (1919–1994)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=June 2015}} {{Use Australian English|date=June 2015}} {{Infobox writer | name = Nene Gare | image = File:Nene Gare (1919-1994).jpg | caption = Nene Gere ca. 1940, aged 20/21 | birth_name = Doris Violet May Wadham | birth_date = 9 May 1919 | birth_place = Adelaide, South Australia, Australia | death_date = 29 May 1994 (aged 75) | death_place = Shelley, Western Australia, Australia | occupation = Novelist, artist and political activist | nationality = Australian | spouse = Frank Ellis Gare | children = Arran (1942–47), Lief Frances (b 1945), Arran (b 1948), Helen Shelley (b 1952) }} '''Nene Gare''' (9 May 1919{{spaced ndash}}29 May 1994) was an Australian writer and artist, best known as the author of the novel ''The Fringe Dwellers'' (1961), which was made into the 1986 Australian film of the same name directed by Bruce Beresford.
==Personal life==
Gare was born '''Doris Violet May Wadham''' in 1919 in Adelaide, South Australia. Her parents John Henry Wadham, a saddler and harness maker, and Mary Hounslow Wadham, were strict Methodists. Gare attended Adelaide School of Art and then Perth Technical College, returning to Adelaide to work as a typist from 1938 to 1939.
In 1941, she married Perth-based public servant Frank Ellis Gare, who then left to serve on the Queen Mary during World War II.<ref name=nla/>
Nene and Frank Gare had four children, Arran (1942–47), Leif Frances (b 1945), Arran Gare (b 1948) and Helen Shelley Gare (b 1952).
From 1946 to 1948, the family moved to Papua New Guinea, where Frank worked as a patrol officer on Duke of York Island, at Salamaua and Mumeng. Many of her experiences in PNG formed the basis of the novel "An Island Away".
In 1947, at the age of four, her oldest son Arran died of malaria, while her two-year-old daughter Leif survived the disease. The family returned to Perth, where Frank worked as a clerk.
The couple's third child was born in 1948 and named Arran in honour of the son they had lost. Nene suffered a persistent cough so the family moved to Carnarvon in the northwest of Western Australia, where they managed a banana plantation and where their fourth child, daughter Helen, was born. Gare's novel "Green Gold" is based on this period.
In 1952–54, Frank was appointed District Officer with the Native Welfare Department in Carnarvon and was transferred to the position of District Officer for the Murchison Region, with the family based in Geraldton.
Using modest government funding, Frank Gare was charged with meeting basic needs (ablutions, water, shelter and power) in Aboriginal reserves throughout the area.<ref>{{Cite news | first= Charlie |last= Wilson-Clark | url=http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/15/1076779831729.html?from=storyrhs | title=He heralded a new era for Aborigines | newspaper = Sydney Morning Herald | date =16 Feb 2004 | accessdate=15 October 2010}}</ref>
Nene and the children often stayed at a semi-rural property at Drummond Cove. Nene came to know several Aboriginal families living in a camp known as the Snake Pit, a collection of tin and hessian shacks with dirt floors and no running water or electricity, just outside Geraldton, with these friendships later inspiring ''The Fringe Dwellers''.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Foster|first1=Darren|editor1-last=Levy|editor1-first=Bronwen Ann|editor2-last=Murphy|editor2-first=Ffion|title=Story/telling - The Woodford Forum|date=2001|publisher=Univ. of Queensland Press|isbn=9780702232022|page=161|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5Rhqzx0oPOgC&pg=PA161|accessdate=18 April 2016|chapter=A Perfect Pink Day}}</ref>
Gare later said that she was influenced by the relative penury of her own parents in comparison to her extended family of wealthier aunts and uncles. Her books "A House with Verandahs" and "Kent Town" draw on this period. Gare told editor Christobel Mattingley that because she felt second-class, and was affected by family hardships during the Depression, she had empathy for the Aboriginal people in Western Australia, on whom her most famous novel was based.
Gare was quoted by Christobel Mattingley as explaining, "I have always written about my own experiences. I write as I feel. I have been too afraid to write from my imagination in case I mislead. My own reading when I was very young caused me to expect so much more from life than one ever gets. So I distrust most fiction. I'd never never contrive to make a plot. Things must happen, as I think they do. No working up to a climax - possibly unfortunately for my publishers".<ref>{{Cite journal| url=http://www.nla.gov.au/pub/nlanews/2006/apr06/06apr.pdf |author=Mattingley, Christobel | title=An Unassuming Radical | journal=National Library of Australia News | issue= April | year=2006 | pages=19–21 }}</ref>
==Art== Gare was a talented artist and held five exhibitions in Perth. She won prizes in the Canning Art Awards for 1971, 1972, 1976 and 1978. She donated most of the proceeds from her art to charities, including Amnesty International, WA AIDS Council, the local dogs' home and a woman lawyer assisting Aboriginal women and children.<ref name=nla>{{cite web|title=Papers of Nene Gare (1919-1994)|url=http://www.nla.gov.au/ms/findaids/8294.html|website=Finding Aids|publisher=National Library of Australia|accessdate=23 November 2016|location=Canberra|date=4 April 1997}}</ref>
==Works== *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/59187600 Jimmy's Orders]'' (3 October 1943) Perth, WA: Sunday Times, p. 3 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/38553912 In Possession]'' (13 July 1944) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 20 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/38567853 You Belong to Me]'' (21 June 1945) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 20 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93336028 Engine Trouble]'' (8 November 1945) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 13 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/38573907 Confusion Reigned]'' (7 March 1946) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 28 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/38574151 Honesty and Policy]'' (18 April 1946) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 86 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93156328 Pigging It]'' (2 May 1946) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 13 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/page/3839221 Letters from a Patrol Officer's Wife]'' (15 August 1946) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 15 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93127003 Peace At A Price]'' (22 August 1946) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 13 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/53247191 Surprise]'' (19 September 1946) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 14 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/53247502 Getting Things Done]'' (3 October 1946) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 14 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93345658 An Odd Job]'' (5 June 1947) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 33 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/39086157 Simple Precautions]'' (19 August 1948) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 12 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93328721 A Night in New Guinea]'' (17 March 1949) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 17 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93217109 Growing Eggs in the Islands]'' (25 August 1949) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 31 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/39093064 New House]'' (1 September 1949) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 16 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/39097748 Fine Feathers]'' (3 November 1949) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 8 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/39099069 Michael's Stupendous Bargain]'' (15 December 1949) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 16 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93752437 Calf Love]'' (29 December 1949) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 14 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/39100223 Antique Vase]'' (19 January 1950) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 16 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93749544 Give Me The Chance]'' (29 December 1949) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 23 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/39102631 Family Outing]'' (27 April 1950) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 16 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/page/3968587 No Party for Michael]'' (29 June 1950) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 16 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/39105192 Test Case]'' (20 July 1950) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 18 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/39107015 Coming Along Nicely]'' (12 October 1950) Perth, WA: Western Mail, p. 16 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/93779990 Wanted Tall Man]'' (12 October 1950) The Adelaide Chronicle, p. 32 *''The Fringe Dwellers'' (1961) Melbourne: Sun Books *''Green Gold'' (1963) London : Heinemann *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/110813638 Welfare Worker]'' (17 April 1976) The Canberra Times, p. 9 *''[http://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/110884396 Christmas Dinner]'' (24 December 1977) The Canberra Times, p. 7 *''Bend to the Wind'' (short stories)(1978) Melbourne: Macmillan *''A House with Verandahs'' (1980) Melbourne : Macmillan *''An Island Away'' (1981) London : Heinemann *''Kent Town: A 1920s girlhood '' (1997) Kent Town, SA : Wakefield Press *''First Weeks in Perth'', not published<ref name=ecu>{{cite web|last1=Squarcini|first1=Rosina|title=Nene Gare, a Biographical Study : Australian Novelist, 1919-1994|url=http://ro.ecu.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1546&context=theses_hons|website=Research Online|publisher=Edith Cowan University|page=41|accessdate=23 November 2016|location=Mt Lawley, WA|date=1999}}</ref> *''Kate Kempter'', not published<ref name=ecu/>
==References== {{Reflist}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Gare, Nene}} Category:20th-century Australian novelists Category:Australian women short story writers Category:1919 births Category:1994 deaths Category:20th-century Australian painters Category:20th-century Australian women novelists Category:20th-century Australian short story writers