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The New Zealand Novel 1860-1965
Bread and Butter
Bread and Butter. The years 1910 to 1920 are singularly barren. Satchell, Bathgate, Ferguson, Edith Grossmann, who all published in this decade, are of the older era and have already been discussed. A. G. Hales touched on New Zealanders in his McGlusky war stories. Hubert Church, better known for his verse, wrote a novel Tanks, 1916, recounting the travels of an incognito duke who samples the Trentham races, fishing, Wairakei hot waters, the Sounds, Queens-town, etc., meeting a lot of silly people chatting pointlessly among the scenery. A. A. Grace's The Tale of a Timber Town, 1914, is a loosely built digger story founded on the Maungatapu Mountain murders of 1866. The casual lingo of pub and goldfields gives it still a flicker of life.
The 1920s, however, when the vast effort of World War I was over, are a period of revival and growth. The best known writer of this time is Jane Mander.