Signposts - a blog about Te Ara the Encyclopedia of New Zealand

The city: civilisation or cesspool?

I know that many of you, our dear readers, are literary types; and when I was asked earlier today about how cities are represented in New Zealand literature, I thought immediately of you.

Ben – one of our theme editors for the Economy and the City theme, which we’re working on at the moment – is writing an entry about how the city has been represented in New Zealand art. He’s got the visual art and movies sussed, but would like some help with literature.

I’ve been having a bit of a think, and have some ideas of my own, but this seems like a good job for the online community. So:

What are some New Zealand novels, poems or stories that feature cities?

How was the city represented? Positive or negative, freeing or caging, civilised or cesspool?

Also, if you know of any studies of cities in New Zealand literature, we’d love to know about them too.

Thanks!

My grandfather Toivo as a young man (click for full image)

Toivo Pärssinen (1911–2007), my Finnish grandfather, fought in two little-known wars (in New Zealand at least) within the Second World War – the Winter War (1939–1940) and the Continuation War (1941–1944). I am named after Marshal Carl Gustav Mannerheim, who led the Finnish forces (he had a great moustache). Russia was the ’sleeping bear’ and whoever was Russia’s enemy was Finland’s ally. This proved to be Germany, once Hitler broke the non-agression pact with Russia in 1941.

During the wars Toivo (which means ‘hope’ in Finnish) was a cornet and later cavalry captain. In the summer of 1945, at the end of the fighting, my grandmother Saima was pregnant and had two children under six. The army flipped a coin. He lost, so he was sent to clear mines in Lapland – departing SS troops had razed the town of Rovaniemi and laid mines. Toivo’s eyebrows got burnt when his best friend stood on a mine. They picked his remains out of the trees.

Toivo's cavalry funeral in 2007 (click for full image)

Toivo did not talk much about the war, but he had a small map on his bedside wall of a horseshoe-shaped lake where he grew up in Karelia. At the end of the war Russia took a large chunk of eastern Finland as war reparations. The Finnish army burnt the Karelian farmhouses as they withdrew. By war’s end Toivo was something of a pacifist but, as he said, ‘if you don’t shoot them they’ll shoot you’. He was pensioned in 1959 and enjoyed a long retirement. If the Finns hadn’t resisted the Soviet invasion they would have ended up like Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – behind the Iron Curtain. Finland’s war experience is chronicled in the novel The unknown soldier by Vaino Linna, which has been translated into English. The book is anti-war.

My New Zealand grandfather, Frank Walrond, ran a stamp shop in Auckland’s Queen Street. During the Second World War he trained soldiers before they went overseas, so he saw no active service. Technically, Frank and Toivo were enemies at times and allies at others. The war was messy and complicated – there were all sorts of dirty little wars, land grabs and attempts to settle old scores. Toivo’s friend died from a German landmine and many of his brothers-in-arms, and his brother in-law, died by Russian fire.

A vodka bottle carved by my great uncle in the trenches (click for full image)

So, on New Zealand and Australia’s day of remembrance, ANZAC Day, I thought of Toivo and my great-uncles who were wounded, and I remembered Saima’s only brother, who died fighting for German forces against the Russians in ‘White Russia’ (Belarus). His last word was ‘aiti’ (mother). A small corner of a Belarusian field is forever Finnish.

The Settled Landscape is the fourth major release from Te Ara, the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. The 97 entries tell of the transformation of New Zealand’s landscape, the farming of animals and crops, and every aspect of rural life – from beekeeping and shearing to country schooling and rural language. The entries have been gathered into eight sections.

Animal Farming
The farming of beef and dairy cows, sheep, deer, pigs, poultry, goats and exotic animals.

Changing the Landscape
How the countryside was transformed by fire, fencing, irrigation and drainage, soil erosion and the introduction of new pastures and new technology.

Claiming the Land
First Māori and then Pākehā named the land, mapped it and asserted ownership over it.

Country Life
A distinctive way of life emerged in rural New Zealand – unusual buildings and types of work, ways of speaking, forms of clothing, and its own recreations from duck shooting to rodeo.

Crops
The cultivation of wheat and grains, apples and pears, citrus, kiwifruit, berries and other fruit, mushrooms, kūmara, wine, hops, tobacco and hemp.

Farming Support Services
Farming is made possible by a range of other people – vets, drovers, topdressers, researchers, government officials and stock and station agents.

Introduced Plants and Animals
Some new plants and animals have proved valuable – horses, dogs, earthworms, fish for recreation and pets to enjoy. But rabbits, possums, rats, insects, weeds and some birds have become pests.

Trees and Gardens
Exotic trees are grown in commercial forests, as shelter on farms and to adorn gardens, both public and private.

Some highlights from The Settled Landscape

The Christmas carol fence

Sir George Grey's zebras

Farmers conquer Canterbury

Types of horse carriage

The whakapapa of apples

Prize-winning steak

Fred Dagg's farm

The farm dogs' Swanndris

Godfrey Bowen's underwear

A koroua with kūmara

Cuban Wellington

Icons of country towns

Defence against magpies

How to make moccasins

Shrek the sheep

Te Ara is now working hard on the fifth major release, The Economy and the City. This tells the story of how people made a living – from early Māori trade and colonial work such as domestic service, to today’s creative industries. It will also cover the development of city life in New Zealand from street life to department stores. Malcolm McKinnon and Ben Schrader are the theme editors for this section.

You'll see lots of these in our next theme – The Settled Landscape

In just over a week’s time we will go live with our next theme, The Settled Landscape. There’ll be 97 sparkling new entries, covering the introduction of exotic plants and animals to New Zealand, the story of farming, and the characteristics of country life.

So if you’re keen to know about magpies, hedgehogs and bees, or the different kinds of sheep breeds, or the story of country shows, then The Settled Landscape will provide the answers.

In the build up to the theme release, we thought we’d give you an insight into the process of how we get there.

It all begins with the appointment of a Theme Editor – someone who knows about the subjects we are dealing with and, more importantly, knows the people who know about the subjects. We call on the best and the brightest around the country. Just this week we began advertising for an editor for the theme after next – on Social Connections, which will include things like families and voluntary groups.

Allan Gillingham, take a bow

Our Theme Editor for The Settled Landscape has been Allan Gillingham. Born on a dairy farm on the West Coast, Allan had a long career as a farm manager, a researcher with AgResearch, and an academic at Massey University.

Allan’s role began when he sat down with me to draw up a list of entries that we wanted to include in The Settled Landscape. We then called together an advisory committee of people who knew about different aspects of farming and country life, and we ran the list past them. Following their feedback, we cut out some entries, added others, combined a few, and then settled on word lengths for each.

Then Allan and myself brainstormed possible writers for each entry. About half were written by our team of in-house writers, and the other half by journalists, and people in universities and Crown research institutes throughout the country.

As the entries come in the Theme Editor has to look at them closely, decide whether they are fair and accurate, and how they need to be revised to make them work well on the web. Then we sit around a table to choose images or film clips, and the Theme Editor is there to give suggestions and advice. Every diagram or map that our designers draw goes past the Theme Editor for approval, and they often have to answer curly questions fired at them by the editors.

When the entries go up on the web, the Theme Editor must give them all a close check. And when the theme is finally launched, the Theme Editor must go out and sell it, and respond to the many congratulations – and the very few complaints – that flow in.

It’s a great job, but a demanding one. So thank you Allan – you have done it brilliantly, and your humorous presence around the table has been a delight. On the 24th of November, when The Settled Landscape goes live, I hope you take a well-deserved bow.

James Hector in his younger days

Congratulations to Simon Nathan, geologist, former Theme Editor for Te Ara (Earth, Sea and Sky and The Bush), writer of our upcoming entry on the West Coast, and one of our regular bloggers.

Simon has just been announced as the recipient of the inaugural Copyright Licensing Ltd/New Zealand Society of Authors Stout Grant toward a biography of James Hector. Simon introduced us to über-influential and wide-ranging James Hector back in March, in his blog post to mark Hector Day.

Explorer, geologist and natural scientist James Hector founded several of the most important scientific institutions in New Zealand: the Colonial Museum (now Te Papa), the New Zealand Institute (now the Royal Society of New Zealand) and the Geological Survey (now GNS Science). Mountains, dolphins and beaked whales have been named after him.

It’s surprising a biography hasn’t yet been written about someone who has been so significant in New Zealand’s history (I’ve heard rumours this is because his handwriting was so appalling that no-one can decipher it), but Simon is now going to remedy this. He was been well-prepared by writing a biography of fellow-geologist Harold Wellman. All the very best for this mammoth task!