Blog Archives
A critical lamp in a dark world, Helen Watson White
Charles Brasch: Journals 1958-1973 Charles Brasch, selected by Peter Simpson Otago University Press, $60.00, ISBN 9781988531144 “How many existences one leads at once,” wrote Dunedin poet, critic, patron and Landfall editor Charles Brasch in 1958: I am here with LF…
Tagged with: Autumn 2019, Charles Brasch, Helen Watson White, Issue 125, Otago University Press, Peter Simpson
Posted in Non-fiction, Review
Posted in Non-fiction, Review
“Lashings of empathy”, Tina Shaw
From the Ashes Deborah Challinor HarperCollins, $37.00, ISBN 9781460754122 What You Wish For Catherine Robertson Black Swan, $38.00, ISBN 9780143772811 Discovering that From the Ashes is a sequel to Fire, Challinor’s 2006 novel, makes sense of this novel’s title. Fire…
Tagged with: Autumn 2019, Black Swan, Catherine Robertson, Deborah Challinor, HarperCollins, Issue 125
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Poem – C K Stead
Tohunga Crescent Across our street the Allen Curnow house sold and garden-tidied and refurbished, respectably letting as “AirBnB” is home to wild parties, and just once a riot bringing cop cars, a paddy wagon, pepper spray and more than one…
Making it and making it up, C K Stead
Life as a Novel – A Biography of Maurice Shadbolt, Volume I, 1932-1973 Philip Temple David Ling, $45.00, ISBN 9781927305447 Recently, I have been writing an autobiography and consequently hunting out old letters. One I found, written to Kay from…
Tagged with: Autumn 2019, C K Stead, David Ling, Issue 125, Maurice Shadbolt, Philip Temple
Posted in Biography, Non-fiction, Review
Posted in Biography, Non-fiction, Review
Unpleasant truths, Douglas Lloyd Jenkins
Theo Schoon: A Biography Damian Skinner Massey University Press, $60.00, ISBN 9780995100176 Hudson and Halls: The Food of Love Joanne Drayton Otago University Press, $50.00, ISBN 9781988531267 There has long been an uneasiness on the part of local biographers when…
Tagged with: Autumn 2019, Damian Skinner, Douglas Lloyd Jenkins, Issue 125, Theo Schoon
Posted in Art, Biography, Non-fiction, Review, Sociology
Posted in Art, Biography, Non-fiction, Review, Sociology
A singular genius, Andrew Wood
Colours of a Life: The Life and Times of Douglas MacDiarmid Anna Cahill Mary Egan Publishing, $80.00, ISBN 9780473423834 Over the decades, New Zealand has lost a tragic amount of cultural talent overseas for many reasons: the old bashing machine…
Tagged with: Andrew Wood, Anna Cahill, Autumn 2019, Douglas MacDiarmid, Issue 125, Mary Egan Publishing
Posted in Art, Biography, Non-fiction
Posted in Art, Biography, Non-fiction
Private life and public record, Kate Hannah
The Unconventional Career of Dr Muriel Bell Diana Brown Otago University Press, $35.00, ISBN 9781988531304 Perhaps some are surprised that a scientist whose impact on New Zealand’s health, particularly the health of women and children, could have been, up until…
Tagged with: Autumn 2019, Diana Brown, Issue 125, Muriel Bell, Otago University Press
Posted in Biography, Health, Non-fiction, Review
Posted in Biography, Health, Non-fiction, Review
A view of the inner cemeteries, Reuben Johnson
Mind that Child: A Medical Memoir Simon Rowley with Adam Dudding Penguin, $35.00, ISBN 9780143771982 We can Make a Life: A Memoir of Family, Earthquake and Courage Chessie Henry Victoria University Press, $35.00, ISBN 9781776561940 Dr Simon Rowley is a…
The games we play, Owen Mann
Sport and the New Zealanders: A History Greg Ryan and Geoff Watson Auckland University Press, $65.00, ISBN 9781869408831 On Christmas Day last year, many people around the country would have ripped open a well-wrapped gift to discover a sportsperson’s biography…
Tagged with: Auckland University Press, Autumn 2019, Geoff Watson, Greg Ryan, Issue 125
Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sociology, Sport
Posted in Non-fiction, Review, Sociology, Sport
Poem – Primo Levi
Singing … But when we began to sing Our songs, senseless and good, It seemed then that everything Stood as it once had stood. The days were merely days. Seven made a week. Killing we thought was wicked. Of dying…