Blog Archives
The Colour of Food: A Memoir of Life, Love and Dinner Anne Else Awa Press, $12.00, ISBN 9781877551925 Back in the days when most New Zealanders ate the same stuff – mince, chops, sausages, a roast on Sunday – the…
Donald Kerr, head of Special Collections at the University of Otago library, assesses the survival of such collections in the digital age. Throughout the country, there are many institutions that contain a diverse range of collections, each containing a myriad…
E-publisher Penelope Todd foresees a complementary future for print and digital. When an invention appears that radically threatens our comfortable habits and suppositions, our instinct is to clutch at the old and mistrust the new. We like our books: the…
North & South magazine art director Jenny Nicholls looks into the future of book design. Recently I was sent a photography book published by Taschen – Mario Testino: Private View – to review. I had been looking forward to the…
Julia Marshall of Gecko Press wonders about the future of the book as artefact. Recently, Frances, in charge of Gecko Press accounts, went to get her daily coffee at The Jimmy in Wellington and was asked where she worked. On…
New Zealand Listener books and culture editor Guy Somerset tries to be brave about e-books. It’s the bookmarks I’ll miss most. At least that’s what I used to think when I was a fervent advocate of the demise of the…
Two issues beyond the 20th anniversary edition of New Zealand Books and two before our 100th issue, we’ve reached another milestone. The determined enthusiasts who founded the journal might well have predicted the first two, and will certainly have hoped…
Road Markings Michael Jackson Rosa Mira Books, $US11.00 (digital), ISBN 9780986469435 One of Buddha’s most satisfying teachings is the simplicity of mindfulness. “When walking, walk; when standing, stand; when sitting, sit; when lying down, lie down.” And, if he…
Chris Else discovers online shopping is no match for the bookshop browse. There are books bought and books borrowed; books stolen and books found; books that are gifts and books that are prizes; books that you read as soon as…
Camille Guy recounts how she went from “four eyes” to “blindie”, and its effect on her reading. The printed word fascinated me always. Sitting on the mat at Waterview Primary School in the early 1950s, I watched infant mistress Mrs…
Hedging digital bets, Donald Kerr
Posted in Comment, ebooks