Donald Horne

Donald Richmond Horne AO (26 December 1921 – 8 September 2005) was an Australian journalist, writer, social critic, and academic who became one of Australia's best known public intellectuals, from the 1960s until his death.

Horne was a prolific[1] author who published four novels and more than twenty volumes of history, memoir and political and cultural analysis.

Despite never completing an undergraduate degree, in 1973 he was offered a research fellowship in Political Science with the Faculty of Arts by the University of New South Wales.

[3][4] Horne began his career in journalism and worked for a number of Frank Packer's publications, first as a journalist for The Telegraph, then editor of the magazine Weekend, and later the fortnightly intellectual periodical The Observer (1958–61).

[1] His wife and editor, Myfanwy Horne (the daughter of journalist Ross Gollan), later completed his part-written manuscript, published as Dying: a memoir in 2007.

[1] In 2002 he was the recipient of the Australian Humanist of the Year award for his strong advocacy of liberal democracy, multiculturalism, tolerance, republicanism and the recognition of indigenes as Australia’s first people.