'An intergenerational legacy': Tributes flow for Maurice Gee

Otago Daily Times

15-06-2025

By Victor Waters of RNZ
The death of Maurice Gee has prompted many New Zealanders to pay tribute to the late novelist.
Considered one of New Zealand's greatest novelists, his work extended over 50 years.
The author, who died recently aged 93, wrote about ordinary people and ordinary lives, often with the narrator looking back at events that caused damage and unhappiness.
Publisher and literary commentator Fergus Barrowman said Gee's work hugely influenced his life.
"I read Plumb when it came out in paperback in 1979, and I was 18, and it was the first New Zealand book I read that really sort of fired my imagination and gave me a sense of how sort of diverse and interesting and challenging this country was.
"I read everything else, and he's really shaped my view.
"I know that his books have stayed in print and been widely read, and the fact that he was at that point turning to write children's books as well meant that there have always been new generations coming on, so people are still reading him as a contemporary," he said.
Barrowman said he knew Gee for more than 40 years and had worked with him from time to time.
That included Gee's 2015 biography - written by his sister Rachel Barrowman - Maurice Gee: Life and Work.
"He was dedicated from early on, but he didn't strike gold quickly," said Barrowman.
"He took some time to learn to write and was in dialogue with Charles Brasch, the stern editor of Landfall, with his early stories.
"At a certain point when he really felt that he had come of age as a writer, he left secure employment and lived by his writing, his adult novels, his children's books, and writing for TV thereafter, so that dedication has been an inspiration for a lot of writers.
"I think he had an inner core of steel and grasped his own significance, but he was also a very humble and modest man who didn't like being the centre of attention.
"I think it was interesting that when he did publish a memoir, it was three memoirs, three shorter pieces, which had been written about his family, and for his family he wasn't trying to foreground himself.
"It was really his books that he wanted to see recognised and out in the world, and the books are known internationally as well as locally."
"Though I haven't seen a lot of him recently, he does leave a hole in my life," said Barrowman.
The Arts Foundation Te Tumu Toi said we they were deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Gee, describing him as "one of Aotearoa New Zealand's most celebrated novelists, a literary giant, and a quiet revolutionary".
General manager Jessica Palalagi said this was cemented by Gee earning the prestigious Katherine Mansfield Menton Fellowship in 1992 and being among the inaugural Icon Whakamana Hiranga recipients in 2003, among numerous other awards.
"He has left a strong intergenerational legacy for us all through his work," said Palalagi.
"To me, that's what becoming an icon is really. It's that ability to make work and to be an artist that lasts across generations.
"I think his writing for children also meant that a lot of us grew up with his literature and then they were turned into sort of like motion pictures and TV shows.
"It was world building, he created worlds through his words," she said.
Palalagi said The Arts Foundation Te Tumu Toi had been trying to organise a rare interview with Gee, which unfortunately was not able to materialise.
She said even in his final years, he still shied away from the limelight.
"I had been actually trying to reach out to him since last year. So we've been talking to him via his daughter because we were trying to organise a sort of a profile piece on him.
"He was kind of like, 'oh, why is everyone making a fuss about this work that I did?'. So I think he was just incredibly humble.
"He was actually very generous in saying that he doesn't actually do a lot of interviews, but he was happy to sit down and have a chat so I felt very humbled in that way to be able to have that time, but we just couldn't quite get there.
"It's quite sad in a way to think that we could have had one sort of last conversation," she said.
Gee was born in Whakatāne in 1931 and educated at Auckland's Avondale College in Auckland and at Auckland University where he took a Masters degree in English. He worked as a teacher and librarian, before becoming a full-time writer in 1975.
He spent much of his later life in Nelson, where he became a loved consituent.
Nelson MP Rachel Boyack said the late novelist made a big contribution to the South Island city.
"He was involved in groups like 'Friends of the Maitai', who have done a huge amount of work to protect out river that runs through inner city Nelson.
"In a recent interview he spoke of the important of the Maitai river, in terms of teaching his daughters how to swim and so while he didn't grow up here he spent his later years of his life here.
"It's really sad, wonderful that he was able to live such a full life into his early 90s but it's always so sad when we've lost someone who made such a significant contribution to our nation."
"Nelson people are very proud that he decided to live and retire here in Nelson," said Boyack.
Those sentiments were shared by another politician, Minister for Arts, Culture & Heritage Paul Goldsmith.
"It's a very sad day, Maurice Gee has been a greatly loved writer and novelist for many decades.
"People of my generation grew up on Under the Mountain being a great local story, some of his other great novels like Plumb have had international acclaim but also being part of our literary cannon as it used to be known as," said the minister.
Goldsmith said Plumb was his favourite novel written by Gee.
He said parliament could look to pay tribute in some way to the late writer in the coming days, but said there had been no discussions yet.