John William "Jack" Bedson (born 5 March 1950) is an Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n writer, poet, children's picture book author, and former university librarian

Librarian

A librarian is an information professional trained in library and information science, which is the organization and management of information services or materials for those with information needs...

.

Bedson was born in the Sydney

Sydney

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

 suburb of Redfern

Redfern, New South Wales

Redfern is an inner-city suburb of Sydney. Redfern is 3 kilometres south of the Sydney central business district and is part of the local government area of the City of Sydney...

 and raised in Sydney's inner suburbs. He went to preschool at Blackfriar's Public School in Chippendale

Chippendale, New South Wales

Chippendale is a small inner-city suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. Chippendale is located on the southern edge of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the City of Sydney...

, primary school at St Benedict's Broadway, and secondary at De La Salle College

Casimir Catholic College

Casimir Catholic College is a co-educational Roman Catholic high school in the Sydney suburb of Marrickville, New South Wales, Australia.-History:...

, Marrickville

Marrickville, New South Wales

Marrickville, a suburb of Sydney's Inner West is located 7 kilometres south-west of the Sydney central business district in the state of New South Wales, Australia and is the largest suburb in the Marrickville Council local government area...

. He worked briefly as a stage hand at TCN

TCN

TCN stands for:* Take Care Now, a private company providing out-of-hours medical cover in England* TanenbaumCHAT North Campus, a private Hebrew high school in Richmond Hill, Ontario, Canada* TCN-9, a Sydney television station...

9 Willoughby

Willoughby, New South Wales

Willoughby is a suburb on the lower North Shore of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Willoughby is located 8 kilometres north of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the City of Willoughby....

, and was accepted to the National Institute of Dramatic Art

National Institute of Dramatic Art

The National Institute of Dramatic Art is an Australian national training institute for students of theatre, film, and television, based in the Sydney suburb of Kensington. It is supported by the federal Office for the Arts, Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. NIDA is located adjacent...

 production course but declined in favour of an Arts degree at the University of New South Wales

University of New South Wales

The University of New South Wales , is a research-focused university based in Kensington, a suburb in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia...

, graduating with First Class Honours in 1973 then completing a Diploma in Librarianship in 1974.

Bedson pursued librarianship in Tasmania

Tasmania

Tasmania is an Australian island and state. It is south of the continent, separated by Bass Strait. The state includes the island of Tasmania—the 26th largest island in the world—and the surrounding islands. The state has a population of 507,626 , of whom almost half reside in the greater Hobart...

 where he also qualified as a ticketwriter, and began publishing poetry. He travelled for three years in Asia and Europe with his partner Margaret Bain before returning to settle in Armidale, New South Wales

Armidale, New South Wales

Armidale is a city in the Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia. Armidale Dumaresq Shire had a population of 19,485 people according to the 2006 census. It is the administrative centre for the Northern Tablelands region...

 where he worked at the library of the University of New England

University of New England, Australia

The University of New England is an Australian public university with approximately 18,000 higher education students. Its original and main campus is located in the city of Armidale in northern New South Wales....

. He acted as University Librarian in 2000 and 2007-9.

His best-selling children's picture books Don't Get Burnt and SheepDogs, illustrated by Peter Gouldthorpe

Peter Gouldthorpe

Peter Gouldthorpe is an Australian artist and illustrator who lives in Hobart, Tasmania.Gouldthorpe illustrated the Jack Bedson children's books Don't Get Burnt, Sheep Dogs and Nojyo ha Osawagi....

, are classic Australian tales of the city and the bush

The Bush

"The bush" is a term used for rural, undeveloped land or country areas in certain countries.-Australia:The term is iconic in Australia. In reference to the landscape, "bush" describes a wooded area, intermediate between a shrubland and a forest, generally of dry and nitrogen-poor soil, mostly...

. His adult poetry is salted with aphorism

Aphorism

An aphorism is an original thought, spoken or written in a laconic and memorable form.The term was first used in the Aphorisms of Hippocrates...

s, as in Karma, Sorta:

Selected bibliography

• Don't Get Burnt, or, The Great Australian Day at the Beach illustrated by Peter Gouldthorpe (Collins, 1985)
• The Contents of Their Wallet edited with Anthony J Bennett (Kardoorair, 1987)
• Sleep no more; poems of Jack Bedson (Kardoorair, 1993)
• The Campbell Howard Annotated Index of Australian Plays 1920-1955 edited with Julian Croft
  Julian Croft
  Julian Croft is an Australian poet and Emeritus Professor of English, University of New England. He was a founder of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature and co-edited its journal, Notes and Furphies for many years. In addition to gathering prizes for his published poems, he is...
  
  (CALLS, 1993)
• Sheep Dogs illustrated by Peter Gouldthorpe (Walter McVitty, 1990) (Puffin, 1995)
• Nojyo ha Osawagi (Walter McVitty, 1990) illustrated by Peter Gouldthorpe

A fuller bibliography is available at AustLit http://www.austlit.edu.au/