Manning Clark was born in Sydney in 1915 the son of a clergyman and after being educated at Melbourne and Sydney Universities he proceeded to Oxford university. From 1946 - 1975 he taught history in Melbourne and Canberra and during this time he regularly published papers on Australian history which became study text for students.

In 1956 he commenced writing his masterpiece, A History Of Australia, the six volumes of which were published between 1962 and 1987. Besides religious and political argument he advocated the necessity of Australia breaking free from Britain. His work attracted much following and created much academic debate and criticism of his moralistic style of writing as against factual accuracy. Clark wrote from the heart and in 1980 he was named Australian of the Year.

Clark died in 1991, with his last publications being The Puzzles Of Childhood in 1989 and The Quest For Grace in 1990, both being volumes of his autobiography.