Sep 9, 2026 – 5.14pmBlanche d’Alpuget, a distinguished novelist, biographer, wife of Bob Hawke, Australia’s longest serving Labor prime minister, and a legendary lover, has died, aged 82.Equally impressive as a biographer, contemporary fiction writer, author of historical novels, and journalist, d’Alpuget never respected rules drawn up by self-appointed arbiters of taste and so-called “objectivity” in her life, or writing about life.Subscribe to gift this articleGift 5 articles to anyone you choose each month when you subscribe.Subscribe nowAlready a subscriber? Andrew ClarkContributorAndrew Clark was a senior writer at The Australian Financial Review.Fetching latest articles
Blanche d’Alpuget: A life built on rejecting conventional rules
She was a brilliant writer, mother and wife who refused to be confined by convention, or by other people’s expectations of who she should be.
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