Case W4
- Women writers
Robin Hyde. Check to your king: the life history of Charles, Baron de Thierry, King of Nukahiva, Sovereign Chief of New Zealand. Wellington: Reed, 1960.
First published in London in 1936, Robin Hyde’s Check to your king is an interpretive historical novel based on the life of the peculiar French pioneer colonist Baron de Thierry. It was finally republished in New Zealand by Reed in 1960.
The jacket design is by Ron Stenberg (1919-2017), an Auckland-born artist who had a long career as a painter, illustrator and teacher, largely in Scotland where he is better known.
Robin Hyde. Check to your king: the life history of Charles, Baron de Thierry, King of Nukahiva, Sovereign Chief of New Zealand. Wellington: Reed, 1960.
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Jane Mander. The story of a New Zealand river. London: Robert Hale; Christchurch: Whitcombe & Tombs, 1960.
Jane Mander (1877-1949) was a New Zealand novelist and journalist whose first and best-known novel was The story of a New Zealand river. An historical novel, it was first published in London and New York in 1920, and subsequently appeared in numerous editions for a century thereafter. The story of an Englishwoman struggling to adjust to live in an isolated timber mill settlement, the novel was popular in America and Britain, but some New Zealand critics disapproved of its unconventional themes.
Jane Mander. The story of a New Zealand river. London: Robert Hale; Christchurch: Whitcombe & Tombs, 1960.
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Sylvia Ashton-Warner. Greenstone. Christchurch: Whitcombe & Tombs, 1966.
Sylvia Ashton-Warner (1908-84) was a New Zealand educationalist and author whose novels typically centre on strong women characters. Her first and best-known novel Spinster was published in London in 1958 and reflected her Māori school teaching experiences in the North Island. Greenstone was published in Britain and New Zealand and is the story of a large colonial family living on the banks of the Whanganui River. The jacket design is by American graphic artist Paul Davis (1938-).
Patricia Grace. Potiki. Auckland: Viking, 1986.
Potiki, the second novel by prominent Māori fiction writer Patricia Grace (1937-), is the story of a small coastal community threatened by developers. It won the fiction section of the New Zealand Book Awards in 1987.
The cover illustration of this first edition is by Robyn Kahukiwa (1938-) who illustrated a number of Grace’s books including The kuia and the spider (1981).
