Nancy "Nan" Witcomb is best known around the world for her simple poems published over 3 decades as "The Thoughts of Nanushka". In her home town of

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

, she is also known as a broadcaster and raconteur and has made appearances on national television.

Biography

Trained as a nurse at the Adelaide Children's Hospital, Nan joined Australian National Airlines (later

Ansett Australia Ansett Australia was a major Australian airline group, based in Melbourne, Australia. The airline flew domestically within Australia and from the 1990s to destinations in Asia. After operating for 65 years, the airline was placed into adminis ...

) as a hostess in 1950, launching a 23-year career that she later documented in her memoir of the early days of hostessing "Up Here and Down There". In the seventies, she hosted talk-back radio on Adelaide AM station 5DN

Cruise 1323 Cruise 1323 (call sign: 5DN) is one of Adelaide's longest running radio stations. In its 80+ years it has changed considerably. It was the first commercial station to begin broadcasting in South Australia. History Radio 5DN began operating ...

with co-host Ken Dickin. Early ventures into writing included scriptwriting for revues and the controversial "The Mavis Bramston Show". Her poem, 'To Mourn Too Long for Those We Love' was read at the funeral of former

INXS INXS (a word play, phonetic play on "in excess") were an Australian Rock music, rock band, formed as The Farriss Brothers in 1977 in Sydney, New South Wales. The band's founding members were bassist Garry Gary Beers, main composer and keyboar ...

lead singer,

Michael Hutchence Michael Kelland John Hutchence (22 January 1960 – 22 November 1997) was an Australian musician, singer-songwriter and actor. Hutchence co-founded the rock band INXS, which sold over 75 million records worldwide and was inducted into th ...

The Thoughts of Nanushka

First published by herself, Nan's "Thoughts" appeared in the 1970s as a single volume, "The Thoughts of Nanushka". A further volume, "The Thoughts of Nanushka Vols VII - XII" appeared in the eighties and a later volume "The Thoughts of Nanushka Vols XIII - XVIII" completed the main three volume set. The same poems have appeared in smaller collections in both hard and paperback, sometimes with different titles, e.g. "Believe in the Dream".

Bibliography

*''Nanushka's Love Poems: To Someone I Love'', Pan, 1992, *''Believe in the Dream: A Selection of Poems from Nanushka'', Volumes 1-18, Witcomb, Nan, 1999,

References

Sources

*Nan Witcom
''Up Here and Down There''

External links