Blog Archives
Beach, bush and brews, Gavin McLean
A Guide to the New Zealand Seashore Dave Gunson, VikingPacific, $19.95 If you can’t be bothered carrying all your seabird, rock pool fish and native plants books down to the beach with you, this book will be a fair substitute.…
Superwoman/Wonderwoman, Marivee McMath
Superwoman: Where are You? Social Policy and Women’s Experience C Briar, R Munford and M Nash (eds), Dunmore Press, $39.95 Superwoman: Where are You? is a catchy title. Since Superwoman is the female counterpart of Superman, created both after and…
Tagged with: C Briar, Dunmore Press, Dunmore Publishing, Issue 10, M Nash, Marivee McMath, R Munford, Spring 1993
Posted in Gender, Non-fiction, Politics & Law, Review
Posted in Gender, Non-fiction, Politics & Law, Review
Collection of writings a ‘veritable smorgasbord’, Maureen Molloy
The Vote, the Pill and the Demon Drink: A History of Feminist Writing in New Zealand Charlotte Macdonald, Victoria University Press, $49.95 Charlotte Macdonald’s compilation of original New Zealand writings by and about women’s rights is a most welcome addition…
Tagged with: Charlotte Macdonald, Issue 10, Maureen Molloy, Spring 1993, Victoria University Press
Posted in Essays, Gender, History, Non-fiction, Review
Posted in Essays, Gender, History, Non-fiction, Review
He waka kua eke, Juliet Raven
Deep River Talk: Collected Poems Hone Tuwhare, Godwit, $49.95 hbk, $29.95 pbk Hone Tuwhare’s Collected Poems, drawn from eight previous volumes of poetry, spans thirty years of writing. This in itself represents a problem for the reviewer. There is something…
Tagged with: Godwit, Hone Tuwhare, Issue 10, Juliet Raven, Spring 1993
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
‘I have been ill for 200 years’, Jane Stafford
The Collected Letters of Katherine Mansfield: Volume 3, 1919‑1920 Vincent O’Sullivan and Margaret Scott (eds), Clarendon Press, $110.95 It is only in fiction that illness makes people saintly. In real life, invalids are cantankerous, depressive and manipulative. To be close…
Tagged with: Clarendon Press, Issue 10, Jane Stafford, Katherine Mansfield, Margaret Scott, Spring 1993, Vincent O’Sullivan
Posted in Autobiography, Biography, Letters, Literature, Non-fiction, Review
Posted in Autobiography, Biography, Letters, Literature, Non-fiction, Review
Desperate lives, Heidi Van de Veire
The Idles Damien Wilkins, Victoria University Press, $19.95 Damien Wilkins’ first collection of poems strikes me as commentaries on snapshots, arranged in three photo albums. The first section has pictures of a father in ill-fitting togs who (God knows why…
Tagged with: Damien Wilkins, Heidi Van de Veire, Issue 10, Spring 1993, Victoria University Press
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
Transforming the Beehive? Naomi Diachuk and Brenda Cutress
Naomi Diachuk’s and Brenda Cutress’s reviews portray Parliament as an institution that is reluctant to change. Naomi Diachuk Making Policy, Not Tea: Women in Parliament Arthur Baysting, Dyan Campbell and Margaret Dagg (eds), Oxford University Press, $29.95 ‘Walking into…
Letters — Issue 10
Review gives too much away I was grateful I had read Maurice Gee’s Going West before I read Elizabeth Smither’s review. One of the many fine things about the novel was Gee’s skilful withholding of major events, but most of…
Language listening to itself, Peter Crisp
The Drummer Ian Wedde, Auckland University Press, $18.95 The poem is a place where language listens to itself. Often it can be an occasion for acute soundings, where nods and glances tug at every cadence. Poetry today can be edgy…
Tagged with: Auckland University Press, Ian Wedde, Issue 10, Peter Crisp, Spring 1993
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review
Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review