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The Long White Cloud

There are many historical works on New Zealand, but The Long White Cloud, which Pember Reeves wrote nearly fifty years ago, is still regarded as the best. It owes its reputation to its comprehensive scope, for its author viewed history as the record of the whole life of a people, not merely political and military, but including its economic, social and cultural ideas and activities, and its ethnological and physical background. It is also magnificently readable and holds attention by its clarity, wit, liveliness and gift for characterisation.

Pember Reeves was himself one of the actors in his own story; formerly a barrister and a journalist, he entered the New Zealand Parliament in 1887 and, after holding several ministerial posts, eventually came to London as Agent-General. For eleven years he was Director of the London School of Economics and was intimate with the Fabians of his day. He died in 1932. This fourth edition of his great work has been brought up-to-date by the addition of chapters by Dr. A.J. Harrop covering the history of New Zealand during the last fifty years. The book has also been re-illustrated with some splendid modern photographs of New Zealand landscape.