Blog Archives
Volume 10 | Number 4 | Issue 45 | October 2000 Vincent O’Sullivan: Michael King, Wrestling with the Angel: a life of Janet Frame Christopher Harris: “Unflagging efforts” (poem) Editorial Correspondence John O’Connor: Alistair Te Ariki Campbell, Gallipoli &…
Thinking of you I found a note you’d written to me too many years ago. You said Good luck whatever you choose to do and, later, It makes no sense to me when referring to something someone else had…
Gallipoli & Other Poems Alistair Te Ariki Campbell Wai-te-ata Press, $24.95, ISBN 1 877159 08 5 In 1971 I wandered into a Christchurch bookshop and asked for the poems of Ezra “Pond”. I was doing UE at night tech; someone…
The Right Thing C K Stead Auckland University Press, $19.95, ISBN 1 86940 221 9 On the dust jacket of his 1972 collection Crossing the Bar can be read the words: “C K Stead is not a prolific poet; …
Freda Stark: Her Extraordinary Life Dianne Haworth and Diane Miller HarperCollins, $39.95, ISBN 1 86950 352 X The dramatic moment of Freda Stark: Her Extraordinary Life comes at the end of the second chapter when Thelma, Freda’s friend and lover,…
The Dream of Nikau Jam Peter Hawes Vintage, $24.95, ISBN 1 86941 421 7 The Craymore Affair Kevin Ireland Vintage, $24.95, ISBN 1 86941 426 8 One of the great fears among actors is being typecast, bound up in the…
Fragments: New Zealand Social and Cultural History ed Bronwyn Dalley and Bronwyn Labrum Auckland University Press, $39.95, ISBN 1 86940 185 9 Fragments bills itself as a step towards a Brave New World of sophisticated histories of New Zealand life,…
Sport, Society and Culture ed Brad Patterson Stout Research Centre, Victoria University of Wellington, $24.95, ISBN 0 473 06403 0 It is extraordinary, to say the least, that sport and academe in New Zealand have squared off against each…
Annus mirabilis for poetry This issue includes reviews of collections by five of our major poets – Lauris Edmond, Alistair Te Ariki Campbell, C K Stead, Jenny Bornholdt and Andrew Johnston. While this might seem an unusually generous allocation, in…
Shadrach Girl Joy Cowley Puffin, $15.95, ISBN 0 14 130899 0 On my eighth birthday I was given a book from a French friend of my parents. It was beautifully bound in pink, with gold lettering, a French children’s classic…