Spark to a Waiting Fuse: James K Baxter’s correspondence with Noel Ginn 1942-1946 ed Paul Millar Victoria University Press, $49.95, ISBN 086473400X I began this book thinking that a shorter one might have been enough for a smallish collection of…
Settler Dreaming Bernadette Hall Victoria University Press, $24.95, ISBN 0864734247 Porcelain Diana Bridge Auckland University Press, $19.95, ISBN 1869402642 The death of Alan Curnow last year seemed to call for some kind of reassessment of our national poetry, and some…
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…
Anno Domini 2000 or Woman’s Destiny Julius Vogel (ed Roger Robinson) Exisle Publishing, $29.95, ISBN 0908988168 “There is no such thing as a load of old codswallop … the codswallop is always freshly made,” or at least it needs to…
Proportional Representation on Trial: The 1999 New Zealand General Election and the Fate of MMP Jack Vowles, Peter Aimer, Jeffrey Karp, Susan Banducci, Raymond Miller & Ann Sullivan Auckland University Press, $39.95, ISBN 1869402650 New Zealand’s voters have been…
Angela: A Wonderful Life Angela D’Audney and Nicky Pellegrino Penguin, $27.95, ISBN 0143018116 In spite of the desperate tabloid-celebrity culture currently fashionable, a New Zealand show-biz biography would seem to be dodgy commercial territory. Biographies of sportsmen: yes. Of politicians:…
Print and Politics: a History of Trade Unions in the New Zealand Printing Industry 1865-1995 Peter Franks Victoria University Press, $49.95, ISBN 0864734158 I once heard a freezing worker talking about his healthy hatred of the boss and another say…
Rugby and Fame, Barry Emslie
The appositely titled The Book of Fame by Lloyd Jones is a triking expression of how much the significance of rugby has changed. Once our fanaticism was a touch bloody-minded. We competed as masters, and our pride was aggressively masculine.…
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