Blog Archives
An account of trauma, Michael Hulse
Allen Curnow: Collected Poems Elizabeth Caffin and Terry Sturm (eds) Auckland University Press, $60.00, ISBN 9781869408510 Allen Curnow’s poetry is a transcript of trauma. “Morning by morning incorruption / Puts on corruption”: this most fundamental of thoughts, borne in upon…
Tagged with: Allen Curnow, Auckland University Press, Autumn 2018, Elizabeth Caffin, Issue 121, Michael Hulse, Terry Sturm
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
Woven among the lines, Elizabeth Caffin
Mike Doyle: Collected Poems, 1951–2009 Ekstasis Editions, $55.95, ISBN 9781897430637 When I moved to Auckland in 1985, I found the literary world was haunted by ghosts. There was Rex Fairburn and Maurice Duggan and Frank Sargeson and Mike Joseph…
Tagged with: Ekstasis Editions, Elizabeth Caffin, Issue 94, Mike Doyle, Winter 2011
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
“Let us go then, you and I”, Elizabeth Caffin
Elizabeth Caffin recalls first looking into T S Eliot’s poems. Some time in the mid-1950s I gave a morning talk to the third form of a Christchurch secondary school. My subject was the poetry of T S Eliot; I…
Age-old contracts, Elizabeth Caffin
A Year to Learn a Woman Paddy Richardson Penguin Books, $28.00, ISBN 9780143010029 Misconduct Bridget van der Zijpp Victoria University Press, $30.00, ISBN 9780864735751 The Rehearsal Eleanor Catton Victoria University Press, $30.00, ISBN 9780864735812 A woman around 40, now on…
Tagged with: Autumn 2009, Bridget van der Zijpp, Eleanor Catton, Elizabeth Caffin, Issue 85, Paddy Richardson, Penguin Books, Victoria University Press
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Risky enterprises, Elizabeth Caffin
Ripples on the Lake Dawn Rotorangi HarperCollins, $26.99, ISBN 13978869506391 Cutting Caleb Keys Glenn Bowden Penguin Books, $28.00, ISBN 9780143006008 Rocking Horse Road Carl Nixon Vintage, $27.99, ISBN 9781969419073 The Blue Mary McCallum Penguin Books, $28.00, ISBN 9780143007234 In the…
Tagged with: Autumn 2008, Carl Nixon, Dawn Rotorangi, Elizabeth Caffin, Glenn Bowden, HarperCollins, Issue 81, Mary McCallum, Penguin Books, Vintage
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
The old frisson Elizabeth Caffin
Billie’s Kiss Elizabeth Knox Victoria University Press, $29.95, ISBN 0864734263 Having begun in some reasonably recognisable New Zealand locations, Elizabeth Knox, novelist, may, we now know, take off and land almost anywhere. What is striking about all her work is…
Tagged with: Elizabeth Caffin, Elizabeth Knox, Issue 54, Victoria University Press, Winter 2001
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Quiet successes, Elizabeth Caffin
Good at Geography Jane Westaway Penguin, $24.95, ISBN 0 14 029142 3 The Company of a Daughter Paddy Richardson Steele Roberts, $24.95, ISBN 0 95 837128 8 Across the Dreaming Night Judith White Vintage, $24.95, ISBN 1 86941 412 8…
Tagged with: Elizabeth Caffin, Issue 44, Jane Westaway, Judith White, Paddy Richardson, Penguin, Steele Roberts
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
The sadness of the incomplete, Elizabeth Caffin
A Boy and his Uncle Anne Kennedy Picador $24.95 ISBN 0 33036057 4 Leave Before You Go Emily Perkins Picador $24.95 ISBN 0 33037204 1 In the opening pages of both these novels is that journey we all are heir…
Tagged with: Anne Kennedy, Elizabeth Caffin, Emily Perkins, Issue 35, Picador
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Jane Austen’s unlikely sister, Elizabeth Caffin
Cousins Patricia Grace, Penguin, $24.95 We now have the good fortune in New Zealand that a number of fiction writers can be relied on to produce a good book time after time – Jane Frame, Owen Marshall, Maurice Gee, and…
Tagged with: Elizabeth Caffin, Issue 7, Patricia Grace, Penguin, Summer 1992
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review