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CITY: Plimmerton
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COUNTRY: New Zealand
NATIONALITY: New Zealander
LAST VOLUME: SATA 291
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PERSONAL
Born March 9, 1931, in Waharoa, New Zealand; died September 27, 2019; son of Owen Liberty and Linda Lasenby; married, 1963; wife’s name Elizabeth (died 1969); children: Rebecca, Anne, Jeremy.
EDUCATION:Attended Auckland University, 1950-51.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Worked variously as a deer culler, possum trapper, and teacher, c. 1950-68; New Zealand Department of Education, Wellington, editor of School Journal, 1969-75; Wellington Teachers’ College, Wellington, senior lecturer in English, 1975-87; full-time writer, beginning 1987.
AWARDS:Esther Glen Award, New Zealand Library Association, 1989, for The Mangrove Summer; Sargeson fellowship, 1991; Victoria University of Wellington writing fellowship, 1993; Dunedin College of Education writing fellowship, 1995; New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards honour award, 1998, for Because We Were the Travellers, junior fiction award, 1999, for The Shaman and the Droll, 2001, for The Lies of Harry Wakatipu, and 2005, for Aunt Effie and the Island That Sank, senior fiction award, 1999, for Taur; Jack Lasenby Award established by Wellington Children’s Book Association, 2002; Margaret Mahy Award, New Zealand Children’s Literature Foundation, 2003; New Zealand Post Book Award Junior Fiction Award, 2004; Prime Minister’s Award for Literary Achievement for Fiction, 2014.
WRITINGS
Also author of Power, Caveman Press. Stories included in anthologies Great New Zealand Animal Stories, Golden Press (Auckland, NZ), 1974; Favorite New Zealand Animal Stories, Golden Press, 1996; and Solve This: A Collection of Puzzling Stories, Shortland (Auckland, New Zealand), 2000; author of the novella Grandad’s Wheelies, 2016. Contributor of poems, stories, plays, and articles to numerous magazines and journals.
SIDELIGHTS
Jack Lasenby draws heavily on the landscape of his native New Zealand for his children’s books, and he sets his stories for children and young adults in rural towns as well as amid mountains, beaches, and swamps. Universal themes that run through Lasenby’s young-adult novels, such as The Conjuror, as well as the novels in the “Travellers” quartet, include group dynamics, political rule, and the quest for a better life. His works for younger readers include the much-anthologized Charlie, the Cheeky Kea , as well as his award-winning stories about Harry Wakatipu, a talking horse whose greatest effort is expended on avoiding work, and the tall tales recounted in such books as Uncle Trev’s Teeth, and Other Stories and Uncle Trev and the Great South Island Plan. Lasenby’s younger fans can also follow the incorrigible Aunt Effie and her twenty-six nephews and nieces on their globe-trotting adventures in humorous books such as Aunt Effie and the Island That Sank and Aunt Effie’s Ark. Praising the title character’s first literary appearance in Aunt Effie, Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy contributor Lori Atkins Goodson wrote that Lasenby’s “lively and humorous” picture book makes a clear promise: that “readers can expect to be taken along on many more humorous excursions in books to come.”
Sexual misconduct is the focus of The Lake, one of Lasenby’s early novels for young adults. The book finds Ruth facing tragedy at age ten, when her father dies. Three years later, her mother remarries, and now Ruth must face a new emotional challenge when she becomes victimized by her sexually abusive stepfather. Hoping to escape, she flees to a place of comfort: the lake cabin where her family had spent holidays prior to her father’s death. After two years in the wilderness, she returns home to confront her stepfather and protect her younger sister. The book includes other instances of incest and sexual assault, most notably in the character of Tommy, a man whose charity toward Ruth during her stay at the lake serves as an atonement for his abuse of his own daughter. In Twentieth-Century Children’s Writers, Diane Hebley observed that in The Lake “Lasenby lovingly evokes the beauty, majesty, and danger of Ruth’s environment, which contributes to her growth in her struggle through grief and for survival.”
Also geared for young adults, The Mangrove Summer is set during World War II. Pearl Harbor has been attacked and New Zealanders, faced with blackouts and fuel rationing, now fear an imminent Japanese invasion. George’s family has moved to their isolated beach house in hopes of escaping harm at the hands of Japanese soldiers, and the six children—ranging in age from seven to adolescence—harbor doubts about their parents’ ability to protect them. Together with George, they escape to the mangrove swamps, where they feel sure no one can find them. Noting that the deteriorating group dynamics that play out in Lasenby’s novel are similar to those in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, Hebley added that in the case of The Mangrove Summer the conclusion is less brutal: all power struggles among the children cease in the face of tragedy.
In The Conjuror Lasenby again focuses on the problems of totalitarian rule. Existing within a harsh, volcanic landscape, a female-dominated futuristic society has lost most racial distinctions and now determines class designations through eye color. With the help of her Black Sisters, the Conjuror rules this kingdom using cruelty, drama, and superstition. Lasenby’s hero, Johnny, secretly educates himself by reading books, and then convinces the next Conjuror-elect to escape with him.
In contrast to The Conjuror, Because We Were the Travellers, the first volume in Lasenby’s “Travellers” science-fiction novel quartet, takes place in a primitive land called Whykatto. As the novel opens, a boy named Ish is traveling with an elderly woman, as both have been banished from their tribe and now must search for a safe haven. Taur finds Ish traveling south, fleeing the violent Salt Men while joining up with a mute named Taur, the Bull Man. While continuing to dodge threats to his existence, Ish finds himself in the land of the Great White Bear in The Shaman and the Droll . There, a meeting with the Bear Man and the wise Shaman reveal the key to harnessing human potential as well as give him the ability to use superstition and the tenacity of the human spirit for his own ends. The quartet closes with Kalik , wherein Ish comes in contact with the primitive Headland people, as well as with its charismatic leader, Lutha, and Lutha’s lieutenant, Kalik. Although Ish knows he can flee this brutal land, his responsibility for a group of frightened children held captive by the Headlanders forces him to confront the menace that has haunted him.
In 2012 Lasenby published the novel The Haystack. Maggie was raised by her widower father in the small New Zealand town of Waharoa in the depression years. Told from young Maggie’s perception, she shows that the slow-moving pace of life in their small town is just right and that most of the other residents play a role in her upbringing and wellbeing. A contributor reviewing the novel in the Tararua District Library blog pointed out that “Maggie is a character you catch yourself thinking about when not reading the book.”
Lasenby also published the novel Calling the Gods in 2012. Teenager Selene is banished from her village in an alternative, futuristic world. Undercover, she returns home to get her younger brothers and, through flashbacks, recalls events that led to her current situation. Writing in the Reader blog, Aleisha Cotterill commented that “this book had a great storyline, but it just didn’t pull it off.”
Uncle Trev and His Whistling Bull is the second novel in the “Uncle Trev” series. The young boy narrator introduces the excitement in his life when his Uncle Trev comes to the farm. Uncle Trev talks about his whistling bull named Hubert, albeit much to the disdain of the boy’s mother.
In a review in the London Telegraph, Martin Chilton noted that “Uncle Trev’s tales pepper the story and the humour is wonderfully daft.” However, Chilton cautioned: “My only worry about recommending such a charming story is that I wonder how easily the story will translate to young British children.” Still, Chilton called the novel “fun.”
Lasenby once explained: “I only regret that circumstances prevented me from becoming a full-time writer earlier. I enjoyed much of the work I did in my various jobs, but writing was always my aim. Much of my material to date has been drawn from direct experience. I choose to write for children because much of the best prose is being written for them: for example, by Cynthia Voigt, Philippa Pearce, and Margaret Mahy. I hope it’s not too wild an ambition to be of their company. It seems to me that there are few authors for adults who share their competence.”
BIOCRIT
BOOKS
Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature, Oxford University Press (Auckland, New Zealand), 1998.
Twentieth-Century Children’s Writers, 4th edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1995.
PERIODICALS
Horn Book, January 1, 1990, Edith R. Twitchell, review of The Mangrove Summer, p. 64.
Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, May 1, 2003, Lori Atkins Goodson, review of Aunt Effie, p. 699.
Magpies, March, 1997, review of The Battle of Pook Island, p. 7; May, 1997, review of Because We Were Travellers, p. 6; March, 1998, review of Uncle Trev’s Teeth, and Other Stories, p. 8; November, 1998, review of Taur, p. 37; July, 2000, review of The Lies of Harry Wakatipu, p. 7; March, 2002, review of Kalik, p. 39; November, 2002, review of Aunt Effie, p. 7; May, 2003, review of Harry Wakatipu Comes the Mong, p. 7; November, 2003, review of Aunt Effie’s Ark, p. 7; November, 2004, Frances Plumpton, review of Aunt Effie and the Island That Sank, p. 7; September, 2005, Bill Nagelkerke, review of Mr Bluenose, p. 6.
New Zealand Listener, April 16, 2005, Margaret Mahy, “The World of Jack Lasenby.”
Telegraph (London, England), April 24, 2012, Martin Chilton, review of Uncle Trev and His Whistling Bull.
Voice of Youth Advocates, February 1, 1990, review of The Lake, p. 344; April 1, 1990, review of The Mangrove Summer, p. 31.
ONLINE
Reader, https://booksellersnz.wordpress.com/ (April 18, 2012), review of Calling the Gods.
Read NZ, https://www.read-nz.org/ (November 19, 2019), author profile.
Tararua District Library (NZ): Te Whare Pukapuka o Tararua, https://tararualibrary.wordpress.com/ (April 13, 2011), review of The Haystack.
Wellington Writers Walk, http://www.wellingtonwriterswalk.co.nz/ (November 19, 2019), author profile.
OBITUARIES
RNZ, https://www.rnz.co.nz/ (September 29, 2019), “Author Jack Lasenby Remembered as Master Storyteller.”
Stuff, https://www.stuff.co.nz/ (September 28, 2019), Glenn McConnell, “Award Winning Children’s Author Jack Lasenby Has Died;” (October 5, 2019), Rob Mitchell, “Jack Lasenby, the Man Who Gave a Generation of Kiwis a Greater Voice.”
Jack Lasenby
New Zealand (1931 - 2019)
Jack Lasenby was one of New Zealand's most important children's book authors. His novels and short stories earned numerous honours, including key awards and fellowships. After publishing his first novel, The Lake, he wrote dozens of books for children and young adults. His writing is characterised by a portrayal of childhood as full of hard lessons, adventure and the search for self determination.
Genres: Children's Fiction, Young Adult Fantasy, Young Adult Fiction
Series
Seddon Street Gang
Dead Man's Head (1994)
The Waterfall (1995)
The Battle of Pook Island (1996)
Travellers
1. Because We Were the Travellers (1997)
2. Taur (1998)
3. The Shaman and the Droll (1999)
4. Kalik (2001)
Uncle Trev
Uncle Trev's Teeth (1997)
Uncle Trev and His Whistling Bull (2012)
Aunt Effie
Aunt Effie (2002)
Aunt Effie's Ark (2003)
Aunt Effie and the Island That Sank (2004)
Aunt Effie and Mrs Grizzle (2008)
Novels
The Lake (1988)
The Mangrove Summer (1989)
Charlie the Cheeky Kea (1993)
The Conjuror (1993)
Harry Wakatipu (1993)
The Lies of Harry Wakatipu (2000)
Old Drumble (2008)
Calling The Gods (2012)
The Haystack (2012)
Novellas
Grandad's Wheelies (2016)
Anthologies edited
Favourite Animal Stories New Zealand (1996)
Non fiction
What Makes a Teacher (2004)
Jack Lasenby
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Jack Lasenby
Born
John Millen Lasenby
9 March 1931
Waharoa, New Zealand
Died
27 September 2019 (aged 88)
Occupation
Writer
John Millen Lasenby (9 March 1931 – 27 September 2019), commonly known as Jack Lasenby, was a New Zealand writer. He wrote over 30 books for children and young adults, many of which were shortlisted for or won prizes. He was also the recipient of numerous awards including the Margaret Mahy Medal and Lecture Award in 2003 and the Prime Minister's Award for Literary Achievement for Fiction in 2014.
Contents
1
Biography
2
Awards and prizes
3
Bibliography
4
External links
5
References
Biography[edit]
Quotation from The Conjuror by Jack Lasenby, Wellington Writers Walk, Wellington, New Zealand
Born on 9 March 1931 in Waharoa,[1] a small farming community in the Waikato, Lasenby was the son of Linda Lasenby (née Bryce) and Owen Liberty Lasenby.[2] He attended Waharoa Primary School and went on to Matamata Intermediate and Matamata College from 1943 to 1949.[3]
From 1950 to 1952, he studied at Auckland University College, where he first met Margaret Mahy, who was also to become a notable New Zealand children's writer. He later described her as "one of the three most intelligent people I've known, a dear friend, and a continual source of laughter, and imaginative wonder".[3] Mahy, in turn, described him as "perhaps the most innately New Zealand writer of all New Zealand writers for children".[4]
As well as being (at various times) a postman, waterfront worker, gardener, fisherman and labourer, Lasenby spent about 10 years as a deer-culler and possum-trapper in Te Urewera[5] where he sometimes said he got his education in the telling of tall tales around the camp fire.[6] He was also a primary school teacher, editor of the School Journal and lecturer of English at Wellington Teachers' College before retiring at 55 to become a full-time writer.[3][5]
Lasenby's books are funny, witty, entertaining and imaginative. They include memorable and often hilarious characters such as Harry Wakatipu the talking horse, Aunt Effie and Uncle Trev, and range from tall tales and yarns to science fiction, dystopia and books set in the bush or in his own Depression-era childhood in small-town New Zealand.[7] He recalled that "the Matamata district was alive with stories in my childhood, sad, funny, haunting".[3]
Lasenby lived at Paremata near Wellington in the 1980s, where he sailed on the Porirua Harbour and Pauatahanui Inlet. With Sam Hunt and Ian Riggir they published poems on an 1886 upright press obtained from the Government Printing Office. He brought up his daughter and two stepchildren there.[8]
Lasenby lived for many years in central Wellington[9] and died on 27 September 2019, aged 88.[10][11]
Awards and prizes[edit]
Many of Lasenby's books were shortlisted for or won prizes or were named as Storylines Notable Books.
The Mangrove Summer won the Esther Glen Award in the 1989 LIANZA Children's Book Awards.[12] The Waterfall was the junior fiction winner in the 1996 AIM Children's Book Awards.
The Battle of Pook Island won the junior fiction category of the 1997 New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards. Because We Were the Travellers won an honour award in the 1999 New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards. Taur won the senior fiction category in the 1999 New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards.[13]
Aunt Effie and the Island that Sank won the junior fiction section of the 2005 New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards. Old Drumble won the junior fiction section of the 2009 New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards. Calling the Gods won the young adult section of the 2012 New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards.[13]
Uncle Trev, first published in 1991, won the Storylines Gaelyn Gordon Award for a Much-Loved Book in 2012.[14]
Lasenby was awarded the Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship in 1991[15][16] and the Victoria University of Wellington writing fellowship in 1993.[5] He was the University of Otago College of Education writer-in-residence in 1995.[17]
The Jack Lasenby Award was established in his name in 2002 by the Wellington Children's Book Association.[18] His standing in the literary world and his identity as a Wellington writer was also recognised with a plaque on the Wellington Writers Walk,[19] unveiled by Governor-General Sir Jerry Mateparae on 21 March 2013.[20]
In 2003, Lasenby was awarded the Margaret Mahy Medal and Lecture Award.[21] He received the Prime Minister's Award for Literary Achievement for Fiction in 2014.[22][23][24]
Bibliography [edit]
Lost and Found, photographs by Ans Westra (School Publications Branch, Dept of Education, 1970)
2 Grandfathers (Triple P Press, 1972)
Chatham Islands, illustrated by Roger Hart (School Publications Branch, Dept of Education, 1973)
Jackie Andersen (Triple P Press, 1973)
Charlie the Cheeky Kea, ill. Nancy Finlayson (Golden Press, 1974)
Rewi the Red Deer, ill. Nancy Finlayson (Golden Press, 1976)
The Lake (Oxford University Press, 1987)
The Mangrove Summer (Oxford University Press, 1988)
Uncle Trev (Cape Catley, 1991)
Uncle Trev and the Great South Island Plan (Cape Catley, 1991)
Uncle Trev and the Treaty of Waitangi (Cape Catley, 1992)
The Conjuror (Oxford University Press, 1992)
Harry Wakatipu (McIndoe Publishers, 1993)
Dead Man's Head (McIndoe Publishers, 1994)
The Waterfall (Longacre Press, 1995)
The Battle of Pook Island (Longacre Press, 1996)
Because We were the Travellers [Travellers, Book One] (Longacre Press, 1997)
Uncle Trev's Teeth and Other Stories (Cape Catley, 1997)
Taur [Travellers, Book Two] (Longacre Press, 1998)
The Shaman and the Droll [Travellers, Book Three] (Longacre Press, 1999)
The Lies of Harry Wakatipu (Longacre Press, 2000)
Kalik [Travellers, Book Four] (Longacre Press, 2001)
Aunt Effie, ill. David Elliot (Longacre Press, 2002)
Harry Wakatipu Comes the Mong (Puffin, 2003)
Aunt Effie's Ark, ill. David Elliot (Longacre Press, 2003)[25]
Aunt Effie and the Island that Sank, ill. David Elliot (Longacre Press, 2004)
What Makes a Teacher? (Four Winds Press, 2004)
Mr Bluenose (Longacre Press, 2005)
The Tears of Harry Wakatipu (Longacre Press, 2006)
When Mum Went Funny (Longacre Press, 2006)
Billy and Old Smoko (Longacre Press, 2007)
Old Drumble (HarperCollins, 2008)
Aunt Effie and Mrs Drizzle, ill. David Elliot (Longacre Press, 2008)
The Haystack (HarperCollins, 2010)
Calling the Gods (HarperCollins, 2011)
Uncle Trev and his Whistling Bull (Gecko Press, 2012)
Grandad's Wheelies, ill. Bob Kerr (Puffin Books, 2016)
Wellington Writers Walk Home
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Jack Lasenby
1931-Present
I want to live among people who believe in truth and freedom...I want to discuss ideas... I want books...
From The Conjurer, Oxford University Press, 1992
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Jack Lasenby
Jack Lasenby is one of New Zealand’s best loved storytellers and children’s writers. His work is imbued with a love of his country and a deep sense of what it is to be a New Zealander.
He was born in Waharoa in the Waikato, a small town which is the setting for many stories based on events in his childhood. He had a varied career as a deer culler and possum hunter, teacher, editor of the School Journal and lecturer at Wellington Teachers’ College before starting to write full time in 1987.
His books cover a wide range of genres, from adventure stories set in the past, present and future to tall tales and fantasy. Some of his unforgettable characters include yarn-spinning Uncle Trev, indomitable Aunt Effie and Harry Wakatipu, the talking horse.
Author Jack Lasenby remembered as master storyteller
3:14 pm on 29 September 2019
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A friend of renowned author Jack Lasenby says he was a master storyteller, whose language was stunning.
Jack Lasenby. Photo: Random House NZ
Mr Lasenby died on Friday, aged 88.
He was the author of children's books, novels, and short stories.
He was the winner of numerous awards, including the Prime Minister's award for Literary Achievement in 2014.
His friend Ruth McIntyre, owner of the Children's Bookshop in Kilbirnie, Wellington, said Mr Lasenby was a hunter in his earlier years.
She said his books gave his readers a sense of childhood as it was when he was growing up.
"A lot of his stories were set in the olden days. They had a lovely sort of family values in the story line, but they were witty, they were funny, but he would be sort of poking the borax a bit, at the same time."
Mrs McIntyre said Jack Lasenby never appreciated anything that was too PC, and would have liked to be thought of as an un-PC writer.
She said he didn't go out of his way to court controversy, but definitely had an "anarchistic streak in him".
"If he felt that the topic or the situation needed to be talked about in his novels, then he would do it."
Jack Lasenby, the man who gave a generation of Kiwis a greater voice
Rob Mitchell
05:00, Oct 05 2019
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Maarten Holl/Stuff
Author Jack Lasenby wrote numerous award-winning books with an eye to the bush or the water just outside his window.
OBITUARY: Jack Lasenby, author. Born: March 9, 1931, in Waharoa. Died: September 27, 2019, in Wellington.
It's his voice she will miss the most.
Others will lament the loss of the words; of Jack Lasenby, the multiple award-winning author of children's books and young-adult fiction. A man Margaret Mahy called "perhaps the most innately New Zealand writer of all New Zealand writers for children".
Many of those children, young and old, will reflect on his legacy and remember the tales of Uncle Trev and Aunt Effie; of Charlie, the Cheeky Kea; and Rewi, the Red Deer. Maybe darker memories will be stirred in the murky depths of The Lake or The Conjuror.
READ MORE:
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Still more will recall the good, keen bloke and lover of all things bush and boat.
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Lasenby family
From the Jack Lasenby family album. "My daughter Rebecca and I lived on the water at Paremata for many years. She still does. I wrote a lot of my children's books in our white cottage on the seawall where the waves dashed spray over the windows in a big nor-wester. We swam, fished, and I sailed a lovely dinghy. We had many good friends and neighbours, the Riggirs whose house is behind my boat, Sam Hunt, Michael King, Robin White - the place was alive and abuzz with teachers, painters, writers, musicians ... Happy days."
But Becky Lasenby is just a daughter remembering a dad and how she "loved the sound of his voice".
She heard it every day as he read to her while recovering in hospital following surgery: tales of adventure in Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons series.
Stories of survival that Jack would later write in his own distinctive Kiwi voice, in school journals and novels that would define sense and place for a generation of New Zealanders.
"I loved it ... talking to him about books, and he could talk for hours about books," she says.
And there were many hours for talking and reading, the two brought even closer by the death of wife and mother Elizabeth in 1969.
Hours and days for their own adventures, first in Wellington, then a little further north at Paremata, where the father could relive a childhood of endless summers at Mercury Bay and the freedoms of remote, rural Waharoa in the Waikato, where he grew up.
Of exploits with Aunty Margaret, whose attitude and adventures inspired the Aunt Effie series.
"We always heard stories of Aunty Marg because she wore slacks, and she smoked and she drank beer and she had a boat, a really fast boat, so she was the favourite."
supplied
In the bush with Barry Crump, left, in 1954.
Back in Paremata, it was the 1980s and a father raising a young daughter alone was unusual, as were some of Jack's methods.
The young man with a background in deer-culling and possum-trapping, who loved nothing more than a few weeks in the bush, sometimes alone, sometimes while the family celebrated Christmas, brought a practical, hands-on attitude to fatherhood.
When he met Elizabeth, she already had two children from a previous marriage.
"Anne and Jeremy were 9-10," says Becky. "He got rid of their beds and made them sleep on sheepskins on the floor because he thought it was much better for them.
"Dad always had his rifles up on the wall – all very un-PC. Anne remembers being asleep on the floor and dad's rifle falling down and bonking her on the head. Gave her a hell of a fright."
The life of Lasenby and literature of Ransome became lessons for living.
"It was all about sailing, lighting campfires and fending for yourself," Becky says. "So I needed to learn how to chop and stack firewood, how to row a boat and how to clean a rifle."
He was "a man's man" who could be "stubborn and ruthless".
But he also "had an incredibly soft and caring side ... which people didn't really expect; he was incredibly compassionate ... charismatic and very kind".
When Becky joined Brownies and needed her hair plaited, Jack got a book out of the library on sailors' knots to help him complete the coiffure.
"He didn't approve of makeup, but I remember him buying me pink nail polish and stuff because he didn't want me to miss out on some girlie things."
Not that this extended to boyfriends. Perhaps mindful of his own "wild" youth and "many romantic trysts", those were kept at an oar's length.
"I was 15, 16 and there was a boy that liked me and he came round to our house with a bunch of flowers and I remember dad opening the door and taking them from him and just shutting the door in his face."
From the Jack Lasenby family album: "My confident sister Marie, my laughing brother Alwyn, and my whingeing, terrified self perched like a row of pukekos along the bonnet of what looks like dad's Essex at Waharoa in the Waikato. It must be about 1932."
Jack was a complex individual, recalls long-time neighbour and friend of nearly 50 years, Ian Riggir.
He too will miss the voice; the one used playfully and forcefully in many tall tales told and arguments won and lost during Friday night fish and chips.
"You'd set up something you knew he was going to bite on, or he would set up something and away we'd go," he says. "If you took him too seriously you'd come away thinking [what a] grump."
Becky and her siblings may have lost a father and stepfather, but Ian too feels the passing of a family member.
"I've got no siblings but feel as though I've just lost an older brother. You love them, but by God they can annoy you at times too."
Ian and Jack were part of a strong, close-knit community at Paremata that included poet Sam Hunt.
They shared a love of the sea, boating, literature and more than a little liquid encouragement.
Sundays were spent in Ian's garage, the three men toiling over an 1886 upright letterpress he had bought from the Government Printing Office.
"We printed poems by Sam, by Jack, by Alistair Campbell, and also James K Baxter," Riggir says. "Sold them around the country, in different bookshops – not a hell of a lot of them obviously."
The broadsheets were an early foray into publishing for a man who started a fulltime writing career late in life.
Jack had written stories in the School Journal, was an editor of the publication between 1969 and 1975. He even helped others as a senior lecturer in English at Wellington's Teachers' College, before setting out on his own writing adventure in the late 1980s.
He saw literature as "spiritual", something that fed the soul, and he soon had many followers for his particularly Kiwi flavour and sense of humour. His stories offered something refreshing and different in a field dominated by an overseas view of these awkward isles.
Jack, who Becky says "always had a thing for the underdog" and detested politics and politicians, enjoyed poking fun at the establishment in fiction exploring the group dynamic (The Mangrove Summer, The Battle of Pook Island and The Waterfall).
Andrew Labett/NZPA
Lasenby at home in Wellington in 2009.
He may have written children's books, but he was not scared of tackling tough subjects.
The man who preferred plates were washed with Sunlight soap, because he'd read dishwashing liquid and detergent killed fish and destroyed oceans, wasn't about to soft-soap the reader.
In The Lake, central character Ruth heads to the bush to escape the sexual abuse of a stepfather, later drawing on inner strength to return home and protect her younger sister.
Much of Lasenby's work and even his visions of New Zealand in the future are rooted in his own pragmatic past of hardship, hunting and the endeavour of children left to their own devices.
What else would you expect from a man who would send his daughter to school with a green pepper "with the lid cut off, to be used as a water cup instead of a drink bottle", says Becky. "And I could eat the pepper afterwards.
"He was never into plastic."
But the public and critics were very much into him.
Jack won countless awards and honours for his numerous School Journal entries, children's books and novels.
These included the Margaret Mahy Award, Sargeson Fellowship, and New Zealand Post book award wins in the children's, junior and senior fiction categories. There were many others.
A father, a neighbour, a friend.
Farewelled this week at the Mana Cruising Club, by the water that ran through much of his life and literature, the rocks that anchored much of his own history and world view.
"It's kind of nice to bring him home," says Becky.
* Sources: Becky Lasenby, Ian Riggir
Award winning children's author Jack Lasenby has died
Glenn McConnell
17:13, Sep 28 2019
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Phil Reid
Jack Lasenby has died, aged 88.
Highly acclaimed children's author Jack Lasenby has died, aged 88.
The man behind titles such as The Mangrove Summer, the Uncle Trev series and Because We Were the Travellers, died on Friday according to friends and colleagues.
He was known for his quirky authorship of children's and young adult fiction, for which he was well regarded.
The Wellington-based writer had won countless awards, and in 2002 had an award named after him.
READ MORE:
* Wellington writers scoop PM's awards
* Aro's Jack Lasenby scoops award again
The New Zealand Book Council described him as "one of New Zealand's most important children's book authors".
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His last major award, in 2014, was the Prime Minister's Award for Literary Achievement. In an interview, Lasenby told The Dominion Post he was thrilled to win the $60,000 award, because it meant he could keep writing. The then 83-year-old said: "That is the greatest part of it."
Lasenby lived in central Wellington, but was born in Waharoa in 1931.
Ross Giblin/Stuff
Jack Lasenby, pictured age 79, won numerous awards for his writing.
Known for his writing, he had worked many jobs in his earlier life. He had been a postman, gardener, labourer and fisherman.
He briefly attended the University of Auckland, but according to the Book Council he quickly became sick of the university and instead moved to the bush. He then spent about 10 years living in Te Urewera, culling deer and trapping possums. His old hunting buddy was fellow author Barry Crump.
Ruth McIntyre, of Wellington's Children's Bookshop, said Lasenby used to frequent the shop and was always a joy to be around. He had been good friends with McIntyre's husband, John.
Phil Reid/Stuff
Author Jack Lasenby spent about 10 years living in the bush.
"He was certainly a character, I would definitely rate him as a friend," McIntyre said.
"Him and John used to get on very well, as they both regarded themselves as grumpy old men."
She said his writing and sense of humour could be described as "politically incorrect", but he never went out of his way to offend.
"He loved to poke fun at the establishment," she said.
McIntyre hadn't seen Lasenby for a few months, but had received news of his death. He used to be a regular at her shop, where he'd keep up with the latest releases.
"He was always so charming and good fun, it was a joy to see him and have a chat," she recalled.
His last published book was in 2016, called Grandad's Wheelies.
In 2012, after winning another award for his book Calling The Gods, Lasenby told Stuff he made sure to write everyday.
He said he was "81 and still scribbling away for young people". By that time, he had written about 30 books for children and young adults. He had also worked as the editor of the School Journal and as an English lecturer.
Lasenby, Jack
In Brief
Jack Lasenby was one of New Zealand’s most important children’s book authors. His novels and short stories earned numerous honours, including key awards and fellowships. After publishing his first novel, The Lake, he wrote dozens of books for children and young adults. His writing is characterised by a portrayal of childhood as full of hard lessons, adventure and the search for self determination. His popular books include Harry Wakatipu (1993), and his Aunt Effie series. Jack Lasenby died in September 2019.
FROM THE OXFORD COMPANION TO NEW ZEALAND LITERATURE
Lasenby, Jack (1931-2019) was born in Waharoa. He attended the University of Auckland from 1950 to 1952 but left in dissatisfaction and spent ten years deer-culling in the Urewera. Returning to Auckland in 1962, he began teaching and, from 1969, editing school journals. A lecturer at Wellington Teachers’ College from 1975, he resigned in 1987 to write full-time.
He often wrote of heartland New Zealand: small towns, farms, and the bush frame narratives that were ‘observant, erudite, witty, often caustic, scathingly anti-bullshit, [and] alert to fit the fable to the moral (and vice versa)’.
His writing is predicated on a belief that although modern entertainment sates children’s hunger for stories, it fails to provide sustenance. His early publications included Lost and Found (1970) and The Chatham Islands (1973), and two picture books from 1976: Charlie the Cheeky Kea and Rewi the Red Deer. However, it is his novels that inspired Judith Holloway to rank him with Margaret Mahy and Maurice Gee as children’s writers ‘whose themes, originality, and sheer literariness make them almost as important and entertaining to adults’ (New Zealand Books, Dec. 1994).
Lasenby’s first novel is characteristic of much of his writing: childhood is not idealised (pain is real and lessons are hard) but adventure abounds and the end is self-sufficiency and individual empowerment. Thus The Lake (1987) tells of a girl learning to survive in the bush and, in the process, finding the strength to handle her stepfather’s sexual advances.
Similarly, in The Mangrove Summer (1989), children staying in the Coromandel in the 1940s to escape a possible Japanese invasion fend for themselves, although with certain tragic consequences. The popular ‘Seddon Street Gang’ trilogy—Dead Man’s Head (1994), The Waterfall (1995) and The Battle of Pook Island (1996)—despite being set during the 1930s Depression, are in a lighter vein.
The gang inhabit childhood’s mildly anarchic world (adults hover peripherally) yet their experiences teach belief in oneself and the value of friendship. Two darker novels of a post-apocalyptic future convey Lasenby’s dislike of inequity and strong views on social justice.
In The Conjurer (1992) a teenage couple attempt to escape a cruel, hierarchical society stratified according to eye colour, while in Because We Were Travellers (1997), an outcast boy and old woman struggle to survive in the land of Whykatto, near the ruined city of Orklun.
As a short story writer, Lasenby was unfailingly entertaining: Harry Wakatipu (1993), the world’s most recalcitrant pack-horse, stacks up well alongside Uncle Trev’s hilarious yarns about travelling asparagus beds, fast grass, and giant kauris with a view of the South Pole, from Uncle Trev (1991), Uncle Trev and the Great South Island Plan (1991) and Uncle Trev and the Treaty of Waitangi (1992).
Lasenby received numerous honours for his writing, including the 1991 Sargeson Fellowship, 1993 Victoria University of Wellington writing fellowship, and 1995 Dunedin College of Education writing fellowship.
Jack Lasenby died on September 27, 2019.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Jack Lasenby received the Esther Glen Award at the 1989 LIANZA Children's Book Awards for his work, The Mangrove Summer.
In 1991, he was awarded the Buddle Findlay Sargeson Fellowship.
Lasenby's The Battle of Pook Island won the Junior Fiction Award at the 1997 New Zealand Post Book Awards for Children and Young Adults.
Because We Were The Travellers (incorrectly referred to as Because We Were Travellers in the Oxford Companion entry) won an Honour Award in the 1998 New Zealand Post Book Awards for Children and Young Adults. Taur won the Senior Fiction Award at the same ceremony in the following year.
The Shaman and the Droll (1999) is the third in the Travellers series and was shortlisted for the 2000 New Zealand Post Book Awards for Children and Young Adults. The Lies of Harry Wakatipu (2000) is part of Lasenby's popular series of tall tales about New Zealand's most famously lazy and dishonest talking horse. It was shortlisted in the 2001 New Zealand Post Book Awards for Children and Young Adults. Kalik (2002) was a finalist in the senior fiction category in the following year, and was also listed as a 2002 Storylines Notable Senior Fiction Book.
The Jack Lasenby Award was established by the Wellington Children's Book Association in 2002.
In 2002, Lasenby published the first of a series of books about Aunt Effie: her six gigantic pig dogs, her twenty-six nephews and nieces, and their adventures in the kauri forests of the Coromandel and fighting off pirates in the Hauraki Gulf.
Harry Whakatipu Comes the Mong (2003). The Deer Culler has only one mate, Harry Wakatipu, a scurvy-gutted pack-horse to rely on. But what does Harry Wakatipu think ?
Aunt Effie's Ark (2003) by Jack Lasenby, illustrated by David Elliot, is the second book in the hilarious and outrageous Aunt Effie series. In this story, Aunt Effie, dressed in her green canvas invalid's pyjamas, hibernates all winter, leaving her 26 resourceful nieces and nephews to deal with snowstorm and flood, ravening monsters, a barnful of hungry animals and a wild ark-ride over the Vast Untrodden Ureweras.
In 2003, Lasenby was awarded the prestigious Margaret Mahy Medal and Lecture Award.
Aunt Effie and the Island that Sank (Longacre Press, 2004) is the third Aunt Effie travelogue. Aunt Effie is restless. She and her 26 nieces and nephews are off again in the scow Margery Daw on a treasure hunt across the pirate-infested waterways of the Hauraki Gulf and The Waikato. Aunt Effie and the Island that Sank won the Junior Fiction Award at the 2005 New Zealand Post Book Awards for Children and Young Adults, and was listed as a 2005 Storylines Notable Junior Fiction Book.
Mr Bluenose was published by Longacre Press in 2005. The Tears of Harry Wakatipu and When Mum Went Funny were published by Longacre Press in 2006.
From the publisher's info for Billy and Old Smoko (2007): 'Billy wakes to find his father all lackadaisical, and a strange woman burning the porridge. She reckons his real mother ran away, and he must call her Mum now. But Billy isn’t stupid. With Old Smoko, a stately, talking horse whom he teaches to read, Billy looks for his real mum under the Kaimais, out the back of Waharoa. He learns the secret of Mount Te Aroha, hears the ancient Maori story of Snow White, and sees how Auckland got its electricity. He also goes pig hunting, plays footy, discovers roast pork and apple sauce sandwiches – and falls in love with the blue eyes of Harrietta.'
Old Drumble (HarperCollins, 2008) is a story about 'the smartest, cunningest, cleverest sheep dog there ever was.' Old Drumble was awarded Best Junior Fiction Book at the 2009 New Zealand Post Book Awards for Children and Young Adults. It was also listed as a 2009 Storylines Notable Junior Fiction Book.
Aunt Effie and Mrs Drizzle (Longacre Press, 2008) is the fourth in the Aunt Effie series.
The Haystack was released by HarperCollins in 2010. The book is set in the 1930s Depression, and Maggie’s growing up without a mother in the little Waikato dairying township of Waharoa. Maggie has to make do with her father’s friends, neighbours, and an old biddy who should know better but can’t help herself. Her pranks ultimately make her new friends along the way, who help her learn what a girl needs to know.
Calling the Gods was published by HarperCollins in 2011. It was a finalist in the Young Adult Fiction category of the 2012 New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards, and carried on to win the Young Adult Fiction category.
Jack Lasenby's first story collection Uncle Trev won the Storylines Gaelyn Gordon Award for a Much-loved Book for 2012. The award recognises a book unheralded at the time of publication but which has remained in print and proven itself an enduring favourite with young readers.
Jack Lasenby's novel Uncle Trev and His Whistling Bull was published by Gecko Press in 2012. Uncle Trev and His Whistling Bull was a finalist in the 2013 New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards in the Junior Fiction category.
Jack Lasenby received the 2014 Prime Minister’s Award for Literary Achievement for Fiction.
MEDIA LINKS AND CLIPS
Jack Lasenby featured on the Christchurch City Libraries Interviews with NZ Children's Authors site
Jack Lasenby on the New Zealand Electronic Text Centre site
Jack Lasenby’s Storylines profile
Jack Lasenby on the Random House site
NZ Listener article on Jack Lasenby by Margaret Mahy
Dear Jack: We Love You tribute on the SpinOff
Updated October 2014.
Childrens Books, New Zealand Post Book Awards
Review – The Haystack by Jack Lasenby
April 13, 2011
Finalist in the New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards
Reviewed by Pamela
The Haystack is a charming story about a little girl called Maggie who grew up in the small Waikato town of Waharoa during the depression years.
Maggie’s mother died when she was young and her father is raising her on his own. Although it appears that her father is not the only one…there are a number of interesting and likeable characters in this book who are also keeping a protective eye on Maggie. The saying “it takes a village to raise a child” rings true in this story – the message coming through from this book is the importance of community.
This story is a snapshot of a bygone time seen through a child’s eyes: a time when people made the best of what they had and life moved at a simpler, slower pace.
This book will appeal to young and “not so young” readers alike. Maggie is a character you catch yourself thinking about when not reading the book, and long after you have finished it. For this reason I rate it an excellent read.
Posted on April 18, 2012
This book is available in bookstores now and is a finalist in the New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards.
Set in an alternative future, Calling the Gods by Jack Lasenby is about the story of a teenage girl, Selene, who is banished from her home village.
As the story progresses, we learn more about Selene, her people and about the situation they’re in. We follow Selene as she stealthily returns to her village to get her younger brothers.
The writing style of this book is confusing. It is mainly Selene telling the story herself and this is the most used style. But also there is some flashback sort of things, Jack Lasenby shows and writes in Italics. The last 3rd or so of the book introduces a new voice, the voice of an older man. He might come from the future, or perhaps the past. He watches Selene and her group (though they can’t see him) and observes what is going on.
This book had the potential to be so good. But it really disappointed me. I have heard that Jack Lasenby can be an excellent author, and this book had a great storyline, but it just didn’t pull it off.
I would rate it a 3/5 stars.
Reviewed by Aleisha Cotterill, a Facebook fan of The New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards.
Uncle Trev And His Whistling Bull by Jack Lasenby: review
New Zealand author Jack Lasenby has written a charming tale, full of tall stories, called Uncle Trev And His Whistling Bull.
Uncle Trev And His Whistling Bull by New Zealand author Jack Lasenby
By Martin Chilton, Digital Culture Editor
5:21PM BST 24 Apr 2012
There's probably not too many modern children's writers who have done their time in the Urewera mountains working as a deer-culler and possum-trapper.
Jack Lasenby, who was 71 last month, is one of New Zealand's most celebrated authors, and that's how he made his living for nearly a decade. He's been a teacher and lecturer, too, but he brings his life experience - and a charming gift for nonsense - to his books.
His new novel, Uncle Trev And His Whistling Bull, is full of the mild anarchy of childhood. You get a sense from the Introductory chapter, titled My Mother's Remarkable Ears, that the book is going to fun. The narrator, a poorly 1930s schoolboy on a farm, has a pretty intimidating mum. Her ears are so sharp they can hear the echo of naughty conversations. She warns him after spotting a mark on the kitchen floor: "My eyes can read that lino like a book".
Into the mix comes the boy's wild and garrulous Uncle Trev (this is the latest in a series of his books). He really does have a bull, called Hubert, who can whistle tunes, from the Rose Of Tralee and The Campdown Races to Pokarekare Ana (Hubert is illustrated on the cover in a lovely drawing by David Elliot). Mother does not like the stories Uncle tells the boy, nor Trev's "uncouth friend" with his "gumboots and disgraceful old hat".
When the boy tells his uncle he is scared of the dark, Trev replies: "Don't go telling her I said so, but I think the dark's probably scared of your mother."
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Uncle Trev's tales pepper the story and the humour is wonderfully daft. "Old Furry's not an animal," says the boy's mother, "it's the silly name your uncle gives that thick soup he makes with bacon and split peas."
Lasenby was born in Waharoa, Waikato, in 1931, and is clearly an entertaining man ("I like arguing with people on the radio and TV - especially thick politicians who can’t answer back," he once said in a children's Q&A.). He has deliberately used lots of the language of the 1930s and New Zealand colloquialisms (good tucker; dunny; a bit crook; doss down) so there is a glossary to explain the terms. My only worry about recommending such a charming story is that I wonder how easily the story will translate to young British children.
Lasenby said: "Uncle Trev's are tall stories - but there's more truth in them than in most so-called non-fiction. I think we underestimate the importance of keeping our past alive to kids; in fact, we underestimate their appetite, their need for stories from the past." And that's really not a load of old Bull.
Jack Lasenby: Uncle Trev And His Whistling Bull (Gecko Press, £6.99)