Sponsored by The Wallace Foundation
When writer and historian Peter Wells found a cache of family letters amongst his elderly mother’s effects, he realised that he had the means of retracing the history of a not-untypical family swept out to New Zealand during the great nineteenth-century human diaspora from Britain. Peter is joined in conversation by Stephanie Johnson as they trace the journey to Dear Oliver and the striking view it gives of the history of Pākehā New Zealanders.
Peter Wells is an award-winning author and film-maker. His books often look at a world of secrets, identity, subterfuge and illusion, frequently using the lens of a gay narrator. Recently he was awarded the Unity 50th Birthday Literary Award. Peter posted on Facebook about his experience of cancer and The Spinoff produced Hello Darkness as an edited transcript. Wells was co-founder of the Auckland Writers Festival and in 2015 founded the LGBTQI Writers Festival, Samesame but Different. Dear Oliver is Peter's most recent book.
Since the much loved The Heart’s Wild Surf in 1996, Stephanie Johnson has published ten more novels. She is a past winner of the Montana Book Award for The Shag Incident, the Katherine Mansfield Fellowship in Menton and the Bruce Mason Memorial Playwright’s Award. With Peter Wells, Stephanie founded the highly successful Auckland Writers Festival in 1998. Stephanie’s recent novel is Jarulan by the River, under her pseudonym Lily Woodhouse.
Saturday and Sunday Sessions
8.30am - 5pm
Titirangi War Memorial Hall
Tickets:
Full Day Pass Includes 8 sessions, morning and afternoon tea and lunch
$150.00 (value $ 174.00) $135 concession (value $150.00)
Early Bird $139.00 ($120 concession) Only available until 3 August
Individual Sessions $18.00 ($15 concession)
Morning/Afternoon Tea $ 5.00 Lunch $20.00
https://www.iticket.co.nz/go-to/going-west-writers-festival-2018