Geoffrey Blainey

Professor Geoffrey Blainey's first book was completed when he was in his early twenties. Since then he has written another thirty-five, including Triumph of the Nomads, The Rush That Never Ended, The Tyranny of Distance and other well known books on Australia's history. His more recent books on global history, including a Short History of the World, have been translated into many foreign languages and published in places as far apart as Brazil, India, Spain and Turkey. 

For twenty years he was professor of economic history and then Ernest Scott professor of history at the University of Melbourne, with a term as professor of Australian Studies at Harvard University. He also served the federal government as chairman of the Australia Council, the National Council for the Centenary of Federation, and the Australia-China Council. In New York, in 1988, Blainey received the celebrated Britannica Prize 'for excellence in the dissemination of knowledge for the benefit of mankind'.