My Vice-Regal Life: Diaries 1978 to 1982
By (Author) Lady Anna Cowen
Melbourne University Press
Melbourne University Press
17th July 2017
Australia
Hardback
361
Width 164mm, Height 243mm, Spine 37mm
678g
Sunday, 8 January 1978 I have decided to keep a diary during Zelman's term of office as Governor-General. I am pleased, because I forget so much and the re-reading of a sentence brings whole occasions, scenes, and otherwise forgotten things, vividly back to mind... And so begins an extraordinary record of the life of a Governor-General's wife. Lady Anna Cowen's edited diaries capture the day-to-day lifethe wardrobe fittings, the running of an enormous householdas well as the pomp and circumstance of vice-regal duties during the term Sir Zelman Cowen, the 'healing Governor-General', served after the dismissal by Sir John Kerr of the Whitlam government.
Lady Anna Cowen is the widow of Sir Zelman Cowen, the nineteenth Governor General of Australia. As wife of the vice-chancellor at the University of Queensland, she was somewhat prepared for the escalation in her official life, but her years at Yarralumla in the aftermath of the Whitlam dismissal were both rewarding and challenging.