Peter Cowan

Peter Cowan (4 November 1914 – 6 June 2002) was a Western Australian writer, noted especially for his short stories.

Biography Born in 1914 in South Perth, Peter Walkinshaw Cowan was the son of Norman Walkinshaw Cowan and Marie Emily Johnston. He was descended from several Western Australian pioneering families, including the Browns of York, the Cowans and the Wittenooms.

After leaving Wesley College, Perth in 1930, Cowan worked in insurance and as a farm labourer before completing his matriculation at Perth Technical College and subsequently entering the University of Western Australia in 1938. After completing his teaching qualifications, he worked as a teacher at Wesley College.

Works Peter Cowan published eight volumes of short stories, five novels and three biographies. He also edited two books of diaries and letters and co-edited seven volumes of short fiction.

Awards Peter Cowan's novel The Color of the Sky won the Western Australian Premier's Book Award for Fiction and the Western Australia Week Literary Award in 1986.

In 1987, he was made a Member of the Order of Australia, and in 1992 he received the Patrick White Award for an Australian Writer of Great Distinction.

Edith Cowan University conferred its first Honorary Degree (Doctor of Philosophy) on Peter Cowan in 1995. In 1997, the Peter Cowan Writers' Centre was established at the Joondalup campus of Edith Cowan University, based in the reconstructed house of his grandmother. The competition involves the submission of stories of a maximum of 600 words, and is administered by the Peter Cowan Writers Centre in Joondalup, Western Australia.

Selected bibliography