Blog Archives

Poem – Janet Charman

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

snowing down south warm breath breathed out of our bodies into the overnight air and condensed to an ice crust on the glass with a sodden mitten tip push plates of glitter lace across the surface to make an…

Tagged with: Issue 50, Janet Charman, October 2001
Posted in Poem

Editorial – Issue 50

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

No, not sour grapes People will always bitch about literary awards, and literary awards will always seem inherently unfair. This year’s Montana New Zealand Book Awards will have thrown up their share of sniping, backbiting and dis-appointed egos. Some…

Tagged with: Bill Sewell, Harry Ricketts, Issue 50, October 2001
Posted in Editorial

Controlled randomness, Kai Jensen

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

Shebang: Collected Poems 1980-2000 David Howard Steele Roberts, $24.95, ISBN 1877228591 I associate volumes of Collected Poems with poetic fame – long sequence of small books, most now out of print, requiring a full collection to satisfy the demands of…

Tagged with: David Howard, Issue 50, Kai Jensen, October 2001, Steele Roberts
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review

Tough grace, Simone Drichel

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

Dogside Story Patricia Grace Penguin, $34.95, ISBN 0141004193 In her long career as a writer of both novels and short fiction, Patricia Grace has shown remarkable consistency in her publishing pattern: invariably, the publication of a collection of short stories…

Tagged with: Issue 50, October 2001, Patricia Grace, Penguin, Simone Drichel
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review

KM’d & KO’d, Alison Gray

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

Recollecting Mansfield Margaret Scott Godwit, $29.95, ISBN 1869620763 It is hard to know whether Katherine Mansfield would have been delighted, amazed or appalled at the industry that has evolved since her death, at the academic careers she has sustained, at…

Tagged with: Alison Gray, Godwit, Issue 50, Margaret Scott, October 2001
Posted in Autobiography, Non-fiction, Review

Letters – Issue 50

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

Cock of the walk Heather Murray’s review of Curnow’s The Bells of St. Babel’s (in your August 2001 issue) is a kind of negative tribute to Curnow’s pre-eminent position on the New Zealand literary scene. How many poets in their…

Tagged with: Issue 50, October 2001
Posted in Letters

Poem – David Howard

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

Now here Family snaps in leatherette albums prove “nothing lasts forever” (thanks Mum) as shadows crawl on their stomachs, the sun sinks in the West you never won. Looming into the tedium waiters understand the way nostrils understand incense,…

Tagged with: David Howard, Issue 50, October 2001
Posted in Poem

Through unfamiliar waters, Chris Maclean

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

Coasting: The Sea Lion and the Lark Neville Peat Longacre Press, $29.95, ISBN 1877135577 Two centuries ago, sealers and whalers came to New Zealand to hunt marine mammals for their oil and skins. Millions were slaughtered, most of them on…

Tagged with: Chris Maclean, Issue 50, Longacre Press, Neville Peat, October 2001
Posted in Natural History, Non-fiction, Review

Nose in a book, Patricia Grace

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

Recently, when I called in to see my brother, we looked through a box of books and other items that were all in some way associated with our father. My father grew up in a small community where I often…

Tagged with: Issue 50, October 2001, Patricia Grace
Posted in Imprints

Hard Knox, Robert Onopa

Posted on October 1, 2001 by NZ Books

Black Oxen Elizabeth Knox Victoria University Press, $29.95, ISBN 0864734093 From the first paragraph of Elizabeth Knox’s previous novel, Vintner’s Luck, the reader enters as complete and rich an alternative world as exists in contemporary fiction. It is a world…

Tagged with: Elizabeth Knox, Issue 50, October 2001, Robert Onopa, Victoria University Press
Posted in Fiction, Literature, Review