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Leaping into Waterfalls: The enigmatic Gillian Mears
Leaping into Waterfalls explores the rich, tumultuous life of Gillian Mears, one of Australia's most significant writers of the last forty years.
Gillian Mears appeared to many to be a shy woman from Grafton, but her lived and imaginative lives were rich with adventure, risk and often transgressive passion. In her award-winning and acclaimed novels and short stories, Mears wrote fearlessly of the dark undercurrents of country and family life, always probing the depths and complexity of human desire.
Mears' sensuality and sexuality were the driving forces of her life and writing. As an adult, she was plagued by ill health yet remained steadfast in her quest to be independent and free; while recovering from open-heart surgery, she traversed the country alone in a de-commissioned ambulance. By her mid-forties, multiple sclerosis had confined her to a wheelchair. Undaunted, she continued to write and publish until her death five years later in 2016.
Mears amassed an extensive collection of diaries, letters, manuscripts, photographs, recordings and ephemera, and deposited it with the Mitchell Library. She was a prolific correspondent with significant figures of the cultural landscape-Gerald Murnane, David Malouf, Tim Winton, Elizabeth Jolley, Helen Garner, Drusilla Modjeska, Kate Grenville and Marr Grounds. This meticulous and moving biography reads Mears' life and work within that broader cultural community to celebrate her truly extraordinary achievements and adventures.
Gillian Mears appeared to many to be a shy woman from Grafton, but her lived and imaginative lives were rich with adventure, risk and often transgressive passion. In her award-winning and acclaimed novels and short stories, Mears wrote fearlessly of the dark undercurrents of country and family life, always probing the depths and complexity of human desire.
Mears' sensuality and sexuality were the driving forces of her life and writing. As an adult, she was plagued by ill health yet remained steadfast in her quest to be independent and free; while recovering from open-heart surgery, she traversed the country alone in a de-commissioned ambulance. By her mid-forties, multiple sclerosis had confined her to a wheelchair. Undaunted, she continued to write and publish until her death five years later in 2016.
Mears amassed an extensive collection of diaries, letters, manuscripts, photographs, recordings and ephemera, and deposited it with the Mitchell Library. She was a prolific correspondent with significant figures of the cultural landscape-Gerald Murnane, David Malouf, Tim Winton, Elizabeth Jolley, Helen Garner, Drusilla Modjeska, Kate Grenville and Marr Grounds. This meticulous and moving biography reads Mears' life and work within that broader cultural community to celebrate her truly extraordinary achievements and adventures.
- GenresBiographyNonfiction
344 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2021
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 31 reviews
April 12, 2022
An extraordinary book about an extraordinary woman and author. One phrase to describe her ‘she did it her way’! She was such a shy yet provocative lady who was not afraid to say what she felt nor write what she wrote. She wanted to die with dignity and after years with MS and having open-heart surgery I think she deserved to go the way she did. This is so well written with empathy and I’m sure her family agreed which is shown at the end with all the help they gave Bernadette the author to complete such a biography.
July 20, 2022
As far as inspiring books go, Leaping into Waterfalls is profoundly inspiring – both its subject is and the way this gifted biographer wrote her book. Gillian Mears was a real individual, a genuine non-conforming artist who, as far as it seems at least, didn’t try to please anyone in her writing. Fittingly, her biographer isn’t coy about revealing uncomfortable stuff about her subject, her subject’s family and friends and lovers, even if the majority of them is still alive. Brennan moves through Mears’s rich and overly documented life with admirable pace. Out of clutter she created an utterly uncluttered biography with just enough gossip and just enough clever literary analysis. Out of the debris of Mears’s diaries, letters and other mementoes and out of numerous accounts of her by people she touched, Brennan distilled the essence. This book is wonderful for anyone who contemplates how to live a wild, creative, free-spirited life, and it acknowledges the many darknesses of such a life too. My only wish is that Brennan told us more about the books that shaped Mears. But this small imperfection fades in the face of how good this book otherwise is.
October 14, 2021
I found Leaping Into Waterfalls quite a remarkable book, as I felt I was reading deeply into the life of Gillian Mears. Brennan has written such an insightful book, with much detail to Mears' writing and her incredibly interesting life. Her struggles and achievements are described with consideration and honestly.
I have only read one book by Gillian Mears, but now I am scrambling to find the rest.
I have only read one book by Gillian Mears, but now I am scrambling to find the rest.
April 23, 2022
I picked this up because i usually enjoy books about writers, musicians and artists and their lives. I knew basically nothing about Gillian Mears and had never read her work before reading this book. Perhaps that affected my enjoyment of this book, or maybe not.
The author writes well and gets to grips with her subject, the childhood part of Mears life is somewhat rushed through in favor of her writing years and her sickness, but that seems like a minor complaint.
Mostly what annoyed me was Mears herself.
She gets diagnosed with MS and instead of listening to doctors she shacks up with some hippy in Northern NSW who enforces a strict macro-biotic diet and fasting regime on her. Then after she nearly dies from that debacle she goes to Venezuela, lives in a shanty, climbs a mountain and fasts to such an extent that she again, nearly dies.
This is an educated woman. I found myself getting annoyed at the drippy-hippy nonsense she engages in when she ought to be taking sound medical advice.
So all in all, it's a well written biography, probably helps if you're a fan of Gillian Mears in the first place, but i just didn't gel with it.
The author writes well and gets to grips with her subject, the childhood part of Mears life is somewhat rushed through in favor of her writing years and her sickness, but that seems like a minor complaint.
Mostly what annoyed me was Mears herself.
She gets diagnosed with MS and instead of listening to doctors she shacks up with some hippy in Northern NSW who enforces a strict macro-biotic diet and fasting regime on her. Then after she nearly dies from that debacle she goes to Venezuela, lives in a shanty, climbs a mountain and fasts to such an extent that she again, nearly dies.
This is an educated woman. I found myself getting annoyed at the drippy-hippy nonsense she engages in when she ought to be taking sound medical advice.
So all in all, it's a well written biography, probably helps if you're a fan of Gillian Mears in the first place, but i just didn't gel with it.
December 29, 2021
Written with empathy and flair, this is a highly readable biography of a very important writer. With Foal's Bread, Gillian Mears wrote an outstanding novel, but her stories and essays were original too.
Bernadette Brennan interviewed most of the key people in Mears's life. From an early age, Mears wrote strikingly well, but her tell-all style of life writing was too close to the bone for some of her family, lovers and friends. Brennan navigates this difficult territory with skill.
How tragically short Mears's life was.
It is painful to read of the relentless onset of MS, the misdiagnoses, and (to my mind) doomed alternative treatments.
Bernadette Brennan weaves the story of the life together with the fiction and essays that flowed from it. There is nothing laboured or over-inclusive about this book - unlike the brick-like new biography of Sylvia Plath (Red Comet) that I have put aside three-quarters read but never to be finished. Her writing has a nice pace to it.
A fascinating life, well told.
Bernadette Brennan interviewed most of the key people in Mears's life. From an early age, Mears wrote strikingly well, but her tell-all style of life writing was too close to the bone for some of her family, lovers and friends. Brennan navigates this difficult territory with skill.
How tragically short Mears's life was.
It is painful to read of the relentless onset of MS, the misdiagnoses, and (to my mind) doomed alternative treatments.
Bernadette Brennan weaves the story of the life together with the fiction and essays that flowed from it. There is nothing laboured or over-inclusive about this book - unlike the brick-like new biography of Sylvia Plath (Red Comet) that I have put aside three-quarters read but never to be finished. Her writing has a nice pace to it.
A fascinating life, well told.
October 31, 2021
A biography of an extraordinary woman and writer, partially told through her books. This is a fascinating and well researched biography which unearths some interesting material about Gillian Mears's life. At times I wanted to know a little bit more about Mears's family relationships (she had 3 sisters), which while addressed to some extent, does not go into detail about the ruptures that occurred in the family.
The book did make me want to read Mears's novels again. It's certainly good to have this biography out in the public domain, sadly Mears died in her early 50s of multiple sclerosis. This biography brings her back in full luminous light.
The book did make me want to read Mears's novels again. It's certainly good to have this biography out in the public domain, sadly Mears died in her early 50s of multiple sclerosis. This biography brings her back in full luminous light.
January 17, 2022
I began reading Gillian Mears’ books when they were first published. I think it was because they were set on the North Coast of NSW where I had lived and worked. It is interesting how much I can remember of them some 25 or more years later. I still have them and will re-visit them.
Gillian has occasionally appeared in the media. For a short period, I was the Teachers Federation Representative on the Board of Studies and I saw how meetings were run and the deference that was given to Leonie Kramer. To me, she was a stuffy old bourgeoise academic. She was involved in the removal of Fineflour from the senior English reading list. I doubt whether she ever read the text. I have recommended it to many students.
I think it was in a Good Weekend story that I first read about her medical condition and her relationship with Nanto.
I did listen to an interview on Philip Adams’ Late Night Live program where Gillian spoke of her life and her writing.
I was unaware that she ended up marrying her English teacher. That is very frowned upon these days.
I am not sure she made good choices in her partners or whether she contributed to failures of these relationship. I became physically angry reading about this Nanto character and his macrobiotic bullshit or as Mears later referred to it as “macro-lunacy.” Today he’s probably a strong exponent of the anti-vaccination movement.
I wonder where her writing would have taken her if she had been well and lived for twenty or thirty years longer. Maybe she would have stepped into Helen Garner’s shoes at some stage?
While reading this biography I was fascinated at the number of other writers who were part of Gillian’s life, Bruce Pascoe, Drusilla Modjeska, Robert Dessaix, Ivor Indyk and Gerald Murnane, among others.
I have read Tom Carment’s “Womerah Lane: Lives and Landscapes” at the time I was most interested in his reports of his friendship with Mears. Brennan often mentions Carment in this biography.
I often measure the stages of life by the different schools I taught in, with Gillian I think she would have reflected on her different relationships, starting with her family, her marriage to her ex-English teacher, Stephen Tatham, her same sex relationship with Helen Salter. Her troubled and disastrous, health wise, time with Feoff (Nanto) Scott. The semi-solitude period in Ant and Bee, interrupted by her time with Marr Grounds. The final stage was at B’yimba. Brennan interviewed all these people, none seemed bitter towards Mears. It seems her honesty
Gillian Mears’ writing has been widely praised. She was a skilled language technician; she bared her soul (and the souls of those close to her) and wrote with a personal honesty and integrity. All those years ago I remember the intimacy of her stories is what attracted me to her.
Brennan has done a masterful job in writing this biography. As she explains Gillian certainly left her with a wealth of material to use. As the end approached you could feel the pain, the discomfit, the lack of control through Brennan’s words. As Gillian’s life ebbed away melancholy seeped from the pages. Such an enigmatic but wonderful woman was leaving for ever. So, with the help of Nembutal and Bailey’s Irish Cream she brought an end to such a sparkling existence. Such a loss.
Brennan has been meticulous and thorough in her research for this biography. It is a benchmark for others who wish to pursue this literary form.
Gillian has occasionally appeared in the media. For a short period, I was the Teachers Federation Representative on the Board of Studies and I saw how meetings were run and the deference that was given to Leonie Kramer. To me, she was a stuffy old bourgeoise academic. She was involved in the removal of Fineflour from the senior English reading list. I doubt whether she ever read the text. I have recommended it to many students.
I think it was in a Good Weekend story that I first read about her medical condition and her relationship with Nanto.
I did listen to an interview on Philip Adams’ Late Night Live program where Gillian spoke of her life and her writing.
I was unaware that she ended up marrying her English teacher. That is very frowned upon these days.
I am not sure she made good choices in her partners or whether she contributed to failures of these relationship. I became physically angry reading about this Nanto character and his macrobiotic bullshit or as Mears later referred to it as “macro-lunacy.” Today he’s probably a strong exponent of the anti-vaccination movement.
I wonder where her writing would have taken her if she had been well and lived for twenty or thirty years longer. Maybe she would have stepped into Helen Garner’s shoes at some stage?
While reading this biography I was fascinated at the number of other writers who were part of Gillian’s life, Bruce Pascoe, Drusilla Modjeska, Robert Dessaix, Ivor Indyk and Gerald Murnane, among others.
I have read Tom Carment’s “Womerah Lane: Lives and Landscapes” at the time I was most interested in his reports of his friendship with Mears. Brennan often mentions Carment in this biography.
I often measure the stages of life by the different schools I taught in, with Gillian I think she would have reflected on her different relationships, starting with her family, her marriage to her ex-English teacher, Stephen Tatham, her same sex relationship with Helen Salter. Her troubled and disastrous, health wise, time with Feoff (Nanto) Scott. The semi-solitude period in Ant and Bee, interrupted by her time with Marr Grounds. The final stage was at B’yimba. Brennan interviewed all these people, none seemed bitter towards Mears. It seems her honesty
Gillian Mears’ writing has been widely praised. She was a skilled language technician; she bared her soul (and the souls of those close to her) and wrote with a personal honesty and integrity. All those years ago I remember the intimacy of her stories is what attracted me to her.
Brennan has done a masterful job in writing this biography. As she explains Gillian certainly left her with a wealth of material to use. As the end approached you could feel the pain, the discomfit, the lack of control through Brennan’s words. As Gillian’s life ebbed away melancholy seeped from the pages. Such an enigmatic but wonderful woman was leaving for ever. So, with the help of Nembutal and Bailey’s Irish Cream she brought an end to such a sparkling existence. Such a loss.
Brennan has been meticulous and thorough in her research for this biography. It is a benchmark for others who wish to pursue this literary form.
February 4, 2022
"Writing is one way of putting life into perspective, but like an aunt from the olden days I piece together many other things: photos into albums, posies into vases, square of knitting into rugs... leaves into compost, lines of poetry into sand..."
What a stunning biography this is by Bernadette Brennan - Leaping Into Waterfalls: the Enigmatic Gillian Mears (Allen & Unwin Books).
More than just a life story of one of Australia's best ever writers, this book goes into often dark territory about what can or should be written, the risk of great writing, and the personal cost it can inflict to follow one's art and voice.
Ultimately though it's a richly researched, honest celebration of a rare, brilliant, and completely daring writer whose work I only came to know after she died, and deserves a wider audience.
Highly recommend...
What a stunning biography this is by Bernadette Brennan - Leaping Into Waterfalls: the Enigmatic Gillian Mears (Allen & Unwin Books).
More than just a life story of one of Australia's best ever writers, this book goes into often dark territory about what can or should be written, the risk of great writing, and the personal cost it can inflict to follow one's art and voice.
Ultimately though it's a richly researched, honest celebration of a rare, brilliant, and completely daring writer whose work I only came to know after she died, and deserves a wider audience.
Highly recommend...
January 14, 2022
Bernadette Brennan’s biography of Gillian Mears is a gift: a thorough, expansive immersion in the life and immeasurable influence of one of our most generous and luminously talented writers.
October 30, 2023
I enjoyed the author’s biography of Helen Garner a lot, so I was pleased to get my hands on her work on Gillian Mears. The first half had me engrossed, the subject is a very dramatic person, and I’m familiar with the work of her fellow writers who form the background. It’s well written but I just lost interest halfway through, the book just dragged for me after that.
November 28, 2022
Loved, loved, loved.
I picked up this book Sunday morning for a ‘quick read’ before starting my day. Numerous cups of tea and hours later …. I couldn’t put her story, her life down.
I utterly enjoyed reading about Gillian’s life, her vulnerability passions, her resilience and dedication to create something special with her love of words.
I was desperate to read something that inspired and Bernadette delivered!
I picked up this book Sunday morning for a ‘quick read’ before starting my day. Numerous cups of tea and hours later …. I couldn’t put her story, her life down.
I utterly enjoyed reading about Gillian’s life, her vulnerability passions, her resilience and dedication to create something special with her love of words.
I was desperate to read something that inspired and Bernadette delivered!
April 2, 2022
‘Gillian Mears often likened herself to a Clarence Valley butcherbird, a creature filled with beautiful song who could also peck out the eyes of fledglings.’
Gillian Mears (21 July 1964 – 16 May 2016) a writer of short stories and novels, was fifty-one years old when she died. She had lived with multiple sclerosis for some years.
In 2011, I read ‘Foal’s Bread’. In 2018, I read ‘A Map of the Gardens’, and I can’t remember when I read ‘The Mint Lawn’, only that I know I need to reread it. There is an urgent intensity to Ms Mears’s writing which has me approaching her work with caution. And, after reading Ms Brennan’s biography, I understand why I need to read slowly and carefully, to avoid being overwhelmed.
‘She knew that in letters she was more friendly and generous than in real life.’
To write this biography, Ms Brennan interviewed over sixty of Ms Mears’s family members, friends, and colleagues. She also went through over one hundred and fifty boxes of archived material Ms Mears deposited with the Mitchell Library. What emerges is a picture of an intense, complex woman who was a prolific correspondent and not always respectful of other people’s boundaries. Ms Mears was plagued by ill health but was determined to be independent. Reading of her travels in an old ambulance after recovering from open-heart surgery had me admiring her courage if not her choices.
But what I really see, behind the biographical details and (at times questionable) choices, is an observant and talented woman whose experience and imagination shaped her writing. While I admire her work, I am wary of the intensity which seems to have led her to make some quite curious choices. Ms Mears tried very hard to control her own life but seemed to be far less aware of the impact of her actions on others. An enigmatic life of contradictions, an indisputable legacy.
Recommended.
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
Gillian Mears (21 July 1964 – 16 May 2016) a writer of short stories and novels, was fifty-one years old when she died. She had lived with multiple sclerosis for some years.
In 2011, I read ‘Foal’s Bread’. In 2018, I read ‘A Map of the Gardens’, and I can’t remember when I read ‘The Mint Lawn’, only that I know I need to reread it. There is an urgent intensity to Ms Mears’s writing which has me approaching her work with caution. And, after reading Ms Brennan’s biography, I understand why I need to read slowly and carefully, to avoid being overwhelmed.
‘She knew that in letters she was more friendly and generous than in real life.’
To write this biography, Ms Brennan interviewed over sixty of Ms Mears’s family members, friends, and colleagues. She also went through over one hundred and fifty boxes of archived material Ms Mears deposited with the Mitchell Library. What emerges is a picture of an intense, complex woman who was a prolific correspondent and not always respectful of other people’s boundaries. Ms Mears was plagued by ill health but was determined to be independent. Reading of her travels in an old ambulance after recovering from open-heart surgery had me admiring her courage if not her choices.
But what I really see, behind the biographical details and (at times questionable) choices, is an observant and talented woman whose experience and imagination shaped her writing. While I admire her work, I am wary of the intensity which seems to have led her to make some quite curious choices. Ms Mears tried very hard to control her own life but seemed to be far less aware of the impact of her actions on others. An enigmatic life of contradictions, an indisputable legacy.
Recommended.
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
October 28, 2021
A revealing and touching biography of the author Gillian Mears and her struggle with multiple sclerosis. I have been a fan of Mears' writing since I read The Mint Lawn in the 1990s, and was delighted when Foal's Bread came out after a gap of some years. What an interesting character! It was difficult to comprehend some of the extreme lengths she went to in an attempt to deal with MS, and how much her body went through over the years. Lots of fascinating thoughts on euthanasia, writing, travel, sexuality, friendship and family relationships. Not an easy person to understand, I think, but loved by many.
February 2, 2022
3.5. Well researched and well written but I couldn’t get over how screwed up and awful this woman was. It coloured my reading of her life. And there were many things glossed over. I guess because some of the people are still alive? And also i felt the author wanted the people involved to like her so she wasn’t prepared to tell all. Maybe another biographer will tell more in the future.
October 17, 2021
Candid biography of an extraordinary writer. I got the feeling that there is still much unsaid, but of course all Mears’ family and friends are still alive. What Brennan does so brilliantly is examine the writing against the life to illuminate both.
October 10, 2024
Notwithstanding Gillian’s struggle and pain with MS I found her a not very sympathetic character.
Reading some of the extracts from her fiction and general comments, at times I was laughing out loud. I felt a slight pretentiousness, and the descriptions of her seemed to reveal to me a graspingness, and a degree of superficiality.
I’m interested in people’s lives, and generally, I’ll read of those I don’t feel particularly sympathetic with. It also depends of course on the quality of the writing of the biographer. In this case I found the writing a bit sluggish and opaque at times, so this combination made it a slow, slightly frustrating read.
But overall it’s three stars for the interest of the life, and really, that the book was not too long.
Reading some of the extracts from her fiction and general comments, at times I was laughing out loud. I felt a slight pretentiousness, and the descriptions of her seemed to reveal to me a graspingness, and a degree of superficiality.
I’m interested in people’s lives, and generally, I’ll read of those I don’t feel particularly sympathetic with. It also depends of course on the quality of the writing of the biographer. In this case I found the writing a bit sluggish and opaque at times, so this combination made it a slow, slightly frustrating read.
But overall it’s three stars for the interest of the life, and really, that the book was not too long.
October 28, 2023
Gillian Mears’ extraordinary life, her enormous creativity, her messy, complicated relationships, especially with herself, and how she documented a tumultuous path through life, is told with such power, talent and grace by Bernadette Brennan. All I knew of Gillian before reading this biography was my love and admiration for her novel Foal’s Bread, how mesmerised and similarly moved I was listening to her Radio National interview with Philip Adams, and finally, an inability to fathom why I should feel such gut wrenching sadness at the news of her death. This wonderful biography helps me understand those feelings.
February 2, 2025
Australian writer Gillian Mears published three novels and over 200 short stories. Acclaimed during her lifetime, she died in 2016 following years of living with MS. She was also a prolific archivist, selling or giving 27 metres of material in 154 boxes to the State Library of New South Wales. It is from these archives that Bernadette Brennan constructs this scintillating biography. Read more on my blog
February 24, 2022
Although I’m grateful this biography was written, I am disappointed of its cursory treatment of Mears’ childhood. Considering its towering influence over her work and life I wanted her biography to excavate that period tenderly and thoroughly. Instead it is skewed too heavily on her later years, possibly because that’s the era in which the author had access to textual records Mears deposited with the State Library of NSW.
January 28, 2023
A compelling read, kudos to the biographer. I had never heard of Mears and while I found her writing life interesting I also found her unlikeable. She comes across as manipulative, demanding, and gullible. Mears rejected Western medicine in favour of 'hippie hocus-pocus' therapies (term taken from another GR reviewer) which l found disturbing. That said, it appears Mears was a talented writer and I'm preparing to read some of her work.
August 14, 2022
Wow what a read and what a life! I thought it was going to end half way through! Brennan has become an amazing biographer - this one of Gillian Mears is filled with expectant death and disease and grief while Mears is magnificently productive writing and searching and loving people cats horses country. A wrenching read and awesome control of a chaotic narrative.
September 3, 2022
This is an exceptional biography of a great Australian author. Although I have not yet read any of Gillean Mears' work, the story of her life is one of exploration and courage through very bad health beginning at a relatively young age. I will now begin another Gillian Mears journey through her words.
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February 21, 2023Interesting read which captivated me with the details of Mears's life. I had only ever really known about Foals Bread probably because I don't generally read short stories which seem to have been her specialty.
I was held by her fierce determination to fight MS as well as her writing. I especially like her phrase ' lambchopdom'.
I was held by her fierce determination to fight MS as well as her writing. I especially like her phrase ' lambchopdom'.
November 29, 2021
Interesting biography of a writer of whom I knew little about. Eccentric, passionate, weird but fascinating as she struggled with MS.
January 9, 2022
A remarkable book. I don’t usually read biographies; this was mesmerising.
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February 25, 2022i've finished for the time being so I will not rate the book yet.
I'm not familiar with Meares' writing so i don't know why I chose to read this. it is well-written but i can't get into it.
I'm not familiar with Meares' writing so i don't know why I chose to read this. it is well-written but i can't get into it.
March 19, 2022
I loved this compelling book about the wonderful, complex, fascinating writer Gillian Mears. Thank you Bernadette Brennan.
May 12, 2022
Bernadette Brennan delicately handles a complex and perplexing life tale, leaving you simultaneously regretful and relieved that you were never caught in Gillian Mears' charismatic orbit.
December 16, 2022
A fine example of wonderful biography - insightful, sensitive, brave. Exploring the act of creativity as well as this remarkable, courageous, challenging, troubled woman.
December 19, 2022
Fascinating and disturbing too.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 31 reviews