About Reverend Dr Stephanie Dowrick  (short bio)

Reverend Dr Stephanie Dowrick, PhD, is widely known as the author of a number of life-changing books in the areas of personal, social and ethical development. She has the rare distinction of having had five No.1 bestselling books. These include Intimacy and Solitude, Forgiveness and Other Acts of Love, The Universal Heart and Choosing Happiness: Life & Soul Essentials. Her latest book is In the Company of Rilke.
 
Stephanie has been the "Inner Life" columnist for Good Weekend Magazine since 2001 (Sydney Morning Herald and The Age). She has also for many years been a regular guest on ABC Radio and gives frequent talks, workshops and retreats nationally and internationally. She is an ordained Interfaith minister and offers regular spiritually inclusive services and weekly meditations at Pitt Street Uniting Church in Sydney.  She also works regularly with Breast Cancer Network Australia, and is currently an Adjunct Fellow with the Writing & Society Research Group at the University of Western Sydney where she completed her research doctorate.

Born in New Zealand, Stephanie lived in Britain for many years. There, she was founder and first Managing Director of The Women's Press, and later Chairperson. She has lived with her family in Sydney since 1983.  www.stephaniedowrick.com

(longer bio)

Reverend Dr Stephanie Dowrick, PhD, is widely known as the author of a number of innovative books on life-changing topics of personal, social and ethical development. Stephanie has the rare distinction of having had five No.1 bestselling books.These include Intimacy and Solitude, Forgiveness and Other Acts of Love, The Universal Heart and Choosing Happiness: Life & Soul Essentials.

Her most recent book is In the Company of Rilke, a spiritual study of the work of the European poet, Rainer Maria Rilke, and a literary study of the rewards of writing and reading more generally. Her books have been translated into many languages.

Stephanie has been the "Inner Life" columnist for Good Weekend Magazine since 2001 (Sydney Morning Herald and The Age). She has also for many years been a regular guest on ABC Radio. Stephanie is currently an Adjunct Fellow with the Writing & Society Research Group at the University of Western Sydney. She completed her PhD in literature and spirituality at that same university. Stephanie also works regularly with Breast Cancer Network Australia, furthering the psychological empowerment of women diagnosed with breast cancer.

In June 2005, Stephanie was ordained as an Interfaith Minister. She gives regular Interfaith services and weekly meditations at Pitt Street Uniting Church, Sydney. She has for many years also given talks and conducted spiritually inclusive retreats and workshops. She has spoken at many events worldwide, and has shared platforms with many eminent thinkers including David Boulton, Tenzin Palmo, His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Rev Dr Don Cuppitt, Professor Raimond Gaita, Rev Dr John Polkinghorne and Bishop John Spong.

Born in New Zealand, Stephanie lived in London for many years. In her early twenties, she established a strikingly successful publishing career holding senior positions with a number of British publishers including New English Library and Triad Paperbacks, jointly owned by Jonathan Cape, Chatto & Windus and the Bodley Head. In 1977, while still in her twenties, she founded and was the first Managing Director of the prestigious independent publishing house, The Women's Press, where she published many outstanding writers including Janet Frame, Alice Walker, Phyllis Chessler, Andrea Dworkin and May Sarton.  She was Chair of The Women’s Press from 1989-2002. In the early 1990s she worked for two years on a part-time basis as Fiction Publisher for Allen & Unwin. Stephanie trained in psychotherapy while living in Britain and for some years had a small psychotherapy practice alongside her writing and other public work. Reverend Dr Stephanie Dowrick has lived in Sydney since 1983 and is the mother of two adult children.

http://www.stephaniedowrick.com

:: Stephanie Dowrick says:

I am profoundly interested in exploring how we can "translate" our highest ideals into everyday living, not only for our personal benefit but also for our collective spiritual and social wellbeing. This exploration - and the many psychological, ethical and spiritual questions that arise from it - drives my life and work. For more than two decades now writing has been my main occupation but I have always remained closely in touch with the wider world, through my earlier work as a publisher, then as a part-time psychotherapist, and now with the emphasis on a wide variety of public talks and workshops and giving spiritually inclusive retreats and services, as well as my work with BCNA, and my invaluable connection with the University of Western Sydney.

In the writing of my books, I have drawn on an extensive range of psychotherapeutic ideas but particularly "Object Relations" theory and Psychosynthesis, as well as the spiritual traditions of East and West. As an interfaith minister, I am particularly inspired by some recent spiritual teachers whose spiritual vision extends beyond their home faith. They include Thich Nhat Hanh, Thomas Merton, William Johnston, Dom Bede Griffiths and. increasingly, Hazrat Inayat Khan.

Following the completion of my research doctorate on the poet Rainer Maria Rilke in 2008, I have continued my research into beliefs and behaviours that can support a more compassionate, healing and inclusive vision of life and living - particularly in this age of widespread religious fear and violence.  I have completed a book on Rilke, looking with greatest interest at the spiritual yearnings that reading Rilke both affirms and allows: In the Company of Rilke.

In addition to writing my books, teaching, giving talks in many kinds of settings, workshops, and spiritual retreats, I also write the  ‘Inner Life’ column for Good Weekend Magazine (Sydney Morning Herald and The Age).  And each month (3rd Sundays, 3pm) I offer a spiritually inclusive Interfaith service at Pitt Street Uniting Church (264 Pitt Street, Sydney 2000) and weekly meditation, also at Pitt Street, each Wednesday at 6pm.  I give regular retreats also at Mana Retreat Centre, nr Coromandel, New Zealand.

Each of these activities - along with my personal spiritual study and practice, and spending invaluable time with friends and my beloved family - is part of the same whole: living life as fully as I am able and reflecting deeply upon it.

• For more detail about Stephanie Dowrick’s life and background go to Interview on this site
• For a press pack – including a brief biography – go to Press Kit on this site
• For a complete list of Stephanie Dowrick's books and audio, go to Published Works on this site