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An English Translation of the Voyage de l'Astrolabe in New Zealand waters with an Introductory Essay by Olive Wright

This beautifully produced volume contains a biographical essay on the French navigator Dumont d'Urville (1790-1842) together with a scholarly translation of that part of his diary which was written on board the Astrolabe during her passage through the coastal waters of New Zealand in 1826-27. As regards the biography of Dumont d'Urville, the author has drawn on French sources as well as utilizing the material available in Wellington, material which includes the navigator's own records published by royal command. Many quotations are expertly woven into the fabric of this well-documented essay, and the story, simply told, gives a clear picture of the great Frenchman's struggle to realize his lofty aims.

The rest of the book is a translation of the New Zealand section of the French narrative, which was prepared for publication by d'Urville himself and completed in 1835- Passages from this record have been translated before, but this is the first time that the whole of d'Urville's account of New Zealand, as he found it in 1827, has been offered in the English language. As d'Urville was a master of style, a distinguished scientist, and a man of great learning, much valuable material is now made readily available to students, while the whole story is so intensely interesting that all New Zealanders, young and old, will enjoy reading the book. The translation itself is a great achievement: it is scrupulously accurate and written in clear idiomatic English, which succeeds to a remarkable degree in reproducing the style and flavour of the French original.

The writer, Olive Wright, a Master of Arts of the University of London, added to her linguistic studies several years' work in the Honours History School of the London School of Economics. She has travelled widely in Europe. A student of thr. University of Montpellier and of the Sorbonne, Miss Wright has lived in Paris and Brittany and has an intimate knowledge of many regions of France. From 1918-1946 she was Head Mistress of the Camden School for Girls, a Girls' Public High School of the Frances Mary Buss Foundation, and after enduring the trials of evacuation in wartime faced the task of carrying on in London during the later phases of the blitz. On retiring, she came to New Zealand, where she has continued to pursue with great enthusiasm her many interests. After discovering the Alexander Turnbull Library, she found great delight in exploring its rich collection of French records of early New Zealand. As she became acquainted with d'Urville, she not only realized his personal worth, but also the inherent value of his writings for our country and her studies grew into this book, which is now offered to the public.

D'Urville's penetrating and sympathetic study of the early inhabitants of these islands will be of peculiar interest to anthropologists and historians, while all scientists will read with profit his observations on primitive New Zealand. For students, colleges, schools, and libraries, it will prove an invaluable source of information, a book which they cannot afford to be without, while the general reader will find it full of interest and withal a really beautiful volume that he will be proud to keep on his shelf.