Interview of Juliet Rieden by Freya Bennett
After years of research, hundreds of interviews, and months spent alongside one of Australia’s most iconic leaders, Juliet Rieden has completed the authorised biography of Dame Quentin Bryce. From her trailblazing role as our first female Governor-General to her lifelong commitment to human rights, gender equality, and community, Bryce’s story is one of resilience, courage, and remarkable leadership. In this interview, Rieden reflects on what it was like to capture Bryce’s life on the page—the surprising insights, intimate family moments, and the lessons about breaking barriers and creating meaningful change that make this biography essential reading.
Hi Juliet, how are you feeling after the huge feat of finishing the Quentin Bryce biography?
Seeing the book in my hands, holding it was an amazing feeling. This has been an intense and lengthy journey starting back in 2022. It involved more than 120 interviews, hundreds of hours of research in national and state archives and other private archives and of course months and months spent with the fabulous Dame Quentin. I am proud of the end result…. I am also exhausted!
What was it about Quentin Bryce that made you feel this was a story you had to tell?
Quentin is a trailblazer, an Australian icon and yet she hadn’t agreed to write her own memoir or have it written by a biographer. She has of course had several requests over the decades. So I was delighted when she agreed to my rather audacious approach to write her authorised biography. What changed her mind? Quentin is now in her 80s and I think understands that as our first female Governor-General, with a pivotal career in public service and the women’s movement she has a responsibility to go on the record.
After two years of research and hundreds of interviews, what surprised you most about her as a person?
Quentin’s deep-seated belief that she must use her voice and encourage others to do so also to make the world a better place, to not be bystanders, shouldn’t have surprised me, but the intensity did. It’s in everything she does. Quentin will never stop working for change. The horrific scourge of domestic violence, the fact that gender equality has still not been achieved, the urgent need for reconciliation and truth telling to bring about meaningful change to the human rights of Indigenous Australians…. these are just some of the things that keep her up at night.
Bryce achieved so many firsts in her career. Were there moments where you could really feel the barriers she faced as a woman in leadership?
Like all women leaders, Quentin faced shocking sexism and misogyny in every role she took on except perhaps as Principal of Women’s College . The higher she soared the more she was chopped down, a victim of our barbaric tall poppy syndrome. You will read about these moments in the book, many will take your breath away.
How did her early childhood in western Queensland shape her values and drive to create change?
It shaped her enormously. Quentin has a finely tuned sense of community. She loves being with people, getting to know them, the mutual support that comes from community life… Also the resilience that is needed to live in remote areas is character building – places where there aren’t lots of services or infrastructure and you have to make things work yourself. As for her core values, Quenitn’s parents belief in gender equality and human rights deeply influenced Quentin and her three sisters.
Writing an authorised biography often gives you access to intimate family stories. Were there any that particularly stayed with you?
I was privileged to be able to rummage through all of Quentin’s private archives – diaries, letters, scribbled notes, journals and boxes and boxes of photographs. Probably the most surprising and spine-tingling item I came across was actually in her husband Michael Byrce’s archives. Tapes recorded in the late 1960s when Quentin and Michael were living in London with their first baby and another on the way. They recorded these tapes to post back to Michael’s parents to share the excitement of living in London at a time when the whole world was changing. I had them digitised not knowing what might be on them. They are wonderful, just hearing their young voices with the baby gurgling in the background talking about all the new things they were seeing gave me goose bumps.
What do you hope readers take away from this biography about leadership, resilience, and breaking glass ceilings?
It has been wonderful getting to know Quentin and I hope readers can see the Quentin I have come to know through this biography; the woman behind the high positions she held. She has taught me a great deal about the power of reform and implementing change … not just talking the talk but walking it. She has also taught me about the importance of friendship, mutual deep supporting life affirming relationships. And about giving back – being a good person in your community. Looking after each other…I could go on…there is so much to take away.
