Dame Carmen Callil founded the internationally recognised feminist publishing company Virago. She was renowned as a champion of women writers, publishers and thinkers. Her public life was marked by verity, intellect and collaboration as she determined to demonstrate that “women had a history of their own” to tell. (The Guardian)

Carmen Callil was born in Melbourne in 1938. Following the death of her father in 1947, Carmen and her sister Yvonne were educated as boarders at Star of the Sea College and then at Loreto Mandeville Hall Toorak.

Carmen studied Literature and History at the University of Melbourne graduating in 1959 before she travelled to Europe, taking on work teaching English in Italy. She was one of the legendary group of Australian writers and thinkers such as Germaine Greer, Barry Humphries and Clive James who moved to London in the 1960s and never returned home. Carmen established Virago Press in 1973 with a bank overdraft, working from her dining room in a tiny flat off the King’s Road in Chelsea. Virago aimed to champion women writers and publish writing on feminist topics; “the resulting venture radically expanded the published range of writing by women and transformed the role of women in publishing itself.” (The Guardian)

In 1978 Carmen established Virago Modern Classics to champion neglected books by women writers; she included Australian authors such as Christina Stead and Miles Franklin in her collection. She remained chair of Virago Press from 1973 until 1995, including a period of time where she moved to run the international publishing firm Chatto & Windus, when the company was sold to Little Brown.

In her retirement Carmen contributed reviews and articles to publications across the United Kingdom and France, co-authored several books and was active in several social causes. Numerous honours were bestowed upon her, including a distinguished writing award from the International Women’s Writing Guild, and honorary doctorates from Sheffield, York, Oxford Brookes and the Open University. In the 2017 Queen’s Birthday Honours,  Carmen Callil was made a Dame for services to literature.

Dame Carmen Callil died on 17 October 2022.