Steven Herrick is a poet and author. He has published twenty-two books for adults, young adults, and children, and is widely considered to be a pioneer of verse novels for children and young adults.

He left school in Year 10, before returning some years later as an adult, and then going on to study poetry at the University of Queensland, where he gained his B.A. in 1982.

In 2000 he was awarded the Patricia Wrightson Prize for Children’s Literature for The Spangled Drongo (1999), and in 2005 he was awarded the Ethel Turner Prize for Young People’s Literature for By the River at the NSW Premier’s Literary Awards.

He lives in Katoomba in the Blue Mountains, New South Wales.

Reading Australia

Felicity Plunkett has written on by the river (2005) for ABR as part of the Reading Australia project. Click here to read her essay

Further Reading and Links

Reading Australia teaching resources: by the river (2005)

Steven Herrick’s website

A biography of Steven Herrick, Poetry Foundation

Mike Shuttleworth reviews 'Slice' by Steven Herrick in the December 2010-January 2011 issue of ABR

'Another Night in Mullet Town review: Steven Herrick's verse novel for boys' by Cameron Woodhead, The Sydney Morning Herald 20 August 2016