AustLit

Dorothy Rickards completed a Bachelor of Arts degree at Melbourne University. She has been a lecturer in drama, puppetry and Early Childhood Education at that institution. Rickards has written a number of children's educational works and readers (mostly relating to drama activities), and with Barbara Walcott she wrote Complete Book of Cats of Australia (1983). She also illustrated children's educational works by other authors, including Boy on Sticks (June Epstein, q.v., 1979), and designed the Big Dipper children's activity series (1980-1985). In 1975 Rickards transcribed Three Legends (told by Cathy Tesha, Veronica Iledare, Fifita Tupou, Olivia Lokotui, Eseta Taifela and Mauga Pilitati), an anthology of East African, Tongan, Samoan and West African legends. In 1982 she presented a bi-weekly children's radio program.