Harry Orsman (1928 – 2002) In his fine eulogy at Harry Orsman’s funeral, Stuart Johnston considered the meanings we might take from “character”. He unravelled the word so that it extended far beyond the way we usually use it, and…
Carnival of New Zealand Creatures Lauris Edmond Pemmican Press, $14.95, ISBN 0473073188 I’ll Tell You This Much Vincent O’Sullivan Pemmican Press, $14.95, ISBN 047306345X Avalanche Vivienne Plumb Pemmican Press, $14.95, ISBN 0473067056 Plunge Harry Ricketts Pemmican Press, $14.95, ISBN 0473076306…
Eminent Victorians: great teachers and scholars from Victoria’s first 100 years ed Vincent O’Sullivan Stout Research Centre, Victoria University of Wellington, $24.95, ISBN 0 473 06487 1 As every schoolboy and schoolgirl doesn’t know, a book called Eminent Victorians appeared…
Eyewitness: A Memoir of Europe in the 1930s Geoffrey Cox University of Otago Press, $39.95, ISBN 1 877133 70 1 Sir Geoffrey Cox turns 91 this year, the last of that remarkable roll-call of New Zealanders whose only way out…
Believers to the Bright Coast Vincent O’Sullivan Penguin, $29.95, ISBN 0 14 028027 8 Like such men of letters as C K Stead and Ian Wedde, Vincent O’Sullivan has been fruitfully exploring all the major literary genres – poetry, short stories,…
Never a Soul at Home: New Zealand Literary Nationalism and the 1930s Stuart Murray Victoria University Press, $44.95, ISBN 0 86473 341 0 An Englishman, teaching in Dublin, who takes our most carefully constructed decade, insinuates himself into one of our…
Wrestling with the Angel: a life of Janet Frame Michael King Viking, $49.95, ISBN 0 670 89371 4 Penguin Books knew they were onto what commerce knows as “a good thing” when they took on the publication they now advertise…
Seeing You Asked Vincent O’Sullivan Victoria University Press $19.95 ISBN 0 86473352 6 Seeing You Asked is Vincent O’Sullivan’s tenth volume of new poetry, the first since The Pilate Tapes of 1986. In The Pilate Tapes and before that in…
Ursula Bethell. Collected Poems. [Revised edition] Vincent O‘Sullivan (ed) Victoria University Press $24.95 ISBN 0 86473 307 0 One of the reasons we keep reading good writers – and Bethell is one of the best – is because every time…