Honouring author’s short but fruitful life
The life of a relatively unknown author described as ‘‘brilliant, beautiful, difficult and doomed’’ has been celebrated with a new plaque unveiled outside her childhood home.
Wellington writer Iris Wilkinson, who wrote under the pen name of Robin Hyde, is the third Wellingtonian to be honoured with a heritage plaque, joining radio personality Maud Basham (Aunt Daisy), and nun, social worker and herbalist Suzanne Aubert.
The project has been the ‘‘baby’’ of Wellington City councillor Nicola Young, who had long set her sights on recognising Wilkinson’s life and her contribution to journalism and literature.
‘‘She packed an enormous amount, good and bad, into her life and while not exactly a role model, she was a fantastic writer,’’ Young said.
Wilkinson was born in 1906 in South Africa and emigrated with her family to Wellington as a baby. She went to South Wellington School and Berhampore School, where she was dux in 1918. She wrote about her early life in her autobiographical novel The Godwits Fly.
She later went on to work as a journalist at The Dominion, the Christchurch Sun, NZ Truth and the Wanganui Chronicle, where she stealthily pushed her own agenda.
‘‘When she was doing the ‘women’s’ pages’ she was planting subversive, feminist and socialist comments that the subs didn’t always pick up,’’ Young said.
Between 1935 and 1938, Wilkinson had five novels published and wrote an autobiographical novel about her adult years, plus copious articles and letters denouncing the planned removal of Ma¯ori from their land at O¯ ra¯ kei.
‘‘[She] was a brave and pioneering writer, despite her enduring health problems. She used Ma¯ori and Pakeha history and stories to find a distinctive New Zealand voice,’’ Young said. ‘‘It was a very different style to her contemporary male writers, who often copied British writing styles.’’
In 1938, Wilkinson made the difficult journey to London, arriving seriously ill and penniless. She moved in and out of hospital, suffering from depression, dysentery and anaemia. In 1939, she took her own life.
In a biography he co-wrote, Wilkinson’s son Derek Challis described her as ‘‘brilliant, beautiful, difficult and doomed’’, living a short and tortured life while producing many novels and poetry, some of which gained her worldwide recognition.
Dr Patrick Sandbrook, who did his doctorate on Wilkinson’s life and legacy, said it was wonderful to see the late author honoured and hoped it might encourage others to seek out her work.
‘‘She’s a fantastic writer and her writing still lives on. She was lost for a lot of time in New Zealand literature and then found again.’’
Wilkinson’s plaque sits outside 92 Northland Rd in Wellington.