Available in Ebook

‘What, after all, is the truth of a place that has only just been worked into language?’

From Polynesian Mythology to the Yates’ Garden Guide, from Allen Curnow to Alice Tawhai, from Jessie Mackay to Alison Wong, from Julius Vogel to Albert Wendt, from the letters of Wiremu Te Rangikaheke to the notebooks of Katherine Mansfield – Māori, Pākehā, Pasifika, and Asian New Zealanders have struggled for two and a half centuries to work the English language into some sort of truth about this place. The Auckland University Press Anthology of New Zealand Literature brings together for the first time in one volume this country’s major writing, from the earliest records of exploration and encounter to the globalised, multicultural present.

Editors Jane Stafford and Mark Williams range across novels and stories, poems and plays, letters and diaries, comics and songs to collect the defining stuff of our literary heritage. The contents will delight and provoke: Erewhon and The Heart of the Bush; Man Alone and ‘No Ordinary Sun’; The God Boy and Hicksville; ‘The Gumboot Song’ and The Vintner’s Luck. Through an imaginative selection and illuminating introductions, Stafford and Williams provide new paths into our writing and our country. For students and readers, at home and overseas, the Anthology of New Zealand Literature will be the indispensable introduction for years to come to what’s worth reading and why.

Authors

More about Jane Stafford and Mark Williams 

Extract

Read an extract here

Awards and Nominations

Winner – 2013 Most Beautiful Books Australia & New Zealand Award – The Auckland University Press Anthology of New Zealand Literature, Jane Stafford & Mark Williams, editors

Winner – 2013 PANZ Book Design Award for Best Cover – The Auckland University Press Anthology of New Zealand Literature, Jane Stafford & Mark Williams, editors

Winner – 2013 PANZ Book Design Award for Best Non-Illustrated Book – The Auckland University Press Anthology of New Zealand Literature, Jane Stafford & Mark Williams, editors

Reviews

This landmark publication is the first single-volume, multi-genre anthology of major New Zealand writing, spanning more than 200 years of New Zealand history and incorporating the work of some 200 individual authors… Stafford’s and Williams’s volume is a major editorial achievement and a valuable resource for specialists and students alike. —Michelle Keown, Journal of New Zealand Studies

So cheesy for me to say but beautiful gift for someone who loves literature, for Christmas time as well. – Charlotte Ryan, 95bfm Morning Glory

...on any terms, this landmark publication of nearly 1200 pages covering more than 200 years is an astonishing achievement, full to the brim with selections to savour. – 100 Best Books of 2012, NZ Listener