Christopher Koch
{{Short description|Australian novelist (1932–2013)}}
{{Use Australian English|date=December 2014}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=August 2014}}
{{Other people|Christopher Koch}}
{{Infobox writer
| name = Christopher Koch
| honorific_suffix = AO
| image =
| image_size =
| alt =
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| pseudonym =
| birth_name = Christopher John Koch
| birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1932|7|16}}
| birth_place = Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
| death_date = {{Death date and age|df=yes|2013|9|23|1932|7|16}}
| death_place = Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
| resting_place =
| occupation = Novelist
| language = English
| nationality = Australian
| education =
| alma_mater = University of Tasmania
| period =
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| subject =
| movement =
| notableworks = The Year of Living Dangerously
| spouse = {{marriage|Irene Vilnois|1959|1979|end=divorced}}
Robin Whyte-Butler
| partner =
| children = Gareth Koch
| relatives =
| awards = Miles Franklin Award (1985, 1996)
| signature =
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Christopher John Koch AO (16 July 1932 – 23 September 2013) was an Australian novelist, known for his 1978 novel The Year of Living Dangerously, which was adapted into an Academy Award-winning film by the same name for which he co-wrote the screenplay. He twice won the Miles Franklin Award (for The Doubleman in 1985 and Highways to a War in 1996). In 1995, he was made an Officer of the Order of Australia for his contribution to Australian literature, and was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters from his alma mater, the University of Tasmania, in 1990.
Early life and education
Koch was born in Hobart, Tasmania, in 1932. He was educated at Clemes College, St Virgil's College, and Hobart High School and later attended the University of Tasmania.[http://www.austlit.edu.au/common/samples/Koch.html Koch, Christopher], AustLit. Koch's admission to the university was controversial, with the professorial board refusing to admit him as he had not matriculated with a mathematics subject—however this refusal was overridden by the chancellor, John Morris, who was then accused of excessive intervention.{{cite web |last1=Townsly |first1=W. A. |title=Sir John Demetrius Morris (1902–1956) |url=https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/morris-sir-john-demetrius-11172 |website=Australian Dictionary of Biography |publisher=Australian National University |access-date=8 October 2023}} After graduating with a Bachelor of Arts with Honours in 1954, Koch joined the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) as a cadet journalist. He left Hobart to travel in south Asia and Europe, and ended up in London where he worked for several years. He returned to Australia to avoid national service in the British Army.{{cite news |last=Romei |first=Stephen |url=http://www.theaustralian.com.au/arts/books/miles-franklin-award-winning-novelist-christopher-koch-has-died/story-e6frg8nf-1226725047709 |title=Miles Franklin Award winning novelist Christopher Koch dead at 81 |work=The Australian |date=23 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131014111409/http://www.theaustralian.com.au/arts/books/miles-franklin-award-winning-novelist-christopher-koch-has-died/story-e6frg8nf-1226725047709 |archive-date=14 October 2013}}
Career
While working in London as a waiter and a teacher, Koch began working on his first novel, The Boys in the Island, which he left with his agent when he returned to Australia.[http://www.smh.com.au/comment/obituaries/christopher-koch-the-year-of-living-dangerously-author-opened-our-eyes-to-indonesia-20130924-2uatz.html Christopher Koch: The Year of Living Dangerously author opened our eyes to Indonesia], The Sydney Morning Herald, 24 September 2013.
Koch's first published works were several poems published in The Bulletin and the literary journal Southerly. While back at the ABC as a radio producer, The Boys in the Island was published in the UK. The positive reviews encouraged Koch to eventually take up writing full-time in 1972.[http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/books/the-voice-of-generations-christopher-koch-dies-of-cancer-20121012-27hs5.html The voice of generations: Christopher Koch dies of cancer], The Age, 23 September 2013. In the early 1960s, Koch was awarded a writing fellowship to Stanford University, where he taught literature and was associated with Ken Kesey (author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest).
File:Indonesian president sukarno responds to political tensions, ABC 1967.webm in April 1967 towards the end of the Sukarno era]]
His novel The Year of Living Dangerously, set in Jakarta during the fall of the Sukarno regime, was made into a film directed by Peter Weir and starring Sigourney Weaver, Mel Gibson and Linda Hunt. The book was loosely inspired by his brother's (Philip Koch) experience as an Australian journalist in Indonesia during that period. Koch himself had worked for two months in Jakarta in 1968 as an adviser to UNESCO.{{cite news|title=Koch's 30-year-old fiction still resonates in Indonesia|url=https://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/12/20/1040174392569.html|access-date=17 April 2018|publisher=The Age|date=21 December 2002}}
Death
Koch died at his home in Hobart on 23 September 2013, aged 81. He had been diagnosed with cancer twelve months earlier.{{cite web|url=http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-09-23/award-winning-author-christopher-koch-dies/4974928|title=Award-winning author Christopher Koch dies aged 81|website=Australian Broadcasting Corporation |date=23 September 2013|access-date=28 October 2016}}
Personal life
Koch married his first wife, Irene Vilnois, in 1959. Their son, Gareth Koch (born 1962), is a classical guitarist. He married his second wife, Robin Whyte-Butler, in the late 1990s, and she lived with him in Sydney and Tasmania,[http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/at-home-with-christopher-koch-20120929-26s2r.html At home with Christopher Koch], The Sydney Morning Herald, 30 September 2012. and was with him when he died in 2013.
Awards and honours
{{Update|part=section|date=January 2025}}
| class="wikitable sortable"
!Year !Work !Award !Category !Result !Ref. |
| rowspan="2" |1978
| rowspan="3" |The Year of Living Dangerously | rowspan="2" |The Age Book of the Year Awards | Book of the Year | {{Won}} |
|---|
| Imaginative Writing (Fiction)
| {{Won}} |
| 1979
| National Book Council Award for Australian Literature |— | {{Won}} |
| 1985
| | {{Won}} |
| 1996
|— | {{Won}} |
| 1999
| rowspan="2" |Out of Ireland |— | {{Won}} |
| 2000
| Victorian Premier's Literary Awards | Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction | {{Won}} |
| rowspan="2" |2008
| rowspan="3" |The Memory Room |— | {{nom|Longlisted}} |
| Nib Literary Award
|— | {{Won}} |
| 2009
| International Dublin Literary Award |— | {{Nom|Longlisted}} |
| rowspan="4" |2013
| rowspan="4" |Lost Voices | | {{nom|Shortlisted}} |
| Prime Minister's Literary Awards
| Fiction | {{nom|Shortlisted}} |
| Queensland Literary Awards
| Fiction | {{Nom|Shortlisted}} |
Published works
- The Boys in the Island (1958, revised ed, Angus & Robertson, 1974)
- Across the Sea Wall (Heinemann, 1965)
- The Year of Living Dangerously (Nelson, 1978)
- The Doubleman (Chatto and Windus, 1985)
- Crossing the Gap: a novelist's essays (Hogarth Press, 1993)
- Highways to a War (Heinemann, 1995)
- Out of Ireland (Doubleday, 1999)
- The Many-Coloured Land: A Return to Ireland (Picador, 2002)
- The Memory Room (2007)
- Lost Voices (2012)
Further reading
- Noel Henricksen, Island and Otherland: Christopher Koch and His Books (Educare, 2003).
References
{{reflist|30em}}
External links
- {{IMDb name|0462272}}
- [https://penguin.com.au/authors/94-christopher-koch Profile] at Random House Australia
{{Miles Franklin Literary Award}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Koch, Christopher}}
Category:Miles Franklin Award winners
Category:Officers of the Order of Australia
Category:Recipients of the Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana, 5th Class
Category:Australian people of English descent
Category:Australian people of German descent
Category:University of Tasmania alumni
Category:20th-century Australian novelists
Category:21st-century Australian novelists
Category:Deaths from cancer in Tasmania
Category:Articles containing video clips