Departures of note

Blanche d'Alpuget was an acclaimed Australian author of biographies, novels and essays. Her political biography of Bob Hawke, whom she later married, was her best-known work and won the New South Wales Premier's Award. She also wrote a critically acclaimed biography of Sir Richard Kirby in 1977 and, in later years, a five-part historical fiction series about Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine.

Across her career she won numerous honours including the PEN Golden Jubilee Award, The Age Book of the Year and the Australasian Prize for Commonwealth Literature. She grew up in Sydney's eastern suburbs, worked briefly in journalism, and lived in England, France, Indonesia and Malaysia before returning to Australia at 30 to begin her writing career.

D'Alpuget met Hawke in Jakarta in 1970 and later wrote his biography; their romance began before his 1995 divorce from Hazel Hawke, and they married shortly after. She remained active in public life in her later years, giving interviews and attending state funerals, until her death at 82.