Denis Harold White Ghosts, Yellow Peril: China and New Zealand 1790–1950 by Stevan Eldred-Grigg, with Zeng Dazheng (Otago University Press, Dunedin, 2014), 384 pp., $55 The subject of White Ghosts, Yellow Peril: China and New Zealand 1790–1950 is vast, even daunting, a fable of an elephant and a flea, yet this book succeeds not only […]
Fanny and Fitz
Edmund Bohan Fitz: The colonial adventures of James Edward FitzGerald, by Jenifer Roberts (Otago University Press, 2014), 392 pp., $40 This is a first-rate and welcome biography of one of the most interesting of all New Zealand’s nineteenth century celebrities and his equally fascinating, multi-talented and adored wife, Fanny Erskine Draper. Jenifer Roberts is an […]
A White Collar and a Red Tie
Edmund Bohan White-Collar Radical: Dan Long and the rise of the white-collar unions, by Mark Derby, (Craig Potton Publishing, 2013), 302 pp., $39.99 White-Collar Radical: Dan Long and the rise of the white-collar unions reveals its author Mark Derby writes well, though this is hardly surprising because he is an experienced writer and historian, whose […]
Why we are in Afghanistan
Adam Gifford Other People’s Wars: New Zealand in Afghanistan, Iraq and the War on Terror, by Nicky Hager (Craig Potton Publishing, 2011), 439 pp., $49.99. New Zealanders may feel anger and betrayal at reading Nicky Hager’s latest installment of their country’s secret history. But for those described by the former United States ambassador to […]