The daughters of
Dorothy Hewett, Kate and Rozanne Lilley have come out publicly and spoken about the sexual abuse they received as children. Kate Lilley was raped at the age of 15 (under the age of consent) and Rosanne was subjected to paedophile acts from the age of 11, 12 & 13, Just about every paper in the country has covered their story: The Australian, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Daily Telegraph, The Saturday Paper and The Courier Mail.
Dorothy Hewett is remembered as a leading poet,
playwright and novelist. Admired for her passionate and politically
charged writing, she was made a Member of the Order of Australia (AM)
for her services to literature in 1986. But what will happen to her legacy in the light of revelations of the sexual abuse of her teenage daughters? Sisters
Kate and Rozanna Lilley say they were sexually assaulted by the men who
visited the family home in the 1970s. The abuse, they say, was
encouraged by their mother.
A CURRENT LEGACY IN HEWETT'S NAME
The Dorothy Hewett Award is a $10,000 prize for an unpublished manuscript conducted by UWA Publishing.
In a recent statement by the Managing Director Terri-Ann White the award title will not be changed.
White states that she has spoken to Kate Lilley about the award and claims that - [quote} If the family were to instruct us to change our position we would do
so, but this is not the intention of Dorothy’s daughters to the ongoing
legacy of her writing. [end quote].
However, this appears as "hearsay" and cannot be substantiated since it has not been published in the public domain or an exact quote documented. Neither has the Lilley sisters mentioned this in an interview on the ABC, and in fact have had this to say.
"I think that a lot of the blowback saying that we're harming Mum's
reputation is really just in disguise a critique of men from that
generation, the kind of men who abused us and their supporters, who
don't want their behaviour to be examined."
Lilley says that her
mother's work has always been polarising, with many finding her
confronting descriptions of sex distasteful.
I find
not renaming the UWA Publishing award - distasteful, ignorant and an act of bloody-mindedness. Why have I written this blogpost? I am an unpublished novelist and in all consciousness have to take a moral stand, so my efforts to have the award name changed are close to the bone. I have entered the competition twice now, but in all honesty cannot enter this UWA award that touts the name DOROTHY HEWETT. In fact, I have binned my three books of Hewett's poetry!
This is an email I have recently written to the head of writing in WA, CEO Sharon Flindell of writingWA.
Dear Sharon (et al)
As a writer I am now concerned with the news of sexual
abuse of Dorothy Hewett's daughters published in The Australian, The
Sydney Morning Herald, The Daily Telegraph, The Saturday Paper, and how
this
taints her name and the Dorothy Hewett Award 2019. As our representative
in the WA writing community pressure should be brought to
bear on UWA Publishing and Managing Editor Terri-Ann White to rename the
award. The latter unfortunately to date refuses to change the name.
Going into the future how can any writer take pleasure in receiving an
honour under the name of a dishonourable person? And since I have
entered the award many times over, and may so again, I would not want to
see my hard work associated
with a woman who allowed vile paedophilic acts to occur. We cannot
compartmentalize what Dorothy Hewett achieved as a writer with her
current fall from grace and the sexual abuse of her children. This is a
watershed moment in the history of West Australian literature and action
needs to be swift in support of all emerging writers.
Perhaps
your 2 day forum on publishing on 10-11th July would be an ideal place
to raise the issue as a moral dilemma for writers.
Yours truly
Helen Hagemann
Quote from the Sydney Morning Herald -
https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/dorothy-hewett-s-daughters-say-grown-men-preyed-on-them-as-children-20180611-p4zku7.html
It
took years for Hewett's daughter Kate Lilley, a poet, to fully
comprehend what happened when she was still legally a child - and many
more to speak out about it.
The English professor says she was
raped at the age of 15 by a well-known Australian poet who is still
alive. She says a film producer sexually assaulted her during a drug-
and alcohol-fuelled party several months earlier.
Her sister,
writer and autism researcher Rozanna Lilley, also experienced sexual
assault. She names the late playwright and former Labor speechwriter Bob
Ellis – who died of liver cancer in 2016 – as one of the perpetrators.
Another Dorothy Hewett Article in the Saturday Paper
https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/2018/06/16/dorothy-hewett-bob-ellis-art-and-exploitation/15290712006379
Sunday, June 24, 2018
Kate Lilley read her poem Party Favour on the program. Here's a short excerpt.
