Western Australian writer, Randolph Stow, author of The Merry-Go-Round in the Sea, died in England at the age of 74.

Stow was recently diagnosed with liver cancer and died suddenly on Saturday in a hospital near his home in the Essex village of Old Harwich.

In 1958, he won the Miles Franklin Award for his novel To the Islands, which was about the relations between indigenous and white Australians. It was inspired by his experience during an Anglican mission.

He published two novels in London while he was still an undergraduate student at the University of Western Australia.

His novel Visitants was based on his adventures as a patrol officer in the Trobriand Islands.

Tony Hassall, Emeritus Professor of English Literature at James Cook University, described Stow as "one of the finest writers Australia has produced".

Prof Hassall said that Stow's books were written completely in his head before being put down on paper and that his consciousness was poetic.

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"The sort of poetic writing and intensity I think is one of the most striking aspects of his novel writing."

According to the professor, Stow's The Merry-Go-Round in the Sea "is one of the most brilliant evocations of an Australian childhood that anyone is ever going to read".

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