Eunice Hanger (8 March 1911 – 16 October 1972) was an Australian playwright and educator.

Early life and education

Eunice Hanger was born at Mount Chalmers in Queensland on 8 March 1911 to parents Thomas Hanger and Myfanwy Granville-Jones. Her older brother,

Mostyn Hanger Sir (John) Mostyn Hanger (3 January 190811 August 1980) was a judge in Queensland, Australia. He was Chief Justice of Queensland and Administrator of Queensland (deputy for the Governor of Queensland). Early years Hanger was born on 3 January ...

, became

Chief Justice of Queensland The chief justice of Queensland is the senior judge of the Supreme Court of Queensland and the highest ranking judicial officer in the Australian state of Queensland. The chief justice is both the judicial head of the Supreme Court, as well as th ...

and was knighted. She completed her secondary education at Gympie High School and won a tertiary scholarship. She then attended the

University of Queensland The University of Queensland is a Public university, public research university located primarily in Brisbane, the capital city of the Australian state of Queensland. Founded in 1909 by the Queensland parliament, UQ is one of the six sandstone ...

, graduating with a BA in 1932 and MA in 1939.

Career

Qualified with her BA, Hanger began her teaching career at Gympie High School, where her father was headmaster. While teaching at Roma High School, she was one of five teachers who went on a tour to study education in Japan, reporting that "suicides from despair at failure in the all-important examination are not at all uncommon". In 1940 she was transferred to Rockhampton High School and in 1948 was promoted to Brisbane High School. Her 1949 stage adaptation of

M. Barnard Eldershaw M. Barnard Eldershaw was the pseudonym used by the twentieth-century Australian literary collaborators Marjorie Barnard (1897–1987) and Flora Eldershaw (1897–1956). In a collaboration that lasted two decades from the late 1920s to the ...

's '' A House Is Built'' was not well received, despite having received the authors' approval. Nelson Burns, in his review for ''

The Courier-Mail ''The Courier-Mail'' is an Australian newspaper published in Brisbane. Owned by News Corp Australia, it is published daily from Monday to Saturday in tabloid format. Its editorial offices are located at Bowen Hills, in Brisbane's inner norther ...

'', wrote "An over-plus of trite verbiage cluttered the trend of the story". The following year, however, she had the audience "enthralled" by her play, ''The Summoner'', which she produced and performed in. In 1955 her play ''

Flood A flood is an overflow of water (list of non-water floods, or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are of significant con ...

'' was runner-up to

Oriel Gray Oriel Holland Bennett (26 March 1920 – 30 June 2003) known by pen name Oriel Gray, was an Australian dramatist, playwright and screenwriter who wrote from the 1940s to 1990s. The major themes of her work were gender equality and "social and po ...

's ''

The Torrents ''The Torrents'' is a 1955 Australian play by Oriel Gray, set in the late 19th century, about the arrival of a female journalist in an all-male newspaper office, and an attempt to develop irrigation-based agriculture in a former gold mining town. ...

'' and

Ray Lawler Raymond Evenor Lawler (23 May 1921 – 24 July 2024) was an Australian playwright and dramatist, actor, theatre producer and director. Lawler's most notable play was his tenth, '' Summer of the Seventeenth Doll'' (1953), which had its premie ...

's ''

Summer of the Seventeenth Doll ''Summer of the Seventeenth Doll'' is an Australian play written by Ray Lawler and first performed at the Union Theatre in Melbourne on 28 November 1955. The play is considered to be the most significant in Australian theatre history, and a " ...

'', joint winners of the Playwrights' Advisory Board's play of the year. It was adapted for radio by

Catherine Shepherd Catherine Shepherd is an English comedic actress, writer and director. Career In the early 2000s Shepherd appeared in several BBC Radio 4 comedies, as Daisy in the sitcom '' Think the Unthinkable'' alongside Marcus Brigstocke and David Mitchel ...

. Hanger died on 16 October 1972 at

Toowong Toowong ( ) is a riverside Suburbs and localities (Australia), suburb in the City of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. In the , Toowong had a population of 12,556 people with a median weekly household income of $1,927. Geography Toowong is ...

, Queensland.

Selected works

*''A House is Built'', 1949 *''The Summoner'', 1950 *''Upstage'', 1950 *''Foundations'', 1952 *''

'', 1955 *''2D'', 1958 *''The Frogs'', 1960

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hanger, Eunice 1911 births 1972 deaths Australian dramatists and playwrights 20th-century Australian women writers University of Queensland alumni Academic staff of the University of Queensland