McPhee Gribble

Before we go, some sad news today that Hilary McPhee, the literary editor and Australian publishing pioneer, has passed away.

In 1975, McPhee, alongside her friend Di Gribble, established the independent publishing house aptly named McPhee Gribble, and it was an extraordinary success.

They launched the careers of future household names, people like Tim Winton, Helen Garner, Kaz Cooke.

Hilary spoke with David Marr here on Late Night Live in February last year on the 50th anniversary of McPhee Gribble, and here she is with the story of when a young Helen Garner pulled up on her bicycle with her first manuscript.

We were in a bunker by this stage, it was the beginning of our second year, when Helen Garner showed up with Monkey Grip, and she said, "I think I might have written a novel.

Will you read it and tell me if I have?" And we, of course, went home that night, both of us with a copy each, and came in the next day and said, "We've got to do this."

Who pub- Who published it, Helen?

Uh, well, no, it was a publisher called McPhee Gribble, who was a-

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah

...

Who published

it? Well, it was a publisher called McPhee Gribble.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Run by two women.

That at that point, the excitement of, oh, I can feel it, I can see the shape, was enough for you to overcome your natural diffidence or scepticism about whether this was for you.

So you bundle up this hideous manuscript and you hand deliver it to McPhee Gribble?

Yeah, well, I'd heard that these two women I was at university with years before, namely Hilary McPhee and Diana Gribble, had started a publishing company.

And I thought, oh, well, see, I didn't know anything about publishing.

Wow.

And, um, w- we just lived on the edge for months, and then suddenly Cloudstreet came out, and it was the first book I'd ever published, uh, first novel I'd ever published that wasn't in hardcover 'cause Hilary and Di, who were my publishers at the time for McPhee Gribble, we just kn- knew that, you know, the economy wasn't in a state.

And then the book just, uh, within a week it was just doing mad things.

And, and so that was the book that saved us.

And And I heard there were these two women who I'd been, I'd vaguely known them at university, Hilary McPhee and Diana Gribble.

They'd set up this new publishing company called McPhee Gribble.

And I think they'd published by this time maybe one or max two novels by women.

And I thought, oh, maybe if I show it to them, they'll tell me if it is a book.