Sarah Shieff - Letters of Frank Sargeson

The Letters

This project would have been impossible without the good will of many people. At the hunting and gathering stage, friends, librarians and fellow scholars helped locate the letters from which the final selection was drawn; as the editing progressed, others offered advice and practical support. Finally, the appearance of each and every letter in this volume represents two and sometimes three separate acts of generosity: Frank Sargeson, via his executors, controls the content of the letters; the recipient or their executor controls the physical item, and the archives holding letters also have duty of care. My first debt of gratitude is therefore due to the late Dame Christine Cole Catley and the Sargeson Trust, who, as the guardians of Frank Sargesons estate, honoured me with this responsibility and gave me unrestricted access to his papers. Kevin Ireland often provided information about the who, where and what of the letters I am grateful for his sharp eye and his voluminous memory. Karl Stead allowed me access to his correspondence with Sargeson, helped decipher Franks handwriting, and provided much helpful detail. Together, Karl and Kay Stead advised and encouraged, made items from their personal collection available, and helped reconstruct Franks method for his famed risotto with pipis. Paul Millar generously shared insights and material deriving from his own research relating to James K. Baxter, Charles Brasch and Bill Pearson. Pamela Gordon and the Janet Frame Literary Trust made copies of Franks letters available and offered contextual and biographical advice.

I would also like to thank a number of others who gave me permission to publish letters: John Baxter, Geoff Bertram, Elizabeth Caffin, Alison and Ray Copland, Raewyn Dalziel, Anna and Delia Davin, Father Felix Donnelly, Adam Dudding, Nick Duggan, Margaret Edgcumbe, Murray Edmond, Patrick Evans, Maurice Gee, John Geraets, Rupert and Pia Glover, John Graham, Martin Green, Duff Hart-Davis, David Hill, Alan Horsman, Lawrence Jones, Rachel and Jonathan King, Graeme Lay, John Macalister, Bill Manhire, Vincent OSullivan, Mary Paul, Brigid Sandford Smith, Margaret Scott, Donald Stenhouse, Catherine Styles-McLeod, Ngahuia Te Awekotuku, Peter Wells and Janet Wilson.

Still others pointed to items, made images available, allowed me to read letters under their control, or offered advice, assistance and kindness. They include: Peter Alexander, Ken Arvidson, Chris Bourke, Diana and Nick Bridge, Christopher Burke, Matthew Butt, Giselle Byrnes, Derek and Lynne Challis, Jenny Chamberlain, Jenny and Martin Cole, Megan and Nigel Cook, Max Cryer, Jeny Curnow, Wystan Curnow, William Dart, Rosamunda Droescher, Frances Edmond, Riemke Ensing, Norman Franke, Phyllis Gant, Peter Gibbons, Ray Grover, Linda Hardy, Stephen and Gail Hofmann, Anna Huang, Keri Hulme, Jan Kemp, Nancy Luther, Brigid Magner, Owen Marshall, O.E. Middleton, Gordon McLauchlan, James McNeish, Douglas MacDiarmid, Ann Monteith, John Newton, W.H. Oliver, Ally Palmer, Jock Phillips and the team at Te Ara, David Roberts, Roger Robinson, Alan Roddick, Elizabeth Aitken Rose, Haru Sameshima, Sarah Schindeler, Colleen Singleton, Saffron Solley, Anne and Jeff Stack, Anthony Stones, Jane Strachan, Oliver Strewe, Terry Stringer and Tim McWhannell, Studio LaGonda, Terry Sturm, Alan Thornton, Michael Whittaker, Tanya Tinter, Denys Trussell, Mark Williams and Ian Witten. My colleagues at the University of Waikato supported the research in various practical and personal ways, including granting two vital periods of study leave (2008 and 2009), a research grant (20082009), and a summer research scholarship (20092010). Special thanks to Profs Roy Crawford, Dan Zirker and Doug Sutton, and to Alexandra Barratt, Tracy Bowell, Lex Chalmers, Athena Chambers, Delwyn Dellow, William Farrimond, Carolyn Henson, Craig Hight, Mark Houlahan, Katie Johnson, Anne McKim, Kirstine Moffat, John Perrone, Jan Pilditch and Alistair Swale.

Many libraries made copies of the letters available from their collections, and gave permission for them to be included here. Special thanks to those who not only offered practical help and advice, but who handled large requests efficiently and with unfailing courtesy: Susan Halpert and Leslie A. Morris of the Houghton Library, Harvard University; Richard Workman and Jean Cannon of the Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin; John Delaney, AnnaLee Pauls, Ben Primer and Don C. Skemer of the Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library; Andrew Gray of Durham University Library Heritage Collection, Palace Green Library; Iain Sharp of Sir George Grey Special Collections, Auckland City Libraries; Kirsty Webb of Takapuna Library; Stephen Innes of Special Collections, University of Auckland Library; Jeff Palmer of University of Canterbury Library; Sharon Dell, Anna Blackman and Natalie Poland of the Hocken Collections, University of Otago Library; and David Colquhoun, Catherine Bisley, Gillian Headifen, Alison Jones, Merryn McAulay, John Sullivan and Amy Watling of the Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington. The Turnbull Library holds Sargesons literary papers, and the papers of many of his key correspondents. Much of the research for the book was therefore conducted in the Turnbulls reading room, directly under Toss Woollastons portrait of Michael King. In many ways Michael has been the projects guiding spirit. His biography of Sargeson has been a constant reference throughout the life of this project.

Thanks also to the staff at Random House, especially to my publisher Harriet Allan for her early and sustaining faith in the book, and to Sue Lewis, Carla Sy and Alex Bishop.

Finally, I would like to thank my family, who have supported this journey Jen Shieff and Heather Macdonald, Kate Bukowski, Rob Shieff and Fiona Moir, Maddy, Harry and Ben Shieff, Judith Macdonald, Octavia Calder-Dawe, Dorothy and Ian Calder, and my parents June and Bill Shieff. I reserve my last word of gratitude for my husband Alex Calder, Franks best reader and my own best companion.

Although I never met Frank Sargeson, our paths did cross in a way. When I was a young clarinetist, interested in any sort of gig, I received an invitation to play the slow movement of the Mozart concerto at a famous writers funeral. It was early 1982. Sun streamed through the high windows of the Maclaurin Chapel. Tributes flowed; friends read from his work; an old mate kept up a slightly sozzled commentary from the front row. There was the ostentatious casket which, I learned much later, had been provided by a well-meaning funeral director in a misplaced gesture of propriety and, more fittingly, a little table with a bowl of red peppers from his garden, and his favourite cap.

I came to know Sargeson on the page a few years later, when, as a graduate student of English, I was taught by his old friends Karl Stead and Bill Pearson. Sargesons spare prose and laconic narrators repelled and fascinated me; the assurance that he had been a cat lover did nothing to dispel the terminal horror of Sale Day. I now find myself teaching Sargesons stories to students more alive to their sly winks and gender ambiguities than I ever was. And as the co-ordinator of the University of Waikatos Frank Sargeson Memorial Lecture, held annually to commemorate the legacy of Hamiltons most famous literary export, Ive since come to meet others in the Sargeson circle his heir and literary executor Christine Cole Catley; Kevin Ireland, who lived for a while in the army hut behind Franks bach at 14 Esmonde Road; Lawrence Jones, who, as a young academic, reviewed Sargesons novel