Conversations is bringing you a summer treat — a collection of Richard's most memorable guests through out the years. 

After a cruel and abusive childhood and an adulthood full of unemployment and homelessness, Gregory Smith decided to step out of society and into the solitary life of a hermit, living in the elements in a forest in Northern NSW. 

Gregory is an academic in the School of Arts and Social Sciences at Southern Cross University in New South Wales.

He recently completed his PhD highlighting the experiences of children raised in institutional care.

For much of his adulthood Gregory was homeless; and by his own admission, a 'do not approach' figure.

For ten years he lived as a hermit in a forest in northern NSW, catching his own food.

After decades of life on the margins, he now has a place of his own, and is a popular teacher.

Gregory's childhood, in and out of orphanages, boys' homes and youth detention centres, made getting a foothold in regular society a massive challenge.

This episode of Conversations contains discussions about child abuse, orphanages, boys homes, child psychology, sociopaths, homelessness, unemployment, hermit, solitude, forests, rainforest, New South Wales, NSW, recluse, sociology, university, relationships, memoirs, autobiographies, Southern Cross Univerity, PHD, Order of Australia.