Blog Archives

Making friends with Mansfield, Ashlee Nelson

Mansfield and Me: A Graphic Memoir
Sarah Laing
Victoria University Press, $35.00,
ISBN 9781776560691

The graphic form is in some ways a more complex undertaking than straightforward prose, for a graphic text must concern itself not only with the words of the narrative, but the art. Even more than this, the words and the art in a good graphic work should add to the meaning of the text by the way the two work skilfully together. In Mansfield and Me: A Graphic Memoir, both the words and the art belong to Sarah Laing. Laing is a writer, a cartoonist, and a graphic designer by trade and she has applied her skills to each in a uniquely beautiful way. Nor is this the only synthesis accomplished by the book: Mansfield and Me is both a biography, of sorts, of Mansfield, and an autobiographical narrative.

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , , ,
Posted in Memoir, Non-fiction, Review

Curiosa and curiosa, Dale Williams

The Owl That Fell from the Sky: Stories of a Museum Curator  Brian Gill Awa Press, $35.00, ISBN 9781877551130 Stag Spooner: Wild Man from the Bush  Chris Maclean  Craig Potton Publishing, $50.00,  ISBN 9781877517686 The Indescribable Beauty: Letters Home to

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Art, Fiction, History, Letters, Literature, Memoir, Non-fiction, Review

Life in the bush, by the bay, Dougal McNeill

Speaking Frankly: The Frank Sargeson Memorial Lectures 2003-2010 Sarah Shieff (ed) Cape Catley, $31.99, ISBN 9781877340277   Celebrating Katherine Mansfield: A Centenary Volume of Essays Gerri Kimber and Janet Wilson (eds) Palgrave Macmillan, $162.00, ISBN 9780230277731   It was a

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Essays, Lecture, Literature, Non-fiction, Review

Careful sympathy, Roger Robinson

Katherine Mansfield: The Story-teller Kathleen Jones Viking, $65.00, ISBN 9780670074358   Let’s hear Katherine Mansfield speak first: The cleanliness of Switzerland! Darling, it is frightening. The chastity of my lily-white bed! The waxy-fine floors! The huge bouquet of white lilac,

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , , ,
Posted in Biography, Literature, Non-fiction, Review

Murry’s Mansfield, Mark Williams

Katherine Mansfield’s Short Stories Vintage, $35.00, ISBN 9781869419837 The death of an author might seem to close the book, establishing a final and complete version of the work. In the case of Katherine Mansfield this has been spectacularly not the

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , ,
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review, Short stories

Pa-men and boys, Linley Boniface

Katherine Mansfield’s Men ed Charles Ferrall and Jane Stafford Katherine Mansfield Birthplace Society in association with Steele Roberts, $29.95, ISBN 187733846X “The idea of sitting and waiting for a husband is absolutely revolting and it really is the attitude of

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , , , , ,
Posted in Biography, Non-fiction, Review

Mansfield parked, Lloyd Jones

Mansfield: A Novel C K Stead Vintage, $26.95, ISBN 1843431769 The short life of Katherine Mansfield has been well picked over. We have the biographies, the critical studies, her own journals and letters. Hardly a year goes by without the

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , , ,
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

To be a pilgrim, Susan Paris

As Fair as New Zealand to Me: New Zealand Writers in Katherine Mansfield’s Menton Victoria University Press, $24.95, ISBN 0864733984 The French Riviera … not the most obvious place to spend time concentrating on your writing. But because of Mansfield’s brief

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , , ,
Posted in Essays, Literature, Non-fiction, Review

Refreshing the text, Jan Cronin

Her Side of the Story: Readings of Mander, Mansfield, & Hyde Mary Paul Otago University Press, $39.95, ISBN 1 877133 71 X,   One of the many problems of Mary Paul’s Her Side of the Story: Readings of Mander, Mansfield,

See more ›

Tagged with: , , , , , , ,
Posted in Gender, Literature, Review
Search the archive
Search by category