Blog Archives

Barbarians at the gate? Penny Fenwick

A Shakeup Anyway ‑  Government and the Universities in New Zealand in a Decade of Reform Ruth Butterworth and Nicholas Tarling Auckland University Press, $34.95 Universities are amongst the most enduring of all social institutions ‑ a state of affairs

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Posted in Education, Non-fiction, Review

An old‑fashioned life, David Mackay

Captain James Cook: A Biography Richard Hough Hodder & Stoughton, $54.95 Explorers do not always present easy subjects for biographers. Often the central achievements take up a relatively small portion of their lives and the doggedness and perseverance required for

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Posted in Biography, Non-fiction, Review

Operatically triumphant, Jeanine Graham

Edward Stafford: New Zealand’s First Statesman Edmund Bohan Hazard Press $49.95 Years of exposure to the drama and rhetoric of the performing arts and a professional lifetime of meticulous attention to accuracy and detail have enabled Edmund Bohan to bring

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Posted in Biography, Non-fiction, Review

Still on the margins, Anne Else

Suffrage and Beyond ‑ International Feminist Perspectives Caroline Daley and Melanie Nolan (eds) Auckland University Press, $39.95 The movement for women’s suffrage can be said to have begun at the World Anti‑Slavery Convention held in London in 1840, where American women delegates

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Posted in Gender, History, Non-fiction, Review, Sociology

Better at a distance, Gerry Webb

My History, I think Stevan Eldred‑Grigg Penguin Books, $29.95 “Neither autobiography nor yet fiction, this fascinating document traces the workings inside the mind of a leading writer”, says the blurb. The sad fact is that the workings of this writer’s

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Posted in Autobiography, Non-fiction, Review

Skin and bones, Tom Beard

Skinning a Fish Kevin Ireland Hazard Press, $19.95 The cover illustration ‑ a cold blue etching of a grotesque deep‑sea fish screwed to a ragged knife ‑ is a spare and disturbing image that hints at a hard edge to

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Posted in Literature, Poetry, Review

Unequal contract, Margaret Wilson

The Vision And The Reality: Equal Employment Opportunities in the New Zealand Workplace Janet Sayers and Marianne Tremaine (eds) Dunmore Press, $42.95 For those of us who teach and research in subjects that discuss the practice and theory of equality

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Posted in Gender, Non-fiction, Politics & Law, Review, Sociology

At odds with liberal times, Michael Laws

Catholic Girls Jane Tolerton Penguin, $24.95 Jane Tolerton’s new book is a series of interviews with 17 Catholic-educated women ranging from lawyers and businesswomen to politicians and other entertainers. Tolerton’s premise for these nostalgic reminiscences is that “the Catholic women

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Posted in Non-fiction, Religion, Review, Sociology

It will all happen again, Brian Gaynor

Lost Property: The Crash of ’87…and the aftershock Olly Newland HarperCollins, $19.95 The mid‑1980s ‑ Allan Hawkins and Equiticorp, Fay and Connor slogging it out in Fremantle, Chase Corporation and mirror‑glass buildings, Bruce Judge, share clubs and investment seminars, Bob

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Posted in Economics, History, Non-fiction, Review
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