Films/Videos Proud Mary 2020 Proud Mary is the story of an assassin (who as a teenager was living on the streets before she was taken into a gangster family) who must look after an orphaned teenaged boy after a hit job goes wrong. External Website

Writers Jean-Jacques Rousseau 1712-1778 Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712 – 1778) was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer. Rousseau's mother died shortly after his birth and his father abandoned him when he was 10. Young Jean-Jacques was sent to live with an uncle, who had the child fostered out. From about age fourteen Jean-Jacque was on his own. He was often homeless and did a variety of working class jobs to support himself. Jean-Jacque was fortunate at the age of sixteen to meet Francois-Louise de Warens (1690-1762), who took the boy in and supported him financially and emotionally. Rousseau's political philosophy influenced the progress of the Enlightenment throughout Europe, as well as aspects of the French Revolution and the development of modern political, economic and educational thought. His Discourse on Inequality and The Social Contract are cornerstones in modern political and social thought. Rousseau's sentimental novel Julie, or the New Heloise (1761) was important to the development of preromanticism and romanticism in fiction. His Emile, or On Education (1762) is an educational treatise on the place of the individual in society. Rousseau's autobiographical writings—the posthumously published Confessions (composed in 1769), which initiated the modern autobiography, and the unfinished Reveries of the Solitary Walker (composed 1776–1778)—exemplified the late-18th-century "Age of Sensibility", and featured an increased focus on subjectivity and introspection that later characterized modern writing. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience Missus Ruth Park 1985 New Zealand born Australian writer, Ruth Park (1917-2010), is best known for her first novel, The Harp in the South (1948), which tells the story of the Darcy family of Surry Hills, NSW. Ruth Park published a prequel to The Harp in the South, Missus, in 1985. In Missus we meet Hugh Darcy and his younger brother, Jeremiah, born in Trafalgar, NSW. At the age of 14, Hugh and Jeremiah are banished from their home by their alcoholic, violent father. Hugh takes responsibility for Jeremiah who was born about 3 years after Hugh and with his feet twisted back to front. After years of Hugh doing itinerant labouring work, and Jeremiah becoming an accomplished cook and storyteller, the men return to Trafalgar. The novel concludes with the marriage of Hugh Darcy and Margaret Kilker. On the way through we also meet the Tookey family. Steve Tookey migrated to Australia from Ireland as a young man. He later marries Eve who was orphaned as a child. Eve eventually feels so constricted by her marriage that she leaves Steve and their daughter and goes to Sydney. External Website

Actors Aaron Pedersen Aaron Pedersen (born 24 November 1970) is an Australian television and film actor of Arrernte and Arabana Australian Aboriginal descent. Aaron and his seven siblings were in and out of foster care in Alice Springs in the Northern Territory as children. Aaron left Alice Springs for Melbourne as a young man after he was accepted to intern at the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC). Pedersen’s acting career began when he starred in Heartland (1994). The following year he co-hosted game show Gladiators Australia and performed the role of Vince Cellini in Wildside in 1997. Aaron Pedersen has played a number of characters in popular Australian television series, including Detective Senior Constable Michael Reilly in Water Rats (1996-2001), Detective Senior Constable Duncan Freeman in City Homicide (2007-2012), Cam Delray in the Jack Irish series (2016-2021), and Detective Jay Swan in Mystery Road (2018, 2020). Aaron is the primary carer for his younger brother, Vincent, who has cerebral palsy. External Website

Television Shows Revelation 2020 Revelation (2020) is a 3-part documentary series presented by award winning Australian journalist, Sarah Ferguson. The document focuses on the criminal priests who sexually abused children and others in the catholic church who failed to report the abuse to authorities. Cameras were taken into the criminal trials of 2 priests, Vincent Ryan and Bernard McGrath, prolific child sex abusers. Ferguson also interviewed both men. Episode 3 focuses on allegations of child sexual abuse by the notorious George Pell at a Catholic boys’ home in the Victorian town of Ballarat. External Website

Biography of Care Experienced People Sheila Pamela Morrison 2023 Sheila (2023) by Scottish born Australian writer, Pamela Morrison, begins with unusual twist on the foundling story. Sheila Bell Rattray (1925-1997) began life as a tiny bundle being dropped off at her father’s house in Scotland. Unbeknown to her father’s wife, Agnes, who took the baby in and gently cared for her, Sheila was the result of an adulterous relationship between her husband, David Bell, & a woman who worked for her husband, Margaret Rattray. Sheila was Pamela’s mother and Pamela’s book, Sheila (2023), is the story of her mother’s life. After 3 years in foster care, Sheila spent the rest of her childhood with her father, David Bell, who was brutal. Sheila and her family migrated from Edinburgh to Adelaide in South Australia, arriving in October 1965. External Website

Authors O Shaken by their pasts, inter-country adoptees demand federal government broaden inquiry scope ➝ Foster families who ignore race are participating in a pernicious form of racism ➝ Back to Top

Performing Arts Singer-musician Bon Scott Ronald Belford Scott (1946-1980) is remembered as Bon Scott, the lead vocalist of the Australian band AC/DC. Scott was born in Angus, Scotland but moved with his family to Australia in 1952. The family lived in Melbourne for 4 years and then relocated to Fremantle in Western Australia. He was nicknamed Bon while at North Fremantle Primary School. Following in the footsteps of his father, Bon joined the Fremantle Scots Pipe band where he learned to play drums and the rudiments of the pipes. He dropped out of school at the age of 15 and took up a number of working jobs labouring jobs. In 1963, Bon Scott was sentenced to 9 months at the Riverbank Juvenile Institution for a number of offences. After his release, Scott was focused on becoming a rock star and set up his first band, the Spektors, in 1964. In 1970, he moved to Adelaide and joined the Fraternity. After returning to Australia from a tour of the UK in 1973 the band had a break and Scott sang with other groups around country South Australia. He then replaced Dave Evans the lead singer of AC/DC in 1974 and the band became highly successful. He died on 19 February 1980 not long after AC/DC's Highway to Hell tour. External Website

Films/Videos The Talented Mr Ripley (Film) 1999 Tom Ripley is a character created by Care Experienced Writer Patricia Highfield (1921-1995). He first appeared in the 1955 novel, The Talented Mr Ripley and subsequently in 4 other novels between then and 1991. Tom Ripley's back story is that he was orphaned at the age of 5 because his parents drowned. He then lived with an auntie, Dottie, who made fun of the boy. He tried to run way as a teenager, eventually making it to New York when he’s 20. He subsequently becomes a career criminal. Loosely based on Highsmith’s 1955 novel, the French film Purple Noon (1960) starred Alain Delon as Tom Ripley. This was Delon’s first major film. In 1999, The Talented Mr Ripley starred Matt Damon as Tom Ripley and received 5 Academy Award nominations. For some, Delon’s portrayal of Tom Ripley is the better one. External Website

Authors N Nothing Natural ➝ Back to Top

Authors N The Orphans ➝ The Silent Stars Go By ➝ Frankie ➝ The Kingdom ➝ The December Boys ➝ Black Sheep ➝ Macbeth ➝ Little Wing ➝ Back to Top

Writers Arthur Conan Doyle 1859-1930 Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was born in Edinburgh in 1859. His parents were an Irishwoman, Mary Foyle, and Charles, the son of well-known political cartoonist and painter, John Doyle. Charles Doyle was employed as a civil servant, but his alcoholism meant the family lived in dire poverty. Concerned about the effect on her son of his “father’s degradation”, Mary Doyle sent 7 or 8 year old Arthur to live with the sister of a family friend, John Hill Burton, a Scottish historian. Arthur Doyle was then enrolled in a Jesuit boarding school and his mother arranged for the boy to have only limited contact with his family while there. After a year in Germany, Arthur began studying medicine at the University of Edinburgh, taking up opportunities to work as an assistant in general practice where he could. After he qualified, he served as a ship’s doctor on a whaling board in Greenland and on a trading boat to the West Coast of Africa. He created the character Sherlock Holmes in 1887 for A Study in Scarlet, the first of four novels and fifty-six short stories about Holmes and Dr. Watson. Celeste. External Website

Biography of Care Experienced People The Life and Work of Muhammad Yahiya Emerick 2002 Muhammad, the founder of Islam, grew up in the Arabian Pensinula. He was orphaned at the age of 6 and then lived in kinship care, first with his grandfather and then with an uncle. In this biography, Emerick explores Muhammad's childhood as well as his prophetic mission from the age of 40. External Website

Films/Videos Boy 2010 Boy is a movie starring James Rolleston, Te Aho Eketone-Whitu, and Taika Waititi. Set on the east coast of New Zealand in 1984, Boy, an 11-year-old child living in kinship care with his grandmother, younger brother and several counsins, gets a chance to know his absentee father. External Website

Authors C Hiraeth (a novel): Representations of Care-Experience in Literature ➝ How do care experienced adults who were also excluded from school make sense of belonging? ➝ Orphans and Class Anxiety in Nineteenth-century English Novels ➝ Back to Top

Authors G The Orphan in Fiction and Comics since the 19th Century ➝ Back to Top

Authors R Re-homing': America's shocking trade in unwanted children ➝ Resistance ➝ Inside Story: Mini ➝ Rabbit-Proof Fence ➝ Rocks ➝ Redress: Breaking The Silence ➝ Back to Top

Television Shows The Sinner 2017 American anthology crime series. It is revealed in the second series that Detective Harry Ambrose (Bill Pullman) was in foster care as a child. This comes to light when a 13 year old boy confesses to killing two people and is put into foster care himself, before being transferred to juvenile detention. External Website

Fiction featuring Care Experience The Thief of Time John Boyne 2000 The Thief of Time (2000) by John Boyne has an unusual premise: narrator Matthieu Zela is 256 years old. In 1758, Matthieu Zela is 15 years old and an orphan after the murder of his mother. He flees Paris with his five-year-old half-brother and travels to Dover. From there, Matthieu has many adventures and meets incredible historical figures—such as Charlie Chaplin (who has a disturbing penchant for girls). He listens to a reading given by Charles Dickens, reads the first book published by Arthur Conan Doyle, contributes to the first Olympic Games in Athens 1896, and survives the Wall Street Crash of 1929. An enduring concern is that the descendants of his brother, Tomas, die young. In 1999, Matthieu is wondering if he can intervene in the case of his current nephew, Tommy, a famous television star and drug addict. External Website

News - broadcast, print, internet, magazine articles Gabriel Garcia Marquez's last novel The Conversation (Marquez) 2024 In this article, Gabriel Garcia Ochoa of Monash University https://theconversation.com/gabriel-garcia-marquezs-last-novel-is-a-moving-testament-to-his-genius-225272 talks about Until August, a novel by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1927-2014) that was posthumously published in March this year. According to Ochoa, Until August “… is a complete but unfinished work that Marquez was not able to fully revise to this satisfaction.” Apparently, Marquez revised his novels repeatedly, with one, Autumn of the Patriarch, taking him 17 years. This is why, says Ochoa, his sons were at first reluctant to publish Until August. External Website