AbstractsLanguage, Literature & Linguistics

Poetry in New Zealand, nearly everyone agrees, came to birth around 1920, or 1930, or 1940; in fact, round about when those who are now the grand old men of New Zealand letters were boys. No doubt future generations will see it as beginning in 1950, or 1960, or 1970. In any case, no attempt will be made in this work to upset such a widely-held belief ??? my researches are unashamedly foetal, a chronicle of the first faint heart-beats, the first weak kicks, and a whole lot of morning-sickness. It is something less than a ???study??? of poetic pre-history; to try to consider New Zealand poetry before 1930 ???in depth??? would be like practising diving in a mangrove swamp. On the other hand, although I have quoted extensively, it is something more than an anthology. Its purpose is to review the course of poetry in this country since it began, so that those who are interested in colonial verse can get some idea of what would have been its ???development??? if it had developed, without having to wade through the four hundred or so volumes in which it is embalmed.