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What minds make, Nelson Wattie

Beyond Wittgenstein’s Poker: New Light on Popper and Wittgenstein Peter Munz Ashgate Publishing Limited, $62.00, ISBN 0754640159 Working at the interface between literature and science, Gillian Beer recently asked in The Guardian: “How do you have new ideas? Language is

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Posted in Imprints, Review

Reading teeth, Jane Hurley

Music from a Distant Room Stephanie Johnson Vintage, $26.95, ISBN 1869416171 Nola Lane is a dental nurse who loves her job. By day she peers carefully into small mouths, tamps down zinc and mercury into tiny jaws and snips cottonwool

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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

Telling it like it was (perhaps), David Hill

A Life’s Sentences Gordon McLauchlan Penguin, $39.95, ISBN 0143019163 Sorry, I’m a Stranger Here Myself Peter Bland Vintage, $29.95, ISBN 1869416325 Both these books call themselves/are called memoirs. I’ve never liked the word; I find a back-of-hand-to-brow affectation in it.

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Posted in Memoir, Non-fiction, Review

Terminal Motel, Renée

Miles To Go Pauline O’Regan Penguin, $35.00, ISBN 0143019139 When I learned that Pauline O’Regan had written a book on ageing called Miles To Go, I thought damn, it’s bad enough being jolted or jollied by strangers – but a

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Posted in Memoir, Non-fiction

Obituary — Maurice Shadbolt

Maurice Shadbolt (1932-2004) Dear Maurice – We could not have a conversation the last time we met, so a letter will have to do, and, as your superstitions always allowed, you’ll be sure to read this, with more time than

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Posted in Obituaries

Letters – Issue 67

Better than boring  Andrew Mason’s sulphurous response (NZB, December 2004) to my article on academic reviewers – the article that level-headed Dame Fiona Kidman called level-headed – made through the fumes one point I could discern that I can help

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Posted in Letters
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