Early life and education

He was born in Roodepoort, South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

 in 1971, and grew up on the outskirts of Johannesburg

Johannesburg

Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or Egoli, is the largest city in South Africa, by population. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa...

. He spent some of his childhood in Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, before returning to South Africa in 1979. In 1989 he moved to 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...

 with his family. He attended the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa. Since then, he has lived in Melbourne and Perth.

Literary career

Mateer has published several collections of poems. Barefoot Speech won the 2001 C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry

C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry

The C. J. Dennis Prize for Poetry is awarded annually as part of the Victorian Premier's Literary Awards, for a significant selection of new work by a poet published in a book. It is named after the early twentieth century vernacular poet C. J...

 and Loanwords was shortlisted for the 2002 Western Australian Premier's Book Awards

Western Australian Premier's Book Awards

The Western Australian Premier's Book Awards is an award for books, scripts, digital narrative and a People's Choice. Awards are provided by the Government of Western Australia, and the awards process is managed by the State Library of Western Australia...

. He was also a recipient of the Centenary Medal

Centenary Medal

The Centenary Medal is an award created by the Australian Government in 2001. It was established to commemorate the Centenary of Federation of Australia and to honour people who have made a contribution to Australian society or government...

 for his contributions to Australian literature.

He has read his work at poetry festivals in Asia and Europe, and most recently in Japan and in Malaysia. His works have been translated into Japanese and Portuguese. Mateer was granted a fellowship to travel to Indonesia

Indonesia

Indonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an...

, and later published a non-fiction travelogue

Travel literature

Travel literature is travel writing of literary value. Travel literature typically records the experiences of an author touring a place for the pleasure of travel. An individual work is sometimes called a travelogue or itinerary. Travel literature may be cross-cultural or transnational in focus, or...

entitled Semar's Cave: an Indonesian Journal.

His latest publications are a book of poems about the Portuguese Empire, Southern Barbarians (Johannesburg: The Zero Press, 2007) and a selection from more than a decade's work, Elsewhere (Cambridge, UK: Salt Publishing, forthcoming).

Works

Poetry

• Anachronism
• Barefoot Speech
• Burning Swans
• Loanwords
• The Ancient Capital of Images
• Southern Barbarians
• Elsewhere

Travel

• Semar's Cave: an Indonesian Journal