The House of Blue Glass

A life of Penelope Lucas

By: Alan Atkinson

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Paperback | 1 March 2026

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23.3 x 15.4 x 2.4

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Acclaimed historian Alan Atkinson – author of the award-winning Elizabeth and John: The Macarthurs of Elizabeth Farm – pieces together the life of Penelope Lucas and the pivotal role she played in building the Macarthur empire. While she is known as the family governess, Atkinson reveals that Penelope was primarily an accountant whose bookkeeping work made an important difference to the Macarthurs’ success.

Penelope Lucas came to Australia in 1805, in her thirties, unmarried – she was the first well-educated woman to travel independently from Europe to Australia – and looking forward to living on inherited income. While Elizabeth Macarthur was unsurprisingly upset when her husband, John, arrived back from three years in England with a woman she had never heard of, Penelope went on to live with the Macarthurs for over thirty years and became close friends with Elizabeth.

In this revelatory work, Atkinson brings together fifty years of scholarship as he explores the gender dynamics of the Macarthur household and the life of a single woman of means in Georgian England and early colonial Sydney.

‘A prodigious feat of historical imagination.’ – Matthew Allen

‘Exquisitely written and meticulously researched.’ – Alecia Simmonds

‘As delicately observational as it is learned…Atkinson writes with the lightest touch.’ – Alison Bashford

About the Author

Alan Atkinson has been writing Australian history since the 1970s, and he has a lifelong interest in family circumstances and relationships. He has written or edited a dozen books, including The Europeans in Australia, in three volumes, the third of which won the Victorian Prize for Literature, and Elizabeth and John, which won the NSW Premier’s Award for Australian history. He is an honorary professor and Doctor of Letters with the University of Sydney.

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