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Tributes are paid to Australian author CJ Koch

Tributes are paid to Australian author CJ Koch

TRIBUTES have been paid to the Australian author CJ Koch, who has passed away at the age of 81.

Christopher John Koch, who was born in Tasmania, wrote eight novels during his 55-year career. He will be best remembered for The Year of Living Dangerously, which was published in 1978, although the author believed some of his later work was better.

The Year of Living Dangerously, which followed a reporter after the fall of the Sukarno regime in Indonesia in 1965, was made into a film starring Sigourney Weaver and Mel Gibson, released in 1982 (see below).

The young Koch had trained as a journalist, but was apparently working as a waiter in London when his first book was accepted by publishers in 1958. The book, The Boys in the Island, was the coming-of-age story of a young man from Tasmania who dreamed of moving to mainland Australia.

But it was to be 1972 before Mr. Koch decided to become a full-time writer. By that time he had been living back in Australia and working as a producer for the broadcaster ABC.

His later works included The Doubeman (1985) and Highways to a War (1996), both of which won Australia’s prestigious Miles Franklin Award. Much of his work explored Australia’s relationship with its Asian neighbours.

When Mr. Koch was diagnosed with cancer in 2012 he was given just weeks to live, but he survived to see his final novel, Lost Voices, published in September that year.

He passed away in Tasmania.

To view the trailer for The Year of Living Dangerously, click here.

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