Blog Archives

Proclaiming to the barbarians, Philip Temple

The Mediator: A Life of Richard Taylor 1805-1873 J M R Owens Victoria University Press, $39.95, ISBN 0864734646 Richard Taylor was one of the more effective and influential of Church Missionary Society (CMS) workers during that golden age for missionaries,

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Posted in Biography, Non-fiction, Review

Sacred and profane, John Horrocks

The Red Tram C K Stead Auckland University Press, $24.95, ISBN 1869403304 The Merino Princess Bernadette Hall Victoria University Press, $29.95, ISBN 0864734921 Learning to Lie Together Diane Brown Godwit, $22.95, ISBN 1869621093 Trams. For me the tram is part

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Posted in Literature, Poetry

Editorial – Issue 69

Miffed, maltreated and murderous In our last editorial we looked at reviewing from the relatively unimpassioned viewpoint of what’s good for New Zealand writing, reviewers and readers. But what, to misapply Freud, do authors want? The question is nowhere near as

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Moments of magic, Harry Ricketts

Selected Poems Basil Dowling Global Vision, $34.95, ISBN 3950186204 “Magic is what I’m after,” observes Basil Dowling in “The Aim of Art” from his 1973 collection The Unreturning Native and Other Poems. It is the kind of claim made by

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Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review

OM – pride of the south, Sue McCauley

Watch of Gryphons and Other Stories Owen Marshall Vintage, $27.95, ISBN 1869417062 Occasional: 50 Poems Owen Marshall Hazard, $25, ISBN 187727089X In 1979 I reviewed – I think for the New Zealand Listener – a slim book entitled Supper Waltz

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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Poetry, Review, Short stories

Strikes against the head, Chris Laidlaw

Tackling Rugby Myths: Rugby and New Zealand Society 1854-2004 ed Greg Ryan University of Otago Press, $39.95, ISBN 1877276979 It was Voltaire, who, not without a dash of cynicism, declared that all history is but myth that time has rendered

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Posted in History, Non-fiction, Review, Sport

Enduring love, Jane Westaway

Between the Lives: Partners in Art ed Deborah Shepard Auckland University Press, $49.99, ISBN 186940339 The arresting Marti Friedlander photograph on the cover of Deborah Shepard’s Between the Lives shows the late Pat Hanly, painter, and Gil Hanly, photographer, side

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Posted in Art, Biography, Non-fiction, Review

Hereafter, Nicholas Reid

The Best New Zealand Fiction Volume 1 ed Fiona Kidman Vintage, $29.95, ISBN 1869416643 The Keys to Hell Jo Randerson, illustrations by Taika Waititi Victoria University Press, $24.95, ISBN 0864734794 First, a simple bibliographical description. Best New  Zealand Fiction Volume

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Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review, Short stories

Unpick this, Renée

Thrift to Fantasy: Home Textile Crafts of the 1930s-1950s Rosemary McLeod HarperCollins, $59.95, ISBN 1869505093 Rosemary McLeod is an intelligent, witty and acerbic columnist who does us the favour of saying the things we’d like to say out loud, if

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Posted in Art, History, Non-fiction, Review
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