‘My hand will write what my heart dictates’: The unsettled lives of women in nineteenth-century New Zealand as revealed to sisters, family and friends ed Frances Porter and Charlotte Macdonald with Tui MacDonald Auckland University Press/Bridget Williams Books, $49.95, ISBN…
An Anthology of New Zealand Poetry in English ed Jenny Bornholdt, Gregory O’Brien and Mark Williams Oxford University Press, $49.95, ISBN 0 19 558338 8 “I cannot think that real poets have any competition,” wrote Blake. But we lesser mortals…
Lands for the People? The Highland Clearances and the Colonisation of New Zealand: a Biography of John McKenzie Tom Brooking Otago University Press, $39.95, ISBN 1 877133 21 3 There have been three reformist governments in New Zealand history. The…
Children of the Poor: How poverty could destroy New Zealand’s future Mike Moore Canterbury University Press, $19:95, ISBN 0 908812 67 1 In 1980 the National cabinet withdrew the government subsidy to CORSO, nominally because it had produced a film…
Blowing My Top Kevin Ireland Penguin Books, $24.95, ISBN 0 140 25645 8 The opening of Blowing My Top discovers the hero, Darby Fulljames, in full cry, venting his discontent at his bankruptcy, disgrace and incarceration. Reading it, I couldn’t help…
Ricochet Baby Fiona Kidman Vintage, $29.95, ISBN 1 86941 304 0 Fiona Kidman is today more than ever in command of her craft. Ricochet Baby, her new novel— and first book since the semi-autobiographical volume, Palm Prints (1994) — will…
Salmond: Southern Jurist Alex Frame Victoria University Press, $49.95, ISBN 0 86473 286 4 The name Sir John Salmond will mean little to most New Zealanders. Historians may be familiar with him as an influential Solicitor-General from 1910 to 1920 (though…
An anxious Kiwi psyche, Bill Oliver
An anthology of New Zealand poetry in English My brief is to look at this anthology from a socio-historical point of view. But before a document can be used as historical evidence it is necessary to ask what kind of…
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