Elizabeth and John

<p><strong style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>*Winner 2023 Ernest Scott Prize*</strong></p><p><strong style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>*Winner 2023 NSW Premier's History Awards Australian History Prize*</strong></p><p><strong style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>*Shortlisted 2023 Prime Minister's Literary Awards Australian History Prize*</strong></p><p><strong style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>A landmark and revealing joint biography of Elizabeth and John Macarthur from one of Australia's most respected historians.</strong></p><p><span style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>Elizabeth and John Macarthur were the first married couple to travel voluntarily from Europe to Australia arriving in 1790 both aged 23 within three years of the initial invasion. John Macarthur soon became famous in New South Wales and beyond as a wool pioneer a politician and a builder of farms at Parramatta and Camden. For a long time Elizabeth's life was regarded as contingent on John's and more recently John's on Elizabeth's. In the multi-award-winning </span><em style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>Elizabeth and John</em><span style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)> acclaimed historian Alan Atkinson draws on his work on the Macarthur family over 50 years to explore the dynamics of their strong and sinewy marriage and family life across two generations. With the truth of Elizabeth and John Macarthur's relationship much more complex and deeply human than other writers have suggested Atkinson provides a finely drawn portrait of a powerful partnership.</span></p><p><br></p><p><span style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>'Based on fifty years of research and reflection by one of this country's most original and creative scholars and finest writers here is the story of the world made by settler Australia's greatest family the Macarthurs. No Australian historian has ever explored the inner lives of a married couple their family and their milieu with such skill passion and intensity. No one has brought to any subject in Australian history deeper insight into dreams ambitions and tragedy that the British occupation of this continent entailed. </span><em style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>Elizabeth and John</em><span style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)> is a stunning achievement by one of Australia's greatest-ever historians.' - Frank Bongiorno</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>'Enthralling and powerful. Alan Atkinson writes with the easy lyrical elegance that comes of deep historical understanding and fine slow history. In </span><em style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>Elizabeth and John</em><span style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)> he weaves together the lives of the Macarthurs with the life of the mind and brilliantly navigates the mysterious mirror maze between them.' - Grace Karskens</span></p><p><span style=color: rgba(34 30 32 1); background-color: rgba(236 234 232 1)>'At once intimate and epic inspired and deeply compassionate this is the kind of book that can only come from a lifetime of close reading. Meticulously researched imaginatively conceived and breathtaking in its ability to retrieve past worlds - both private and public. An exceptional work of biography and history written by one of Australia's most original historians.' - Mark McKenna.</span></p><p><br></p>