University of Virginia Library

3. Publishing

In this guide, 'publishing' encompasses the factors which influence the decision to produce a work at a particular time, and the editorial activities which are required to produce a work. Dennis McEldowney's overview of publishing in New Zealand expands the definition:

To this definition should be added the question of financial responsibility, for the publishers' financial risk is normally a central issue which shapes all aspects of the publishing process. Printing and distribution are covered elsewhere in this guide: note, however, that there is inevitably some overlap between these sections and this chapter.

     This guide, as the Introduction indicates, 'may be regarded as a report on the state of research' into print culture in New Zealand. Readers will quickly discern this to be the case for this chapter, especially as they note the large number of references to areas and topics for further study, and the unevenness of coverage for aspects of the publishing field.

     This chapter is divided into four main sections: the process of publishing, the publishers, general and regional studies, and categories of publication.

The process of publishing

Publishing, most simply put, is the issuing, usually for sale, of printed matter. As Dennis McEldowney describes it, the publisher 'selects and edits the text before it is printed and sells or otherwise distributes it after'. The publisher does not write the book, nor print it nor bind it, nor sell it to the reader, who is the publisher's ultimate customer. Without the publisher's presence these other activities would, however, be pointless. Even after excluding all of these activities, publishing encompasses a number of complex tasks. The publisher carries out the roles of financier, organiser, and go-between as part of the process by which the written work gets from its author to its reader. These tasks can be divided up according to the relationships the publisher forms with others who perform various actions on or around the author's manuscript, and with those who bring the published work to its eventual market. Some of the activities excluded from the following discussion are covered elsewhere in this guide.

     In order to 'prepare and issue (a book . . . etc.) for public sale' (as the Concise Oxford Dictionary defines 'publish'), there must first be a text. Whatever the impetus behind its genesis, a commissioned work or independently created, it has an author (or authors). Once the publisher has decided to publish a text, it becomes the object of attention of a number of the publisher's agents. These include all those people who work on the text or on the book which is to contain it: editor, designer, typesetter and printer. Formerly many of these people were employed within the office of the publisher, but increasingly they work independently of the publishing house, and are contracted to perform specific tasks. The publisher organises all of these: the preparation of the manuscript for printing, the production of the item by printers and binders, the provision of illustrations and covers, advertising and promotion, and the sale of the product to distributors and booksellers.

     Central to any consideration of the process of publishing is the fact that publishing is a business. All of the operations described above are financed by the publisher's capital. The publisher must spend most of this money before any return is received. The capital is advanced against a perceived market and therefore a return on its outlay: without a market for the published work, the publisher could not contemplate this financial risk. However, this discussion will concentrate on the editorial processes of publishing rather than the financial side, which remains to be written about in the New Zealand context. Some inkling of the issues may be gained from overseas publishers' accounts (e.g. Stanley Unwin's The Truth about Publishing , 1926) or surveys such as John Feather's History of British Publishing (1988), which devotes considerable discussion to the topics of copyright ('the cornerstone of publishing in a free market economy') and the commercial imperatives of marketing.

     What defines the direction of a particular publisher's activity could be described as the result of the tensions between an individual publisher's personal inclinations and the forces of business reality. What makes New Zealand publishing distinctive in this context is probably the level of influence of individuals, and small and medium-sized firms which have often prevailed and had an effect disproportionate to their size as the multinational behemoths fragmented, disestablished, regrouped and refocused around and amongst them. This would not have happened to the same degree in a larger pond.

     Outlines from a New Zealand perspective of the process of publishing are to be found in some of the handbooks which have been produced for writers and editors, including:
     Arnold Wall, A Reed Deskbook for Writers (1973)
     Anna Rogers, Write and Be Published (1994)
      First Edition (1993, rev. ed. 1995)
      Write, Edit, Print (1997)

Publishers' accounts of the process are to be found mainly in the autobiographical writings of those involved, including:

     Charles Brasch, Indirections (1980)
     Denis Glover, Hot Water Sailor & Landlubber Ho! (1981)
     Phoebe Meikle, Accidental Life (1994)
     Dennis McEldowney, Then and There (1995)
     A.W. Reed, Books are My Business (1966)
     Ray Richards, 'The man in the middle' (1974)

Author and publisher

The first publishing in New Zealand represents a primitive sort of commissioning process. The Church Missionary Society trained the printer William Colenso and sent him to New Zealand; the missionary William Williams was charged with preparing the copy for the first publications, Mäori translations of Scripture. The few earlier publications created outside New Zealand but intended for circulation in New Zealand had similarly been generated or commissioned by their publishers. The New Zealand Company's propaganda exhorting settlement in the antipodean Brighter Britain was also a publishing programme entirely instigated by the publishing organisation.

     The pattern of publishing in the early years of European settlement was for an author to pay for the issue of a work, and most of these works were political and religious pamphlets. Despite the presence on the title page or elsewhere of a printer's or perhaps a bookseller's imprint, this was essentially self-publishing. McEldowney identifies the first memorable locally-published book as F.E. Maning's Old New Zealand (1863) issued in Auckland by Creighton and Scales, proprietors of the Southern Cross newspaper, who evidently already saw a New Zealand market for tales of the 'Good Old Times', as Maning's subtitle put it. A parallel edition was issued for another market by Smith, Elder in London.

     By the mid 19th century in Britain an author's contract with a publisher might involve the outright sale of the copyright, or a profit-sharing arrangement. The Copyright Act 1843 had strengthened authors' interests, and in 1887 the Berne Convention on Copyright gave both publishers and authors further protection. The author's contract determines the details of the commercial relationship between author and publisher, defines the responsibilities of both parties in particular areas, and is intended to protect both parties.

     If a work is commissioned, the publisher sets the parameters: the subject and its treatment, length, general style (in terms of the audience), inclusion of illustrations and other matter such as appendices, bibliography, and indexes. In any case author and publisher sign an agreement setting deadlines, the author's responsibilities (for instance, involvement in proofreading), the degree of editorial control to be exercised by the publisher, and the author's remuneration—royalty payments, advances against royalties, or a lump sum or other agreement. The contract also normally addresses the extent to which the author takes responsibility for defamation or breach of copyright, whether the author will offer an option on future work, and the conditions under which the contract may be terminated by either party.

     By the turn of the century Whitcombe & Tombs had a standard printed agreement along these lines which they asked their authors to sign, offering a royalty of 10% or more on the retail price, and giving themselves a free hand to make most of the editorial decisions. This contract was still being used six decades later, although some authors struck out the latter clause. Authors' contracts now include clauses to cover new technological and cultural developments, such as motion picture rights and electronic publication options. These days a publisher may claim a greater degree of control than previously, but is also likely to be making a significantly larger investment in the marketing of a book. Most publishers offer a standard contract but are usually willing to negotiate terms. Standard author contracts are described by Anna Rogers (1994) and in First Edition (1995). The New Zealand Society of Authors provides its members with a minimum terms agreement and an annotated model contract. See also A.W. Reed's address to PEN, The Author Publisher Relationship (1946) and his section on contracts in Stuart Perry's The New Zealand Writer's Handbook (1952a).

     An author may employ a literary agent to carry out contractual negotiations. The agent receives a percentage of the author's royalty. New Zealand's first formally constituted literary agency was Ray Richards, formerly of A.H. & A.W. Reed, who set up his agency in 1976. Although literary agents have not yet risen in New Zealand to the power and prominence they hold in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States, a relatively small number of commercially successful and therefore sought-after authors have found it worth their while to employ the bargaining skills of a professional in their dealings with the larger New Zealand publishing houses, and an agent is a necessity for entrée to overseas publishing contracts. First Edition lists 11 of the New Zealand agencies of various kinds in 1995, including publishing consultants and book packaging services, mostly established during the mid 1980s.

     Book packagers solicit manuscripts to fit concepts that are marketable to a publisher, usually as all-inclusive packages—commissioned, edited, designed, illustrated and sometimes even printed. The packager takes care of all dealings with the publisher, and the author's agreement (including royalties) is with the packager. Publishing consultants provide another kind of agency for both authors and publishers, offering assessment of manuscripts to publishers, assessing authors' drafts and assisting in bringing manuscripts to a publishable standard before they are offered to a publisher. To a degree these agencies have made redundant the role of the publisher's reader, potentially a position of considerable influence with the power to shape a list and determine the progress of an author's career (though in New Zealand probably not a significant force). In non-fiction publishing, the reader is usually a specialist outside the world of publishing. The rise of literary agents in New Zealand and their effect on the industry are discussed in articles by Jandene Dyson and Lesley Hanes in Endnotes (1995).

     In order to deal more effectively with such issues as contracts and remuneration, authors have formed themselves into societies to promote their common interests. Writers' organisations are described briefly in E.C. Simpson's A Survey of the Arts in New Zealand (1961) and in Art Facts (N. Scotts et al., 1987).

     The short-lived Fellowship of New Zealand Writers, founded in 1929 by Pat Lawlor, Johannes Andersen, A.E. Currie and others is described by Rachel Barrowman in The Turnbull (1995). Some of the Fellowship's records are to be found in the papers of its founders at the Alexander Turnbull Library. Soon after, the New Zealand Centre of the international writers' organisation PEN was founded in 1934 by Lawlor, and was the organising force behind the first New Zealand Authors' Week in 1936. The Authors' Week Committee produced occasional bulletins and a publication, Annals of New Zealand Literature , commemorating the Week itself, which was held during March 1936. Subsequent PEN publications for New Zealand have been Alan Mulgan's Literature and Authorship in New Zealand (a lyrical overview which now smacks strongly of colonial cringe, published in London by Allen & Unwin for PEN in 1946) and Perry (1952a). Now the New Zealand Society of Authors, the organisation produces a regular bulletin (originally the PEN Gazette and now The New Zealand Author ). Through energetic lobbying it was instrumental in the setting up of the State Literary Fund in 1946 and the Authors' Fund in 1973, and continues to attempt to keep state agencies and other non-authors toeing the line.

     Other writers' societies include the New Zealand Women Writers' Society, formed in 1932 and initially chaired by the ubiquitous Pat (for Patrick) Lawlor, which produced a Bulletin from 1951 until its demise in 1991. It is described by Anne Else in Women Together (1993) and its records are in the Alexander Turnbull Library. Two publications were produced to celebrate the Society's 50th jubilee in 1982: Women Writers of NZ 1932-1982 (a history and anthology by Margaret Hayward and Joy Cowley), and History of the New Zealand Women Writers' Society (by Thelma France et al., 1984). Other organisations have been the Penwomen's Club, New Zealand (formed 1925) and Ngä Puna Waihenga, the New Zealand Mäori artists' and writers' society, founded in 1973. The New Zealand Writer's Guild, most of whose members are radio and television scriptwriters, is lively and active.

     New Zealand's high per capita output of books suggests it has a correspondingly high population of authors. An indication of the numbers might be gained from an analysis of New Zealand Authors' Fund returns. The Fund, which compensates authors for sales lost through library lending, is described in an article by J.P. Sage in New Zealand Libraries (1987). In 1984-85, according to a survey by Andrea Williamson, 850 authors were registered with the Fund (although only about 20% identified themselves as full-time writers). In 1995 the Fund made payments to 1,332 authors for 4,844 titles. Those afflicted with the need to be published may attend the evening classes and short courses in creative writing which are a feature of university extension programmes and other adult educational institutions, for example the WEA. Polytechnics offer journalism studies, and Victoria University of Wellington's creative writing course, founded in 1975, was the first of a number of tertiary courses and has produced some notably high profile writers. The effects of individual courses on writing styles, and the success or otherwise of their graduates in getting their work published, has yet to be studied. Bill Manhire's course at Victoria is documented in Mutes and Earthquakes (1997).

     Aside from the work of the authors' societies such as PEN, practical guides for writers who want their work published have appeared from time to time, covering topics from manuscript preparation to publishers' contracts and proofreading. Changing times and conditions might be examined by a comparison of these over the decades. Daphne Double's New Zealand Writers' and Publishers' Yearbook did not reappear after its 1969 debut. Others include the works by Arnold Wall (1973), Anna Rogers (1994) and John Parsons's New Zealand Writer's Handbook (first issued in 1990, most recent edition 1994). A more specialised guide is Gavin McLean's Local History (1992).

     Authors' papers and their accounts of their dealings with publishers are also a rich source of information. Noel Hilliard contributed his views on 'Authorship in New Zealand' to the 1973 Book Council seminar, The Changing Shape of Books (1974). Peter Gibbons notes in his chapter on non-fiction in The Oxford History of New Zealand Literature in English that M.H. Holcroft's autobiographies offer much detail on the vicissitudes of authorship and its remuneration. Gibbons's thesis on J.C. Andersen (1992) offers a wealth of information relevant to scholarly publication in Andersen's era. Other biographical and autobiographical sources worth investigating for this topic are:

     Robin Dudding (ed.), Beginnings (1980)
     Frank Sargeson, Sargeson (1981)
     Denys Trussell, Fairburn (1984)
     Lynley Hood, Sylvia! (1988)
     Janet Frame, An Autobiography (1989)
     Ross Galbreath, Walter Buller (1989)
     Lauris Edmond, An Autobiography (1994)
     Michael King, Frank Sargeson (1995)
     Keith Ovenden, A Fighting Withdrawal [Dan Davin] (1996)
     Anthony Dreaver, An Eye for Country [Leslie Adkin] (1997)
     Ian Richards, To Bed at Noon [Maurice Duggan] (1997)

Encouragement to publish

Financial incentives to publishers to instigate the risky and expensive process involved in producing a book are sometimes difficult to separate from incentives to authors to produce a text in the first place. (Incentives and awards for writers are discussed in Chapter 5 in the section on 'Recognition and rewards of success'.) McEldowney asserts that—with some notable exceptions—until 1960 most publishing in New Zealand had not become fully independent, relying to some degree on assistance from other commercial activities or the sponsorship of booksellers, printers and institutions. For some types of publication, notably poetry and serious non-fiction, that remains the case, and the largest and most important source of financial assistance to publishing in New Zealand has always been government subsidy.

     A.G. Bagnall notes in his introduction to the New Zealand National Bibliography , vol.1 (1980), the existence of much government sponsored and supported publication in the records of the Colonial Secretary, a source he describes as 'frequently tapped but by no means exhausted'. He narrates in some detail one early instance of government assistance to publishing, involving the government as publisher as well as sponsor: John White's Ancient History of the Maori (1887-90) was a mixed experience for all parties. T.F. Cheeseman's Manual of the New Zealand Flora (1906), Robert McNab's Historical Records of New Zealand (1908-14), T.M. Hocken's Bibliography (1909), James Cowan's New Zealand Wars (1922-23) and, from the 1920s, a whole raft of Dominion Museum Bulletins by Elsdon Best are further large scale, government-assisted publications. Major initiatives came with the programme of the first Labour government which took office in 1935. These included a series of centennial surveys (published by the Department of Internal Affairs) and a small number of grants to other commemorative publishing projects. J.W. Heenan, Undersecretary for Internal Affairs, used a discretionary fund to assist some other publication projects. Discretion probably exacerbated the inevitable backbiting unleashed among the subsidised and unsubsidised, including those who disapproved in principle. These early efforts are described by Rachel Barrowman in 'Culture-organising' (1996). The centennial surveys are described in a research essay by A.J. Booker (1983) and in the autobiographical writings of their editor, E.H. McCormick ( An Absurd Ambition , 1996). Internal Affairs also set up a War History branch which embarked on a mammoth publication programme.

     Heenan eventually gave way to pressure from PEN and others to set up the State Literary Fund in 1946. His reservations about the difficulty of creating an authority capable of keeping all parties happy in a world renowned for the number and vociferousness of what he described as its 'mutually intolerant cliques' were well founded and the Fund has a lively history. A rather desiccated summary of its early activities, including a useful list of grants, is The New Zealand Literary Fund, 1946-70 (1970), and statistical information on grants from 1973 to 1986 appears in Art Facts (Scotts et al., 1987). From the outset the Fund's primary purpose was to give 'grants towards publishing costs' and it restricted itself to publications judged to be of literary merit—largely fiction, poetry and literary periodicals—and excluding local histories, for which assistance was deemed to be available under the provisions of the Municipal Corporations and Counties Acts. Manuscripts were to be submitted to the Fund's Advisory Committee by publishers, not authors. O.St J. Vennell's Patronage and New Zealand Literature (1977) surveys attitudes to the Fund and makes some recommendations for its future resourcing and direction.

     By 1985, the proportion of its grants which the Fund gave to publishers had fallen from 60% to 20%, a matter on which Bridget Williams animadverts in 'Publishing and the Literary Fund' (1986). In 1988 the Fund and its Advisory Committee joined the Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council, becoming the Council's Literature Programme and Literature Committee. It further metamorphosed in 1995 with the rebranding of the Council's funding body as Creative New Zealand. The Literature Committee simply disappeared, without warning to its members. In 1993 the Council published a Research Report on the Literature Programme's Publishers' Survey , noting that 25% of its funding was in grants to publishers, and analysing 25 publishers' responses. In 1996 grants to book publishing fell to $18,000 from the previous year's $50,000 and Creative New Zealand set up a Task Force for Language and Literature to review its policies. Some recent events are described by Andrew Mason in Quote Unquote (1996).

     The government also assists publishers through annual grants made by the Historical Branch of the Department of Internal Affairs towards the publication of historical works, countering one of the biases of the Literary Fund. The Historical Branch also co-publishes many of the departmental and other organisational histories commissioned through its agency. Another example of this kind of indirect government subsidy is the publication of the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography by the Department of Internal Affairs jointly with a commercial publisher (described in 1995 by Bridget Williams). The Mäori Purposes Fund Board (and its predecessors) has made substantial contributions to the Polynesian Society and other publishers; centennial grants in 1940 and the sesquicentennial contributions of the 1990 Commission are other government sources of funding to assist publication. Details are to be found in agencies' reports in the Appendices to the Journals of the House of Representatives .

     Learned societies or institutions may also consider subsidising publication of books otherwise commercially unfeasible. Companies wanting to raise a monument to their history or to produce a gift for presentation may commission and fund publications to which they may offer a greater or lesser degree of editorial control. Substantial publications might appear in parts, in consecutive issues of journals such as the Transactions and Proceedings of the New Zealand Institute (later the Royal Society of New Zealand) or the Journal of the Polynesian Society , occasionally being reprinted as monographs. For many years this was the only way to get scholarly non-fiction published in New Zealand. Accounts are to be found in C.A. Fleming's Science, Settlers and Scholars (1987) and M.P.K. Sorrenson's Manifest Duty (1992). Mäori-language publications have relied heavily on subsidy, from H.W. Williams's Dictionary (1917) and Bibliography (1924) to the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography 's Mäori-language series, Ngä Tängata Taumata Rau (1990-). Funding options for small and independent publishers are discussed by Janet Pascoe in Endnotes (1996).

Restrictions to publishing

Aside from the topic of censorship, little focus has been devoted to forces—apart from the market—which restrict the publisher's freedom of action. Factors discouraging publication may include emergency legislation, such as restrictions on paper or other supplies in wartime. Nancy M. Taylor discusses censorship for reasons of national security and other World War II issues in The Home Front (1986). Some grades of paper were not unduly restricted: some British publishers, for example Penguin Books, found it convenient to print some of their titles for the local market in New Zealand during wartime.

     Legal restrictions, including libel and defamation laws, and, recently, privacy legislation, may restrict the publisher's actions. A controversial or sensitive text will be subjected to legal opinion and the author's contract will set out the parties' responsibilities. General guidance for authors and publishers to the libel, defamation and privacy legislation is found in some detail in Write, Edit, Print (1997).

     In Censored (1989), Paul Christoffel gives a brief historical treatment of the issue, noting that censorship in application to publishing in New Zealand has largely related to imported material. Most publishers have practised self-censorship. Perry's The Indecent Publications Tribunal (1965) notes the lack of any New Zealand legal text on the topic of 'literary censorship on moral grounds' and describes New Zealand's experimental 'expert tribunal', listing its decisions from 1963. There is no general study of the suppression of publications for political reasons. Taylor discusses wartime censorship in some detail, and Rachel Barrowman describes the case of the left-wing periodical Tomorrow in A Popular Vision (1991).

     The Copyright Act 1994 protects the holder's rights to the intellectual property contained in the creation of a literary work (in the broadest sense); the publisher's rights in the creation of an edition of a work are also protected. Plagiarism, if detected, may lead to legal proceedings and the destruction of the publication. The requirement that publishers must deposit three copies of each publication with the Legal Deposit Office of the National Library of New Zealand, although sometimes considered onerous, is unlikely in practice to affect the decision to publish. New Zealand is a signatory to the Berne Convention and is thus affected by any amendment to its provisions. Most recently the New Zealand book trade has been concerned about the effect of changes to the Convention allowing individual nations to determine their own policies on parallel importing. Australian legislation undermining publishers' traditional distribution monopolies was of particular concern. Submissions by book trade organisations on the Copyright Bill succeeded in having the status quo preserved for New Zealand in the 1994 Act. (A tacit agreement between publishers and booksellers enables a small number of books to evade restriction.)

     In 1988 the Book Publishers Association of New Zealand set up Copyright Licensing Ltd to negotiate licences for reprographic rights with educational institutions on behalf of publishers and authors, to collect fees locally and distribute income from overseas rights organisations to New Zealand rights holders. In 1996 the company collected over $700,000 and received over $100,000 from overseas reproduction rights organisations for distribution to local rights holders.

     Until the better-selling New Zealand authors could be persuaded that they might be equally well served by a local publisher as by their traditional London imprints, territorial rights were an issue affecting New Zealand writers rather than publishers. Publishers certainly did not expect their books to attain significant sales in other territories. For works for which an overseas market was conceivable, they might enter into a joint publishing arrangement with a British firm. Australasian or colonial rights might or might not be included, but from 1947 until the demise of the British Commonwealth Market Agreement in 1976, the carving up of the global trade in English language books between Britain and North America meant that a book by a New Zealand author published by an American publisher might never appear in bookshops in this country, and the opening up of the market has in effect made little difference to book distribution. The key effect of the closed market on New Zealand publishing is probably overall a positive one: multinational publishers operating in New Zealand who were taking advantage of their territorial monopolies may have felt philanthropic inclinations—or more likely discerned a marketing opportunity—and set up local publishing operations which have been critical to the development of the industry, and to New Zealand literature.

The publisher's tasks

Following delivery of the manuscript, the publisher goes about the business of getting it into print. Costings are prepared and marketing decisions are also made at this point. Some of the steps in this process are briefly described in handbooks such as Rogers (1994) and in more detail in Write, Edit, Print (1997). Most of these activities are now contracted out to agents beyond the publishing house, although the editor is often on the publisher's permanent staff.

Editorial tasks

Publishers generally have a critical input into the shaping of drafts before and after they agree to publish a manuscript. A reader or an editor will often, in consultation with an author, suggest and guide the recasting of a work and seek to find a mutually acceptable solution. The title 'editor' covers a range of activities, and a book will often have several editors. At the top of the pecking order is the commissioning editor, often designated Publisher, the one with the power to accept or decline. An important part of the role of this editor is to represent the publisher's interests to the author, and the author's interests to the publisher. There is an inevitable tension here, especially with small firms where the editor is in fact the publisher (though publishers may go to great lengths to nurture their stable of authors, in the small world of New Zealand publishing occasional allegations of unprofessionalism and broken, formerly warm friendships attest to the difficulties). In larger companies, the editor is often cast in the role of author's champion. The commissioning editor may 'structurally' edit the work, a time-consuming process which should ideally be carried out in close collaboration with the author; or may entrust the task to a more junior in-house, or increasingly a freelance, editor. ('Face to face—Ray Richards on Barry Crump' (1996) spills the beans on one of New Zealand's popular publishing successes.) Finally, every book requires the attention of a copy-editor.

     At the very least, the editor is responsible for ensuring that the manuscript which goes to typesetting is as correct in terms of factual detail (if that is appropriate), spelling and grammar as it is possible to make it within the constraints of time and budget allocated to the project; and ensuring consistency, or adapting the author's conventions to follow the publisher's house style, where the publisher considers this to be necessary or appropriate. A.H. & A.W. Reed's house style takes up three pages of the Reed Deskbook for Writers (1973), compiled by Reed's editor Group Captain Arnold Wall (not to be confused with his father, Professor Arnold Wall), specifying styles for punctuation, abbreviations, dates, numbers, capitalisation, quotations, and so on. Many publishers consider that internal consistency of a manuscript is usually sufficient, but may invoke the conventions of a particular style manual for certain features or elements of a work, such as bibliographies or proper names. In the case of multi-author works (such as the present one), a style manual becomes a more central issue.

     Apart from in-house style sheets—often unpublished or semi-published, such as Auckland University Press's The Preparation and Style of Manuscripts (4th ed. 1985)—publishers make use of a variety of more or less well-known manuals to ensure consistency within or between publications. Most of these derive from large overseas publishing firms, for example Hart's Rules (Oxford University Press), Judith Butcher's Copy-editing (Cambridge University Press), or the Chicago Manual of Style (University of Chicago Press). G.R. Hutcheson gives 'Some hints on copy and layout' in H.B. & J.'s Handbook (1938), although as a printer he is most concerned with clarity of instructions and design considerations. The only substantial New Zealand-published style manual was until recently The New Zealand Government Printing Office Style Book , first issued in 1958 and revised several times. A third edition appeared in 1981. It resurfaced in 1991 as The New Zealand Style Book and in its most recent incarnation is simply The Style Book (revised and expanded by D. Wallace and J. Hughes, 1995). Earlier issues carried an 'Official Section' devoted to the details of legislative publishing, and particular attention was given to the correct names of statutory bodies. A study of the various editions of this manual would also reveal interesting trends in the treatment of things characteristically New Zealand. Its current contents include guidance on punctuation, spelling, capitals, italics, abbreviations and symbols, measurement, nonsexist language and common confusions. Write, Edit, Print (1997), the most substantial style manual to be issued in New Zealand, is based on the conventions of the Australian Government Publishing Service Style Manual (5th ed. 1994), with substantial New Zealand input. Non-discriminatory language is one of its features, and it includes considerable practical detail on the making of books, from copy preparation to typesetting and printing.

Design and typography

Design includes format, choice of typeface, page layout, illustrations, and the design of the book jacket. One designer may be responsible for all parts of a book, but more frequently the cover will be designed separately (at a notably higher rate). The designer, whether freelance or in-house, is briefed by the editor chiefly responsible for the book. To a certain extent design decisions may be based on a house 'look'. Marketing considerations are also relevant here. Any discussion of the design aspects of publications is difficult to separate from considerations of typography relating to printing and production (see Chapter 2). Many amateurs and enthusiasts have taken an interest in this side of publication, and anyone who has ever dabbled in self-or desktop publishing appears to swiftly form firm opinions on typographical topics, particularly regarding legibility. Printers and designers notable for their influence in New Zealand include R. Coupland Harding; Denis Glover—whose correspondence with Oxford printer John Johnson is reproduced by D.F. McKenzie (1987)—Bob Lowry and others at the Caxton Press; and the historian J.C. Beaglehole. Many books are designed in-house and little study has been devoted to any development of a specifically New Zealand style. Dennis McEldowney attempted a survey of New Zealand trends in 'The typographical obsession' (1980). The recently instituted GP Print Book Design Awards (replacing the New Zealand Book Awards Production category—introduced to focus on design, but too broad in its criteria to accomplish this very successfully) offer its judge an opportunity to air opinions on design in book production. The thoughts of the first judge of the awards (Lindsay Missen) were published in 1997.

     In the days of hot lead, typesetting was an integral part of the printer's establishment (and a printer's house style was often as influential as a publisher's). With the shift to photosetting after World War II, a number of independent firms were established, and to get the best prices publishers often contracted typesetting and printing separately. The general availability of cheap professional-standard 'desktop' typesetting systems since the late 1980s, and the provision of manuscripts on computer disk, has seen much typesetting work carried out in-house.

     Proofing is usually a joint responsibility of author and publisher, defined in the author's contract. The careful reader may suspect that in many mass-market titles these days both parties have abdicated their responsibility and dispensed with this step altogether—or left it to the computer spell-check. The publisher's production editor will be responsible for checking the technical details of proofs—the grid, margins, folios, widows, orphans and the other arcana of page design. Instructions on proofreading are included in the style manuals cited earlier, and a rare and interesting historical glimpse into one house's practices is to be found in W.A. Glue's History of the Government Printing Office (1966).

     The relationship between publisher and printer is crucial to the quality of the finished product. A number of New Zealand publishers have also been printers (for example Caxton, Whitcombe & Tombs, and the Government Printer). Since the 1970s much printing of New Zealand titles has taken place overseas, particularly in Southeast Asia, for reasons of economics (especially in colour printing), quality assurance and the capacity to produce large casebound books or perform complex printing jobs. The arm's length nature of the relationship with an overseas printer obviously restricts communication and control and usually the delivery of Ozalids or dyelines provides the last opportunity for the publisher to rectify errors. The Industries Development Commission reported in 1978 on an appeal by the New Zealand Printing Industry Federation which wished to manufacture a greater proportion of New Zealand-published books ( Book Production Inquiry , 1978), finding that restrictive tariffs on overseas printing would be unlikely to help, and would also contravene the Unesco Florence Agreement on the importation of educational, scientific and cultural materials (1952) to which New Zealand was a signatory. The Commission suggested that printers and publishers should cooperate to develop a small group of specialist manufacturers. Publishers' submissions to the Commission suggested they were not unhappy with the status quo. Recently local printers have been able to offer more competitive terms and the advantage of proximity is clearly appreciated by many publishers, whether or not the quality of the printed product has any bearing on a book's sales.

Education and training

Most skills in book production came directly to New Zealand from Europe, especially from the United Kingdom. Later immigration of skilled tradespeople from Australia also had an influence, and the nature and extent of these importations and their effect on the development of a local publishing practice requires more extensive study. Training for publishers has traditionally been 'on the job', as tyro editorial staff worked their way up to positions of greater influence and responsibility. New Zealand publishers have come from a variety of backgrounds, including bookselling, printing, journalism, librarianship and accountancy, and have imported relevant skills and training. The arrival of the multinational publishing firms brought with it some trained and experienced staff, and occasional opportunities for reciprocal exchanges with other offices, often ground for the fertilisation of new ideas. More recently, formal training has been available from the Australian Book Publishers' Association, and since 1993 a one-year full-time course has been offered at Whitireia Community Polytechnic in Porirua. The scope of this course is indicated in its publication First Edition (1993, rev. ed. 1995) and its success may be gauged by the fact that a high proportion of its graduates have quickly found employment in the publishing industry. The Book Publishers Association of New Zealand also runs occasional seminars through its Local Publishing Forums.

     Training for editors is also available in a variety of night school, continuing education and WEA contexts; and the journalism courses offered by the University of Canterbury, Wellington Polytechnic and elsewhere include training in many of the skills of book publishing. A number of courses are listed in First Edition .

Publishers' organisations

Publishers have always worked together to a certain degree, to protect their common interests and those of other branches of the book trade, and to ensure their survival to compete against each other. The earliest formal publishers' organisation to be established in New Zealand was the British Book Publishers Representatives Association (BPRA), formed in the 1950s. In 1962 the New Zealand Book Publishers Association was created at a meeting in Wellington attended by 15 representatives of the commercial and university publishing houses, and a delegate from the Mäori Purposes Fund Board. Albion Wright of the Pegasus Press, Christchurch, was elected first president. A small council employed a Wellington accountant part-time as secretary.

     The BPRA and the NZBPA combined in 1977 to become the Book Publishers Association of New Zealand (BPANZ). The organisation moved to Auckland and Ray Richards, who had recently left Reeds, became its secretary. Gerard Reid was appointed the full-time director of the expanding association from 1979. However, in the later 1980s the economic downturn caused publishers to re-examine their expenditure on Association membership, for some members a hefty sum, as subscription levels rose with turn-over.

     For a number of years booksellers' and publishers' organisations had worked closely together, and by the mid-1980s were holding conferences at the same time, although separately. The preference of a number of publishers for the booksellers' organisation as a marketing body, rather than the BPANZ, was one of the factors, along with a reduction in membership charges, which led to the latter's retrenchment and the closure of its office in 1990. The BPANZ now operates from the office of Copyright Licensing Ltd (jointly owned by the BPANZ and the New Zealand Society of Authors). Combined book trade conferences have been held since the 1980s and Booksellers New Zealand, the flourishing booksellers' trade organisation, began to include publisher members in 1991.

     Other organisations include the New Zealand Book Trade Organisation, set up in 1968 by representatives of the NZBPA and the Booksellers' Association to promote their general interests, and now defunct. It issued The Booksell Report , a marketing, sales and promotions newsletter, from 1983 to 1986. The New Zealand Book Council was established in 1972 with a more general membership of those who have an interest in books. Brief notes on the trade organisations are to be found in Gordon Tait's summary of the New Zealand industry in The Book Trade of the World (1976) and in Scotts (1987).

     A brief history of the BPANZ appears in its newsletter The Publisher (no.12, 1995). The draft objects of the original NZBPA and the minutes of its first meeting are held at the Alexander Turnbull Library, and notes on its formation appear in Double (1969). The Association publishes a newsletter, entitled The Publisher since March 1994, formerly New Zealand Publishing News (1977-93). A useful discussion of the issues relating to booksellers' and publishers' organisations is in Part 4 of Anna and Max Rogers's Turning the Pages (1993).

     Three groups of the BPANZ's records, covering the years from 1970 to 1991, are held in the Turnbull Library's manuscripts collections. Current records are held by the Association. Data on the history of publishing, its economics and the issues it faces are to be found there. The records include minutes of council meetings, market research (especially of the educational market), statistical surveys of the industry, turnover information, annual conference records, material on major issues such as discounting, copyright, GST, censorship, and labour relations, as well as membership lists, and information on the size of the industry, personnel, and sales. They are a vital—and almost untapped—source for any serious study of the recent history of the New Zealand publishing industry. Lists of members (currently numbering about 70) appear from time to time in The Publisher .

Trade publications

Many trade publications are essentially ephemeral in nature. This makes them hard to find, but they are a central documentary source for any study of the publishing business. Substantial exceptions are the annual volumes of New Zealand Books in Print , issued under varying imprints from 1957. Catalogues issued by publishers, usually annually and usually midway through the publishing year, include announcements of recent titles, advance notices of new publications, and often a comprehensive backlist. Intended to be circulated to the trade, and in limited quantities for public consumption, their obsolescent character means that they are often discarded, even by their publishers. Some of those that have survived may have been conserved for extraneous reasons: the Turnbull Library catalogue lists a few, including A Caxton Catalogue (1938), and some Reed and Whitcombe & Tombs catalogues, but the best collections are probably to be found in library acquisition departments. Government organisations are more likely than commercial publishers to issue consolidated lists or bibliographies of their publications (for example Elaine Marland and Keith Pickens's NZCER, 1934-84 , 1985), although Reeds proudly included a comprehensive listing of their output in their two house histories. Whitcombes and Reeds also issued regular newsletters, Whitcombes from the 1930s until about 1970 under the title Books of Today . A trade journal, the Book Trade Monthly , appeared between 1979 and 1983 under various titles, latterly as the New Zealand Bookseller and Publisher . Some larger publishers have regularly or occasionally produced in-house newsletters: Longman Paul's Scuttle Butt is an example. Even more evanescent are publishers' advertisements, fliers, book promotions, and press releases, but any of these which can be found will provide evidence of value to the study of publishing.

Economics of publishing

'Publishing is a paradoxical business', remarked the author of the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research's report on the printing and publishing industry, H.M. Oliver, in 1976. Publishers saw themselves as a profession rather than merely a business enterprise, she noted, and the principal criterion of success might not necessarily be profitability. However there is no doubt that at a time of skyrocketing paper prices and other costs Stanley Unwin's apophthegm—that a publisher's first duty is to remain solvent—was foremost in their minds. The average salary of someone working in publishing was something like $3,000, Oliver remarked; the desirable print run for general books was probably close to 5,000 copies. The average output of established publishing houses was between 10 and 50 titles per annum, but four publishers of the 18 surveyed produced 600 titles between them, Reeds accounting for about half of these. Publishers expected to make a profit on the sale of the final 25% of an edition—an optimistic estimate compared with Ray Richards's in 1973, when he said that only the last 15% of the run would provide any return on the publisher's investment.

     Ten years later, according to the New Zealand Official Yearbook , the average print run of a general book was much the same, having peaked somewhere in the early 1980s, and was declining. Three hundred publishers were now thought to be active, but only about 100 were specialist book importers or publishers. By 1995 the average print run was down to 3,000 copies and by 1996 it was thought to be approaching 2,000. The Yearbook repeated the same statistics for the number of active publishers, although First Edition in 1995 noted a Statistics Department return of 165 (but was able to identify only 64 by name).

     These snapshots of some of the data relating to economic factors in publishing are notable for how much remains outside the frame. The Yearbook noted in 1990 that 'no thorough studies have been conducted of the book industry' and collected most of its information from the BPANZ. Official statistics on book production are buried in the Census of Manufacturing in conflated returns for Printing and Publishing. Apart from figures collected by the BPANZ and its predecessors and other professional bodies and published in trade newsletters, there is a lack of available data. BPANZ representations to the Statistics Department over a period of years for more meaningful categorisation of returns appear to have been unavailing. The book trade itself has generally been too busy to spend much time computing or compiling the figures of interest to the student of the economics of New Zealand publishing. Nevertheless publishers in unguarded moments have occasionally let slip useful and revealing details.

     Ray Richards's frank analysis of the New Zealand publishing situation in 1973 ('The man in the middle', 1974) identifies many of the issues central to a study of the New Zealand publishing industry in the era before the advent of the multinational enterprises had really made itself felt. He identifies a number of causes of publishing failure, not neglecting the crucial luck factor, sometimes called Publisher's Flair (or Nose). In the 'small-market, restricted-interest situation' that is the New Zealand book world, he stresses the importance of a strong backlist, and notes the inflation of the economic edition of a book from 1,000 copies in the 1930s to 4,000 in the 1970s. Summaries of statistics from 13 BPANZ members are appended. Any similar picture for later years must be pieced together from fragmentary sources.

     Publishing in New Zealand has sprung from a variety of structures. In earlier years family firms predominated, although they might go elsewhere for additional capital to facilitate expansion. Reeds, for instance, expanded by offering shares to a limited number of directors, staff, booksellers and authors in 1961. Sources of capital for firms may be private investors, a parent institution, a parent company or business group. In recent years the ownership of companies may have changed several times, through takeovers and mergers. The desire of a business conglomerate to divest itself of units not considered to be part of its 'core business' is a current trend which has already had some repercussions in New Zealand. Company structure will depend largely on its funding base and type.

     Information on book sales analysis, the relative turnover of titles from a publisher's backlist and frontlist, comparative sales of overseas and New Zealand titles, overseas sales of books and rights, trade and specialist sales, and analyses of market segments are to be found in publishers' files. Overall statistics for the trade appear intermittently in a variety of sources. Some of these are identified in the section on book buying in Chapter 4 of this guide. W.B. Sutch contributed 'An economic survey' to R.A. McKay's History of Printing in New Zealand (1940), and Alan Mulgan expressed his opinions in his 1946 survey. The only comprehensive census of book publishers, distributors and sellers was conducted in 1987. Some of its results are summarised in the Official Yearbook for 1990.

     A Unesco survey from 1982, An International Survey of Book Production During the Last Decades , records New Zealand book production statistics from 1949 to 1978, during which period New Zealand's annual book production rose from 277 to 2,079 titles. It appears to be unique as a comparative study. Oliver (1976) includes BPANZ statistics for 1970-74. Average edition size in 1973-74 was 7,430 copies, but no analysis enables this to be broken down into educational and other titles, backlist or new publications. Publishers' cost structures are, however, discussed, a rarer event. Trends in the demand for skilled labour were examined by the Labour Department in a brief survey, Printing and Publishing Industry , in 1984. Examination of Journalists' Union and Editors' Union awards and activities would make an interesting study. First Edition (1995) contains a section on book trade statistics which includes a publisher's cost breakdown (sourced to the Book Trade Conference), and a book costing—the formula by which a publisher checks the economic feasibility of issuing a title at a planned retail price (the example given would not see publication).

     The economic history of individual firms may be found in their records. Studies of individual companies (see the section following) provide some financial data but are unlikely to include balance sheets. In the case of active businesses, information on costing, discount structures, profit margins and financial management remains commercially sensitive and is likely to be kept confidential.

The publishers

The businesses

For over 80 years the New Zealand publishing scene was dominated by two firms. In 1882 the Christchurch bookseller George Whitcombe combined forces with the printer George Tombs, thereby controlling the means of production as a printer and having access to the market as a bookseller, an enviable position from which to strike out as a publisher. By the time Whitcombe & Tombs's publishing petered out following Bertie Whitcombe's retirement in 1963, their major competitor since the 1930s, A.H. Reed Ltd (better known by its imprint, A.H. & A.W. Reed), was a multinational publisher with an output of 300 titles per annum. Reeds, too, had its beginnings in bookselling—initially in mail-order marketing of religious material—entering publishing in earnest only with a co-production (with the printer Coulls Somerville Wilkie, and hedging their bets with the local university's support) of J.R. Elder's edition of The Letters and Journals of Samuel Marsden in 1932.

     Even the estimated 12 million copies of Whitcombe's story books published between 1908 and 1962 pales beside the unimaginable quantities of material published by the third major player of the era, the Government Printing Office. The Office had its origins in the earliest years of colonial government, in 1842, and after a hiatus from 1847 was re-established in Wellington in 1864. Its official function clearly marks it out as a special case but it is also significant as the country's only publisher of major reference works—and contract printer to New Zealand's largest publishing enterprise, the telephone directory.

     Publishing reputations are not made entirely by bulk of output, however. The social ferment of the 1930s was the fertile ground from which a number of significant publishing enterprises sprang, some longer-lasting than others. Aesthetic considerations underlay the enterprises of Harry H. Tombs—son of George—whose serials Art in New Zealand and Music in New Zealand , the annual New Zealand Best Poems , and some ambitiously designed monographs are landmarks whose present reputations might be cold comfort to their hard pressed proprietor who eventually had to give up the publishing business as hopelessly uneconomic.

     Like Harry Tombs, maintaining its viability with a commercially more robust jobbing printing sideline was the Caxton Press of Christchurch. Now of almost legendary status in New Zealand literary history, it first made an impact in 1940 with publications by Frank Sargeson and M.H. Holcroft. The name of Denis Glover is inextricably linked with this enterprise, as Bob Lowry's is with the short-lived Auckland student publication, the Phoenix , perhaps more notable as a literary historical landmark than as a publishing history event. Out of the spirit of the times and the cooperative bookshops set up by the optimistic socialist fellow travellers of the era arose the Progressive Publishing Society (PPS) in 1942, with ambitious plans and some notable authors (including Curnow, Fairburn, Holcroft and Sargeson) and a series, New Zealand New Writing , modelled on John Lehmann's Penguin New Writing in the United Kingdom. The PPS was not notable, however, for successful marketing decisions; and the commercial and political world was about to change again.

     After World War II, Whitcombe & Tombs's publishing successes in readers and schoolbooks were undermined by the ascendancy of the Department of Education's School Publications Branch, as well as by competing firms, notably Reeds. Caxton led in literary publications while Reeds dominated in popular reading. Hamilton bookseller Blackwood Paul, who had been on the board of the PPS, moved into publishing and on a shoestring budget managed a number of popular successes.

     The University of New Zealand Press was set up in 1947 after decades of dogged lobbying by Sir James Hight. The highlight of the 17 titles it issued before the University's dissolution into its constituent parts in 1962 may have been F.H. McDowall's Buttermaker's Manual (2 vols, 1953), although the title best remembered now is probably Keith Sinclair's Origins of the Maori Wars . Although other university presses were already established, Auckland's was the first to become a significant publishing force, from 1966 for a time in association with Oxford University Press, followed by Victoria in 1979 and Canterbury and Otago in the late 1980s. New Zealand's university presses have branched out from their academic roots and are notable for the general market titles included in their lists.

     Of the 20 New Zealand book publishers listed in Perry's 1952 New Zealand Writer's Handbook , only two names (Reed—misleadingly—and Caxton—barely) are recognisably identified with publishers active in New Zealand today, although some others may live on through their lists, now under other imprints. It was in the 1960s that overseas publishing firms began to make an impact on the local scene. William Collins (originally of Glasgow) had had a presence here since 1888 and had printed its popular British-originated titles in New Zealand as early as 1943. It did not, however, become a local publisher until the late 1960s.

     Blackwood & Janet Paul's absorption into Longman Paul in 1967 marked the first 'merger' of local publishing with major overseas interests. Other foreign-owned (i.e. British) firms who entered New Zealand publishing from the late 1960s or early 1970s were Heinemann Educational, Hodder & Stoughton, and Oxford University Press (a comparatively late starter). Through its parent company's ownership of Longman, Penguin absorbed part of a New Zealand list and made a consistent contribution locally from the mid 1980s (its first local venture was a reprint of David Yallop's Beyond Reasonable Doubt? , 1980).

     Another phenomenon of the 1970s was the entry of Paul Hamlyn into New Zealand publishing, in association with Whitcombe & Tombs, with two substantial series of part-works, New Zealand's Heritage (in 105 parts, 1971-73) and subsequently New Zealand's Nature Heritage (both edited by Ray Knox). Locally these might be seen as drawing on the model of the pictorial survey series Making New Zealand , produced as part of the government's centennial publications programme. However they were also following a worldwide trend of the time. With a high-powered advisory board chaired by J.C. Beaglehole, New Zealand's Heritage claimed to be the first fully-illustrated social history of New Zealand, and at a total of almost 3,000 pages, and with articles by many of the country's leading scholars, it was a significant event. (It included a survey of publishing by M.H. Holcroft in part 97.) There seems to have been no successor to these series (except perhaps for Weetbix cards), perhaps a publishing idea that has fallen out of fashion.

     Local publishers had continued to be active. Reeds had opened an Australian subsidiary but were bought out and dismembered in the 1970s, with the local publishing arm initially becoming Reed Methuen. In 1979 it became part of the aptly-named Octopus group. The imprint has now re-emerged as part of the Anglo-Dutch Reed Elsevier group in the 1990s. Whitcombes merged with the printer Coulls Somerville Wilkie in 1971 to become Whitcoulls, but vivisection has seen the backlist sold to Penguin and the portmanteau now adorns only bookshops, presently owned by the same United States based office products conglomerate which bought GP Print and GP Publishing (the former Government Printing Office before its scandalous privatisation). In 1989 the Government Printing Office had been able to claim that it was the largest New Zealand-owned book publisher and distributor.

     Other New Zealand firms—John McIndoe, Alister Taylor, Price Milburn and others—had briefer lives, some ceasing through choice, some through economic necessity. The tenacious Bridget Williams (of Port Nicholson Press, then Allen and Unwin New Zealand, then Bridget Williams Books and now with Auckland University Press); David Bateman; Dunmore Press of Palmerston North; Ann Mallinson (Mallinson Rendel); and Bob Ross and Helen Benton (currently Tandem Press) are among the relatively long-term survivors of an increasingly competitive environment, where overseas boardroom machinations or trends in business philosophy can wipe out a household name from half a world away.

     The history of Mäori language publishing is another story, where factors other than economics have played an important part. From missionary beginnings it has survived 150 years of indifference and manipulation, if not outright suppression. Government and institutional support has enabled the undertaking of some large scale works, from the Mäori Bible and the Williamses's Dictionary via Apirana Ngata's Nga Moteatea to the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography 's Mäori-language series, Ngä Tängata Taumata Rau . Recently, independent Mäori language publishing has re-emerged, with the production of educational and children's books to the fore. The award winning Huia Publishers are a notable example (examined by Helen McLean in Endnotes , 1997). Most works recently published have been translations, and there is an emerging debate about quality and sources of vocabulary.

     Dennis McEldowney's stylish survey in the Oxford History of New Zealand Literature in English (1991, to be updated for early 1998 publication) identifies the key businesses in New Zealand's publishing history and adumbrates the changing scene. His footnotes are the researcher's first signposts to an uneven infrastructure of further references. Tony Murrow and Julie McCloy provide brief historical overviews, and Jo Nicol a paper on Mäori publishing, in Endnotes (1995). The forthcoming Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature will also contain entries for the more 'literary' publishers. Specialist publishers in non-literary areas have commonly been overlooked. Such major enterprises as the business information publisher CCH, the medical publisher Adis, and the legal publishers Butterworths (part of Reed Elsevier) and Brookers, are beyond the pale to most chroniclers. Other non-literary types such as Moa Press (now part of Hodder Moa Beckett) and Rugby Publishing have also been politely ignored by the publishing historians.

     Whitcombe & Tombs published no company history, although notes for a planned centennial volume (by A.H. Johnstone) are extensively quoted by Anna and Max Rogers (1993). Records of Whitcombe's publishing from 1905 to 1986 are held at the Alexander Turnbull Library (where they were deposited by Penguin Books). Ian McLaren's Whitcombe's Story Books (1984) is the only systematic study of any aspect of the long-lived firm's output. Reeds produced two celebratory publications, The House of Reed (1957, written jointly by A.H. and A.W.) and The House of Reed, 1957-1967 (1968), a chronicle of a hugely successful decade, written largely by A.W. Reed. Considerable records, author files and book proofs are now in the Turnbull Library manuscripts collection. Elizabeth Caffin presented a paper on Reeds' golden age to the History of Print Culture conference in Dunedin in 1996.

     The records of the enterprising Harry H. Tombs Ltd are held in the Turnbull Library manuscripts collection, as is some Caxton Press material amongst Denis Glover's papers. Caxton is one of the Christchurch publishers treated in depth in Noel Waite's thesis 'Adventure and art' (1997); the others are Pegasus and Hazard (as well as the more marginal Hawk and Nag's Head presses). Rachel Barrowman has documented the history of the Progressive Publishing Society in 'Making New Zealand articulate' (1988) and her book A Popular Vision (1991). In 1995 an exhibition at the National Library Gallery of books published by Blackwood & Janet Paul was accompanied by a booklet by Janet Paul and John Mansfield Thomson, Landmarks in New Zealand Publishing . Some of Blackwood & Janet Paul's papers are held at the Turnbull Library, with some restrictions on access. Also restricted are Port Nicholson Press papers and other papers of Bridget Williams held at the Library.

     Government Printing Office records exist at National Archives, with lacunae caused by the periodic fires that have depleted all government records. Rachel Salmond examines the earliest years in Government Printing in New Zealand, 1840 to 1843 (1995) and an overall history was written by W.A. Glue (1966). The University of New Zealand Press receives a brief treatment by Hugh Parton in his history of the University (1979); an article by J.E. Traue in New Zealand Libraries (1963) provides a fuller account and a checklist. The Press's papers are at National Archives. Dennis McEldowney is currently working on the early history of Auckland University Press, and the state of the university presses is surveyed by Nicola Hill and Lis Roche in Endnotes (1995).

     Other house histories are few. The publishing house of William Collins issued a booklet to commemorate its centenary in New Zealand as Quenching the Thirst for Knowledge (1988). It includes a timeline of the company's history in New Zealand, whose milestones include the appointment of David Bateman as managing director in 1968 and Brian Phillips in 1978. Butterworths devoted a few pages to New Zealand ('the law publisher's paradise') in their 1980 history (by H. Kay Jones) and a subsequent (unpublished) account of their New Zealand activities has been written by Julia Millen. A detailed account of the specialist Wellington publisher Technical Publications is Francis D. Wootton's There Was a Tide (1992) and an article on a similar topic is Hugh Brown's on PSL in Endnotes (1996). The bare bones of businesses may be discerned in a number of sources: the BPANZ newsletter, The Publisher , includes profiles of publishing firms in many of its issues, and the company listings in Book Publishers and Distributors (1995-) are accompanied by brief descriptions. Authors' handbooks at various times have included lists of publishers with descriptive detail, and publishers are listed in such publications as the New Zealand Business Who's Who (the latest edition is the 38th, 1997) and New Zealand Books in Print .

The people

The key personnel in publishing are various in their roles: owners and proprietors, managers, editors, accountants, designers, typesetters, sales-persons, and so on. In the 19th century they were likely to be involved in other activities besides book publishing—in allied trades such as printing or bookselling, or in other kinds of business. For researchers seeking, in the first instance, to identify the individuals who have been involved in publishing, general sources such as directories and electoral rolls may be painstakingly combed. Published around the turn of the century, the Cyclopedia of New Zealand , in six volumes divided regionally, provides a useful index of professions and trades under whose heading for 'Printers and Publishers' some of the pioneers will be found. Newspapers are also indexed here.

     In the earlier decades of European settlement in New Zealand after the missionary era, many newspaper proprietors dabbled in publishing. A number of them appear in G.H. Scholefield's Dictionary of New Zealand Biography (1940), and even more in the first volume (1769-1869) of the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography (1990), where they can be located through its Categories Index: headings for Commerce, Trades and the Press contain reference to individuals active in publishing. Key individuals in this period include the newspaper publishers and proprietors W.E. Vincent, Barzillai Quaife, Julius Vogel, Samuel Revans and John Williamson, some of whom are better remembered for their other—mainly political—activities. Henry Wise the Dunedin directories magnate, the pamphleteer and controversialist J.G.S. Grant, and Pätara Te Tuhi, editor and publisher of the Mäori King's newspaper Te Hokioi , are other notable figures. In the later decades of the 19th century the 'rag-planters', founders of provincial newspapers, proliferated. Ross Harvey's work on these individuals includes a substantial number of biographies published in 1993 in the DNZB 's second volume ( 1870-1900 ). Other prominent figures who appear in this volume are the publishers J.R. Blair, W.R. Bock (of Bock & Cousins, lithographers), Henry Brett, G.T. Chapman and the Wanganui publisher A.D. Willis.

     It is not until the early 20th century that the founders of the modern publishing industry appear. Who's Who in New Zealand , published from 1908, is the standard biographical reference for succinct information about individuals. George Whitcombe and George Tombs left no memoirs, but vivid impressions are recalled by former employees in Anna and Max Rogers's Turning the Pages (1993). Bertie Whitcombe, George's son, a fixture at Whitcombe & Tombs for more than 70 years (managing director for 41 of these, from his father's death in 1917) is the central figure in an unpublished centennial history by Arthur Johnstone, who joined the firm as office boy in 1909. Dennis McEldowney has contributed an entry on Bertie Whitcombe to the DNZB (vol.3, 1901-20 , 1996). Whitcombe's editor from 1901 to 1907, James Hight, is better known in his academic context. His successors Arnold Shrimpton, Carl Straubel and David Lawson are more elusive, perhaps partly a consequence of the retiring, or at least back room, nature of the editorial profession.

     A.H. Reed founded his Sunday School Supply Stores in Dunedin in 1907, although he did not begin publishing pamphlets until 1922 and ventured into books ten years later. He and his nephew A.W. (Clif, short for Wyclif) were better historians than their erstwhile competitors Messrs Whitcombe and Tombs. Besides the company chronicles mentioned already, A.H. produced an Autobiography (1967), and the prolific Clif (author of 160 books by 1966, to Uncle's 85) wrote a memoir of A.H., Young Kauri (1975), and Books are My Business (1966) for a British publisher's careers series. Elizabeth Caffin has contributed an entry on A.W. to the DNZB (vol.4, 1921-40 , forthcoming). Both A.H. and A.W. have entries in A.H. McLintock's Encyclopaedia of New Zealand (1966), the only publishers who do.

     To the activists of the new socialist and radical movements in the early 20th century, the printing and publishing of their message was a central concern. These include the Romanian-born W.P. Black and radical printing tradesmen and unionists J.T. Paul and R.S. Ross, all of whom appear in the DNZB (vol.3, 1901-20 ). The entrepreneur publishers Bertie Whitcombe and A.H. Reed sit perhaps uncomfortably alongside them.

     Further information on individuals is to be found in general biographical sources such as the Alexander Turnbull Library's Biographical Index on Microfiche and New Zealand Biographical Clippings, 1890-1988 (also on microfiche, both 1997), the National Library's later computerised indexes, and G.R. Macdonald's 'Dictionary of Canterbury biographies' at the Canterbury Museum ( Index on microfiche, 1987). Much biographical information can be gleaned from trade publications, the papers and records of publishing houses and the histories of firms and organisations. The Reed histories (1957 and 1968) contain lists of some staff, as does Glue's History of the Government Printing Office (1966). Other worthwhile sources of information on individuals include Rogers (1993), The Oxford History of New Zealand Literature in English , The Book of New Zealand Women (1991)—see the subject index under 'Literature and Scholarship' for editors—and the forthcoming Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature . The Dictionary of New Zealand Biography's database, accessible to researchers on application, contains data on many individuals who do not find a place in the published volumes. The fourth volume in the series, to appear in 1998, will include some of the figures who first made their mark in the third and fourth decades of the 20th century. The diverse sampling of those involved in publishing includes Leo Bensemann, Denis Glover, Bob Lowry, Harry H. Tombs, Henry Kelliher and the aerial photography publishing pioneer Leo White.

     People in the broader cultural sphere who had an influence on aspects of the development of New Zealand publishing include the prolific scribblers James Cowan, Johannes Andersen, Pat Lawlor and Elsdon Best. All have collections of papers in the Alexander Turnbull Library. Women in publishing have been less effectively documented, despite the preponderance of women editors and publishers in many present day firms. Sources include the Herstory diary in general and the diary for 1988 in particular, and articles in Broadsheet by R. Taylor (1982) and P. Joyce (1985). (A cumulative name and subject index to Herstory was compiled by Kathryn Peacocke in 1990.)

     Publishing's denizens may wield unbridled power in their shadowy enclaves but unless their reflected glory may sell a book they are inclined to shun the spotlight. Trade literature is the place to find out about these enigmatic figures. Since 1994 a series of 'Profiles from the Trade' compiled by Whitireia Publishing students has been an occasional feature of the BPANZ's newsletter The Publisher . Those profiled so far have included Wendy Harrex, Daphne Brasell, Tony Harkins and Ray Richards.

     The richest lode for information about people in publishing is still largely unexploited. Many of the best sources of historical, practical and biographical information are still active in the trade. Ray Richards began at Reeds in 1936 as the office boy, became managing director and chairman of the firm's Australian subsidiary, left in 1976 to set up New Zealand's first literary agency and became the first executive director of the BPANZ. Now more or less retired from publishing (though still producing Pony Club Manuals with sales of over 100,000) he maintains his agency with over 100 clients. Hugh Price, formerly manager of Sydney University Press and proprietor of Price Milburn, continues to publish occasionally as Gondwanaland Press and assiduously collects and records information on New Zealand imprints. Others with long careers or broad experience include Fergus Barrowman, David Bateman, Graham Beattie, Helen Benton, John and Geoff Blackwell, Elizabeth Caffin, Christine Cole Catley, Jane Connor, David Elworthy, John Griffin, Wendy Harrex, David Heap, Bert Hingley, Ros King, David Ling, Ann Mallinson, Brian Phillips, Wendy Pye, Bob Ross, Rosemary Stagg, Alister Taylor, Brian Turner, Geoff Walker and Bridget Williams. Publishers may decry the desultory dabblings of effete academics and frivolous amateurs on the more salubrious margins of their risky and sometimes cut-throat business but few have had the inclination or the time to tell the story themselves. The researcher has a rich field for exploration.

General and regional studies

No comprehensive general study has yet been made of New Zealand publishing. Dennis McEldowney's essay in The Oxford History of New Zealand Literature in English (1991) is the closest to a general survey. Penny Griffith's preliminary bibliography, Printing and Publishing in New Zealand (1974), includes monographs published between 1890 and 1960. Blackwood Paul surveyed 'Publishing and bookselling' for A.H. McLintock's Encyclopaedia of New Zealand (1966), and Gordon Tait contributed seven pages on New Zealand to The Book Trade of the World, Volume II (1976). Ray Richards takes a practical view in 'The man in the middle' (1974). Some historical treatment is to be found in the publishing research papers by Tony Murrow and Julie McCloy in Endnotes (1995). Working Titles: Books That Shaped New Zealand , ed. Susan Bartel (1993), the catalogue of an exhibition held at the National Library of New Zealand, provides an illustrated but necessarily selective range of publications which have been influential for New Zealanders. Fergus Barrowman briefly analyses fiction production from 1979 to 1994 in his introduction to The Picador Anthology of Contemporary New Zealand Fiction (1996) and notes the contribution that publishing history has yet to make to the study of New Zealand literature.

     Publishing in New Zealand was initially concerned with producing utilitarian works. As the settlers were able to move from more immediate practical concerns—taming the land, providing shelter and food—so publishing altered, from publishing as an auxiliary activity of printers, to publishing as a separate specific activity. This is virgin territory for print culture historians and it seems especially significant to more carefully distinguish when the distinction between publishers, and publishing as an offshoot of printing, became clear cut in the New Zealand context. Also essential to explore is the role of publishers based elsewhere (notably London) who were closely identified with New Zealand. Aspects of the relationship between the British and New Zealand publishing trade are noted in Luke Trainor's contribution to this chapter about colonial editions and their role in New Zealand.

     McEldowney indicates another factor which needs closer examination, that of the nature of what was published and its change from works of a practical nature to an output covering a wider span. No studies have yet been made of this and the balance needs to be further explored: an analysis of imprints listed in Bagnall's retrospective national bibliography volumes is a possible starting point for the earlier periods.

     Few regional studies of publishing in New Zealand exist. More are needed; they are especially important for the 19th century before the communications infrastructure was sufficiently developed for New Zealand to be considered as a single unit. K.A. Coleridge's work on early publishing and printing in Wellington is a notable exception. Her contribution in this guide on regional publishing in Wellington, and George Griffiths's on Otago, suggest what needs to be done for other regions. Each takes a different approach to this topic: Coleridge suggests what needs to be studied to develop a fuller picture, whereas Griffiths has already done some of this detailed work for the Otago region and so can present a fuller description.

Colonial editions

Colonial editions at special prices were a form of British publishing of, chiefly, fiction for the colonial markets. Study of the system offers a window on the British dominance of book culture in New Zealand until the third quarter of the 20th century and what that meant for local print culture.

     The classic form of the colonial edition is exemplified by Rolf Boldrewood's A Colonial Reformer (London, 1890), number 116 in the Macmillan's Colonial Library series , which began in 1886. This is a copy of a novel purchased in New Zealand and its preliminary pages have on it the words 'This Edition is intended for circulation only in India and the British Colonies'. In form the book was like its British equivalent and was part of the same printing (indeed it became common for the sheets to be sold among publishers who then bound them for their own colonial series). Still this book, like almost all of its kind, was cheaper than the British version both in appearance—it had green cloth—and its noticeably lower sale price in New Zealand. British publishers delivered it to exporters at perhaps 50% of the price at which it was sold in New Zealand.

     As this suggests, the significance of the colonial edition was not so much in any differences in production, which became small after World War I, but rather in its place in the marketing of British books, with all that meant for the colonial connection. Nineteenth-century novels, in three volumes or one, were too expensive for mass sale in New Zealand or other colonies. Local booksellers, agents and wholesalers needed the inducement of a cheap edition, extended terms of credit and—an important point—access to the most recent fiction. The colonial edition met this need. It also suited British print capitalism of the late 19th century by providing a facility for extended and cheap production, linked to heightened international competition where safe colonial markets were of benefit.

     The first book issued in Macmillan's Colonial Library was Lady Barker's Station Life in New Zealand (1886). Boldrewood, the popular Australian novelist, and Barker (Mary Broome) did not, however, provide representative titles; most of the offering was popular British fiction put on the market at one title each fortnight from 1886 to 1913. Other British publishers also produced colonial editions: Bell was prominent, with 35 agents in New Zealand by 1901, as was Methuen with its editions of Kipling; some were paper bound, some cloth, some drab, like Macmillan, some gaudy with imperial symbols. The authors who were colonial, either by present or former residence, were only a sprinkling, regarded by publishers as interchangeable among their various colonies in providing frontier adventure in exotic settings. This may be seen from the reports of publishers' readers on New Zealand and on other colonial manuscripts submitted to them.

     Simon Nowell-Smith's International Copyright Law and the Publisher in the Reign of Queen Victoria (1968) alerted students to the importance of the colonial edition. The publisher John Murray was first in the field with his Colonial and Home Library (1843). It was triggered by British Copyright and Customs Acts passed from 1842 to 1847 which attempted to provide protection for British books throughout the empire. Although an interesting precursor, it did not have that key feature of later colonial editions, including Murray's own, that volumes were not to be sold in Britain. A nearer analogy is provided by Bentley's Empire Library (1878-81) and Colonial Library (from 1885) which developed in conjunction with Melbourne publisher George Robertson and his London agent, E.A. Petherick, another Australian.

     The trans-Tasman connection was important for colonial editions. British publishers regarded Australia and New Zealand as one market area, their branches and agents covering both. Wholesale and retail booksellers and publishers such as Robertson and Angus & Robertson of Sydney, operated in New Zealand, just as Whitcombe & Tombs established a Melbourne office. The New South Wales Bookstall Co. under A.C. Rowlandson published cheap local fiction which circulated well in New Zealand, reminding us that neither British publishers, nor colonial editions, had a total predominance. This framework gives added relevance to the recent and most complete study of the colonial edition, Graeme Johanson's Monash University doctoral thesis 'A study of colonial editions in Australia 1843-1972' (1995).

     There is some evidence that the Bentley initiative, as well as the Macmillan one and those that followed in the late 19th century, were influenced by fear of United States competition, both legitimate and illegitimate. Although world copyright was foreshadowed by the 1886 Berne Convention, the United States did not subscribe to the general exchange of the protection of original work of national authors. British publishers, such as Macmillan, set up United States branches to meet the provisions of United States copyright and to facilitate sales, and indeed some colonial editions were printed in the United States. However, although there are expressions of concern about American pirate editions circulating in New Zealand, for example a United States edition of Mrs Henry Wood's popular novel East Lynne (1880) sold in Christchurch at 1s 6d when the British price was 7s 6d, the evidence is fragmentary.

     Whatever the truth, Johanson provides evidence of a striking increase in book sales by British publishers to Australia and New Zealand in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He suggests that the volume of British book exports to Australia had by 1914 increased by 2.6 times the 1893 level, and raises the possibility of a proportionate increase for fiction, which might have been 20% of the total. Although it is not certain that this translates into the sale of colonial editions in Australia, let alone New Zealand where the calculations have not been done, Johanson makes a convincing case for the importance of colonial editions in Australia, and the shared market area suggests that the same would be true for New Zealand.

     The impact of World War I on colonial editions and British book exports to New Zealand is tolerably clear. Shipping was severely interrupted, costs of production rose with higher material expenses and wages, and binding costs, so important to colonial editions, trebled. Hardback colonial editions rose from 3s 6d to 6s and paperback editions were not produced. The formal differences between the British edition at 7s 6d and the local at 6s were reduced to a stamp notifying that they were colonial editions; the emphasis was now on the pricing arrangement, 'colonial terms'. British book exports to New Zealand fell sharply and the emphasis in the 1920s was on the protection of the booksellers' margins.

     New Zealand had, in proportion to population, a large number of booksellers. The Booksellers' Association, formed in 1921, organised effectively to defend margins against, on one hand, the higher British prices and, on the other, the competition from drapers' stores. Overall, they were in a position analogous to the British book trade 20 or 30 years before and sought the same solution, a Net Book Agreement, to ensure that there was a schedule of prices without discounts enforced by agreement of the British publishers and the New Zealand booksellers. The Booksellers' Association helped form the Australian and New Zealand Booksellers' Association (1924-31) to present a united face to the publishers. Typically, they protested about libraries purchasing colonial editions direct from London, but they also demanded from British publishers' branches in Australia, such as the Australasian Publishing Co., the right of New Zealand booksellers to buy direct from London rather than getting their books from Sydney. In 1923 they asked the Publishers Association in Britain to intervene to prevent exporters directly sending colonial editions to buyers in New Zealand at cut prices. By the end of the decade a fixed schedule of prices was enforced by local booksellers and British publishers. One aim was to have the books sell in Australia at British retail prices. Colonial editions were excluded since they cost less in Australia than in Britain. Colonial editions were only a part of the total of British books, but they had over many years set the pattern whereby recent colonial fiction retailed in New Zealand at or below the British retail price, and the export price from Britain was about 50% of the sale price in New Zealand.

     When the Edinburgh publishers, William Blackwood, produced two novels with Australian settings by Miles Franklin (Brent of Bin-Bin) in 1929-30, they set a price for T.C. Lothian, their agents who travelled New Zealand, of 3s 3d and a sale price of 6s. Lothian took its 10% and country booksellers would buy from wholesalers but there was a substantial basis here for an alliance between local booksellers and publishers at 'Home', especially when the British retail price was 7s 6d.

     The solidity of this linkage in the book trade is indicated by the way in

which it survived the storms of the 1930s: the Depression, a period of Australian tariffs on books to protect local printing, and devaluation of the pound. Colonial editions, now termed empire editions, or later overseas editions, did not have their previous formal prominence. Some publishers, Murray and Macmillan for example, continued with overseas editions, while others used the Readers Union which from 1935 published for distribution in the dominions. But the underpinning of 'colonial terms' continued and, as R.J.L. Kingsford in The Publishers Association 1896-1946 (1970) makes plain, British publishers regarded New Zealand and Australia as their exclusive market areas. There is no work on New Zealand equivalent to Johanson's, although the matter is dealt with in part in Anna and Max Rogers's Turning the Pages (1993) and by Dennis McEldowney (1991). There is also valuable material in The Book in Australia ed. D.H. Borchardt and W. Kirsop (1988).

     Johanson (1995) quotes a report for British publishers in 1929, 'the phrase "colonial edition" connote(d) not necessarily a distinctive format of a novel, but merely the practice of selling the ordinary English edition at considerably reduced rates (of a discount of 50%) for export purposes'. He traces the colonial edition through to its demise with the end of resale price maintenance in Australia in 1972. Before then, however, the writing was on the wall. In 1946, publisher A.W. Reed remarked that 'the dice are loaded against the New Zealander in his own country'. In Australia a former publisher, P.R. Stephenson, commented in 1962 that 'Australia remains a colonial dependency of Britain . . . In so far as the mind of a nation is conditioned by reading matter, the minds of Australians are conditioned 90% by imported books' (Trainor, 1996, Trainor, 1997). Similar issues may be raised concerning the impact of colonial editions on New Zealand authors. Some were published under this system and enjoyed a circulation that they might never have secured from local publication—Boldrewood provides an Australian example—but national literature may have been stunted by the British dominance.

     Colonial editions are an obvious agenda item for the study of print culture. Their significance will not be known until the detailed work is done, including that on periodicals and readership. Then we shall be better placed to understand the longstanding dominance of British books, the internal dynamics that made that possible in New Zealand, and what that might have meant for the colonisation of the New Zealand mind.

Regional publishing: Wellington

There has been virtually no work on patterns of publishing within the Wellington region, apart from the brief survey article by Coleridge, 'Printing and publishing in Wellington, New Zealand, in the 1840s and 1850s' (1986), which is primarily statistical in nature. McEldowney (1991) touches on the localised character of a number of the publishers that he discusses, but this must be extracted from the general discussion in the text. This section examines the studies that need to be undertaken to present a fuller picture of patterns of publishing within the Wellington region.

     The first need for any study of regional publishing is to identify the works and the publishers. Item by item scanning of The New Zealand National Bibliography to 1960 , ed. A.G. Bagnall (1969-85), and of the annual volumes of the 'Current National Bibliography' (1961-65), and New Zealand National Bibliography (1968-83), will provide a comprehensive list which can then be sifted to identify the specifically regional publishers, as distinct from Wellington-based national publishers such as the Government Printing Office. Assistance can be found in the bibliography compiled by Hilda McDonnell, Wellington Books (1992), covering Wellington City, the Hutt Valley, Porirua City, and the Kapiti Coast. McDonnell's bibliography reveals the range of the very many specialist works with a distinctively regional or local character published by organisations such as schools, churches and local history associations. It does not, however, cover non-historical works, such as poetry or educational material, which are also published by very localised specialist publishers. Searching by place of publication in electronic databases, such as the catalogues of some New Zealand libraries, will also assist.

     Publishers can be identified through business directories, such as the Universal Business Directory (1948-) and other directories which are listed in Don Hansen's The Directory Directory (1994). This exercise will identify a number of publishers based in Wellington, but will miss many of the small part-time and one-person operations which were sometimes significant commercial publishers in specialised areas. For the earlier years, up to perhaps 1930, it will be desirable to also identify the printers in this way, since nearly all except the largest publishers were chiefly printers or booksellers, possibly acting on commission from the author.

     Once publications have been identified, reviews of them may provide further information about the publishers and their activities. Reviews can be located by using the Index to New Zealand Periodicals (1940-86), Index New Zealand (1987-), and the specifically business index Newzindex (October 1979-). For the period before 1940 the only universally applicable method of locating relevant articles is by direct searching of the newspapers and periodicals, although some individual titles have been indexed (often selectively) in the Alexander Turnbull Library and other institutions.

Regional publishing: Otago

Dunedin's economic vigour enabled it to dominate southern publishing in the 19th century and lead the field in New Zealand. Of the 550 items listed in the New Zealand National Bibliography as being published south of the Waitaki River to 1890, 90% came out of Dunedin. Few of them carried a publisher's imprint, 10% carried no imprint at all, and most were attributed to a printer: 67 items for the Otago Daily Times, Mills & Dick 65, Fergusson & Mitchell 38, and so on. Printing in smaller towns was confined almost entirely to local newspaper offices.

     In subject matter, religion (66 titles) headed the list, publications on evolution, free thought and spiritualism swelling the total to 88 (several titles, fitting more than one category, have been counted into each category). Verse (31), fiction (17), and 'general literature' produced 89; local bodies and amenities 56, commercial 44, education 36, and politics 32. Clubs and societies, and personal pamphlets each produced 24. Such modern preoccupations as women, Mäori and sport together barely reached double figures.

     Local bodies, companies and organisations issued many of the items, and so did private individuals—mostly in testimonials, petitions and pamphlets, but also in more ambitious works. Victor Nicourt, French master at Otago Boys' High School, published the Otago French Primer for Beginners on his own behalf in 1866. The most prolific individual publisher, so prolific that he distorts the statistics, was J.G.S. Grant, who pumped out 60 literary, political and philosophical pamphlets.

     Though some Otago writers had work published abroad, there was a noticeable willingness to publish within the local community, for the gold-rushes enabled enterprising booksellers and printers to reach an adequate market. Title pages seldom stated when bookseller or printer was also doubling as publisher, but in some cases the distinction is clear. Ben Farjeon's 1866 novel Grif: A Story of Colonial Life was issued by 'William Hay, Publisher, Princes Street'; and the title-page of J.T. Thomson's Rambles with a Philosopher (1867) and the verso in John Barr's The Old Identities (1879) credit Mills, Dick & Co. as both publisher and printer.

     Booksellers such as Hay, J. Wilkie, James Horsburgh, Joseph Braithwaite and R.T. Wheeler developed publishing as a sideline. Horsburgh leaned towards religious and prohibition titles, but also issued Professor Black's Chemistry for the Goldfields (1885); Braithwaite favoured the Freethinkers. Wilkie, in 1888-89, published five competent works of fiction by four different authors, all using pseudonyms.

     Surviving information on print runs suggests that 19th-century publishing in Dunedin could easily be underestimated. Salmond's The Reign of Grace (Horsburgh, 1888) went through five editions, each of 1,000, in a year; Marshall's Homeopathic Guide , issued by a local pharmacist in 1884, had a print run of 5,000; and J.F. Neil's New Zealand Family Herb Doctor (1889) reached three editions and 5,000 copies by 1891.

     Dunedin publishing did not end with books and pamphlets, for newspapers and periodicals abounded. More surprising was the city's investment in directories. Local directories had already been issued before the 1870s by Lambert, Harnett, Mackay and Wise. But Wise's New Zealand Post Office Directory (1872) laid the foundations of an empire which took in New Zealand and parts of Australia. John Stone, who entered the field in 1884 and was outstandingly successful with his Otago-Southland directories, also serviced North Island markets.

     Though the bookseller R.J. Stark issued Thomson's A New Zealand Naturalist's Calendar in 1909, southern publishing in the early 20th century generally depended on printers. Newspaper offices such as the Southland Times, Gore Publishing Co. and the two Oamaru newspapers frequently issued in pamphlet form material from their own columns, and the Otago Daily Times published many notable regional histories: Memories of the Life of J.F.H. Wohlers (1895), Gilkison's Early Days in Central Otago (1930), Pyke's Early Gold Discoveries (1962), and the three-volume Advance Guard (1973-75), before its publishing department stuttered to a close.

     The rise of Whitcombe & Tombs changed the regional pattern considerably. George Whitcombe, bookseller, and George Tombs, printer, merged their independent Christchurch businesses in 1883 then took over a branch of Fergusson and Mitchell in 1890, creating a base in Dunedin. Bertie Whitcombe, general manager from 1911, opened bookshops throughout Australasia and soon dominated New Zealand publishing, particularly in children's books.

     Whitcombe's success, coinciding with a developing New Zealand identity, offered an example for other firms to emulate. Two such—Coulls Somerville Wilkie and the House of Reed—had Dunedin origins. The economic situation after World War I had caused disarray in the city's bookselling and printing trades. J. Wilkie and Co., taken over by the Somerville family in 1894, produced Wilson's Reminiscences of the Early Settlement (1912), but in 1922 amalgamated with Coulls, Culling & Co. to create the enlarged printing firm of Coulls Somerville Wilkie. As for the book trade, the only survivors in Dunedin were Whitcombe & Tombs, A.H. Reed and Newbold's secondhand bookshop. Reed, then a wholesaler of devotional literature, formed a partnership with his nephew and occupied a gap left by the financial collapse of the Bible Depot.

     In 1932 Coulls Somerville Wilkie and Reed jointly published Samuel Marsden's letters and journals on behalf of the University of Otago. Coulls Somerville Wilkie, more conscious of good design than many contemporaries, continued in book work until after World War II, but remained essentially printers. The two Reeds, however, became increasingly involved in authorship and publishing, and their Dunedin operation laid the foundation for a national publishing firm.

     Early in 1946, two years before the centenary of the Otago settlement, a special committee commissioned a history of the province, expanding the concept to include 20 district histories under the general direction of A.H. McLintock. The project was outstandingly successful: 16 ancillary titles eventually appeared, totalling some 25,000 copies; a volume in matching format was commissioned by Western Southland; McLintock added The Port of Otago (1951); and the Otago Daily Times ran a novel-writing competition which produced Georgina McDonald's Grand Hills for Sheep (1949). The body of Otago history almost doubled overnight. Unfilled gaps became apparent and the concept of publishing by community committee showed how those gaps might be filled.

     In another development the McIndoe family's long-established jobbing printing firm was led by John McIndoe junior, back from RAF service, into publishing from 1956. In the following 30 years until his retirement, McIndoe became one of New Zealand's best publishers, showing an awareness of literature and social issues. Significant works of poetry, novels, short stories and substantial histories of Otago and Canterbury, as well as booklets of charm and individuality, were produced. Generally southern publishing has been solid but unstylish, but John McIndoe had an eye for design and typography.

     In 1968 McIndoe also became publishers to the University of Otago Press. Prior to this, university publishing activities included those of the Bibliography Room which in the 1960s and 1970s produced booklets of verse by such writers as James K. Baxter, Höne Tüwhare and Ruth Dallas. An attempt in 1948 to establish a University Press came to nothing and though the Press adopted an imprint in 1959, its early titles never achieved viability.

     Under the editorial direction of first W.J. McEldowney and from 1988 Helen Watson White, and with production and distribution by McIndoe from 1968, more substantial works appeared. John Parr's Introduction to Opthalmology , feared uncommercial, turned out to be a runaway success. In 1993 Wendy Harrex was appointed to run the Press full-time on the lines of an independent publishing house, increasing output to 20 titles a year and broadening its range.

     Individual publishers, mainly of verse, appear from time to time. The most determined of them has been Trevor Reeves, of Caveman Press, who issued numerous booklets of poetry and crusading politics. But neither the individuals, nor such provincial newspaper jobbing offices as the Southland Times and the Oamaru Mail, both of which published books with short bursts of enthusiasm, have become full-time permanent publishers.

     In Invercargill, the Southland Times interest was taken over in the 1960s by Craig Print, its work in this field greatly expanding as Southland communities, following Otago's example, began producing many substantial local histories. In 1976 the company published Sheila Natusch's On the Edge of the Bush on its own behalf and has since maintained a steady output, mainly of history and non-fiction, and not restricted to Southland. It has now printed or published over 300 titles.

     Since the late 1970s Otago Heritage Books, functioning as both publisher and bookshop, has issued many titles on aspects of southern history, including the notable four-volume Windows on a Chinese Past (Ng, 1993-). Longacre Press, set up by McIndoe's former editorial team when that firm moved out of publishing, began operations with the sumptuous Timeless Land (1995). Its main thrust has been in the field of young adult fiction, and its products have been popular in Australia as well as in New Zealand.

     Marketing is a permanent problem for southern publishers. Population imbalance and transport costs meant that a publisher of McIndoe's standing found it barely possible to distribute good quality poetry nationwide. No southern publisher has tackled the national popular market front on. Craig Print and Otago Heritage design their output to markets within reach, Longacre aims for a niche market, and the University of Otago Press depends in part on its academic and textbook interests. Nevertheless, considering the region's small population, publishing in Otago and Southland has maintained quite remarkable vigour, particularly in the field of history.

Some categories of publication

The student of publishing in New Zealand is handicapped by the lack of bibliometric studies. There is, for instance, no equivalent for New Zealand of Simon Eliot's Some Patterns and Trends in British Publishing 1800-1919 (1994), a study which examines the size, patterns and nature of book production based on detailed statistical analyses of lists of what was published. We do not have for New Zealand any firm knowledge of quantities published, and what kinds of publications they were, beyond the most cursory information. Short surveys of some of the most important of the categories of publications produced in New Zealand form the bulk of this chapter. The selection of categories is not comprehensive: there is, for example, no coverage of map publishing. Nor is the selection balanced, and in this sense it reflects the current state of research into aspects of New Zealand's print culture.

Government publishing

From its earliest days the State in New Zealand has been a major publisher. The colonial government's first official notices were printed on the Church Missionary Society's press in early 1840; its first separately issued official Gazette came out towards the end of the same year. Rachel Salmond tells the story of those early and sometimes makeshift days in Government Printing in New Zealand, 1840 to 1843 (1995), drawing expertly upon archival sources. W.A. Glue's History of the Government Printing Office (1966) takes the narrative briskly forward more than a century. Glue's account focuses on personalities, equipment and buildings, but nonetheless makes the magnitude of the State's undertakings as a publisher clear. Its parliamentary publications kept citizens informed in great and sometimes crushing detail of their government's activities; its legislative publications guided citizens (or at least their lawyers) on their rights and duties; its departments became exemplary publishers in the fields of agriculture, education, statistics, science and health, with even occasional excursions into the world of arts.

     Unfortunately, the mass of material so produced over the years has been less than perfectly mapped. Alison Fields, writing in New Zealand Libraries (1995), noted that New Zealand is one of the few countries in the world to have national bibliographic coverage for monographs for the entire span of its written history. Yet, within this record, government publications are in fact a submerged, although substantial, part of a miscellaneous bulk. Navigational problems are acute. Guides include Kathleen Shawcross et al., A Guide to the New Zealand Primary Sources in the Davis Law Library (1977), C.L. Carpenter's Guide to New Zealand Information Sources Part V: Official Publications (1980), updated by Jill Best in 1994, and J.B. Ringer and C. Campbell's New Zealand Government Publications: An Introduction (1980). The Office of the Clerk of the House of Representatives has published the Users' Guide to Parliamentary Publications (1989). David McGee's Parliamentary Practice in New Zealand , first published in 1985 but revised and expanded in 1994, includes much incidental detail on the organisation and form of parliamentary publications. J.B. Ringer's An Introduction to New Zealand Government (1991) includes not only chapters on parliamentary, legislative and statistical publications, but also notes on publishing by local government and selected quasi-state organisations. The tripartite format of each chapter offers background information on the history, functions and structure of government, guidance on using related publications and lists of further references. This guide, however, like the others mentioned above, now badly needs updating, particularly in relation to the new MMP environment.

     The above guides are manuals of a kind, pragmatic in nature. This is also true of the few legal textbooks that give guidance on the availability of statutes, the most informative of which is perhaps J.F. Burrows's Statute Law in New Zealand (1992).

     Over the past decade attention has gradually turned from the practice of government publishing to its theory: from what is available to what should be available, and in what format. This has been in part inspired by the consequences of the major government restructuring which began in the mid 1980s. The deregulation of government printing in 1986, the sale of the Government Printing Office in 1989, and the continuing fragmentation of the public service have had a major effect on departmental and other government publishing programmes. Pleasance Purser's article 'Production, distribution and bibliographic control of New Zealand government publications' (1988) reviewed the scene after deregulation but prior to the sale of the Government Printing Office. D.I. Matheson's 'Access to New Zealand government information' (1988) reviewed current and potential problems of accessing information.

     It should be clear by now that there are large gaps in research on New Zealand government publishing. The bibliographic groundwork has not even been done. Some departments have issued spasmodic promotional catalogues of their publications; some have more or less regularly issued bibliographies or chronological lists (the Department of Statistics has been perhaps the most consistent performer here). However, few if any systematic and comprehensive bibliographies of any aspects of government publishing have been compiled, nor are satisfactory cumulative indexes available to the major publications.

     Apart from Salmond (1995) and Glue (1966), and a chapter on the Government Printing Office in R.A. McKay's centennial compilation (1940), little or no work has been done on the history of the government's involvement in publishing. This is especially true of departmental publishing. Few departmental histories make more than a fleeting mention of their department's publishing programmes. This is the case even for the publicly-funded scientific institutes, one of whose primary functions is, presumably, to publish. A rare exception, Rose-Marie C. Thompson's The First Forty Years: New Zealand Oceanographic Institute (1994) still devotes no more than two pages to the topic. A more notable exception is Sir George Wood's Progress in Official Statistics 1940-57 (1976).

     No work at all has been done on the publication practices of local and regional government, or state owned enterprises; little research has been done into the accessibility and usefulness of government information in print form. R.C. Lamb, writing in New Zealand Libraries (1958), examined the idiosyncrasies and shortcomings of a cumulative index to the Appendices to the Journals of the House of Representatives (matters left uncorrected in subsequent indexes). Genealogical researchers such as Denis Hampton and Alan Tunnicliffe have focused on the historical uses of major publications to family historians—uses incidental to the original purposes of publication. David Hay in What About the Users? (1991) suggests that public sector reports in today's formats are of little use and little valued by external users (that is, users other than parliamentarians and their staff).

     The ideology underlying government publications has also been little studied. The Education Department's long term flagship, the School Journal , is one exception, with a pioneering essay by David Jenkins on its social attitudes (1939), and a history by P.R. Earle (1954), followed by an article by B.P. Malone, 'The New Zealand School Journal and the imperial ideology' in New Zealand Journal of History (April 1973), and more recent unpublished work by Rebecca McLennan and Michael Reid. Now that government departments and agencies have more overtly than ever taken up advocacy roles, similar service could well be done for virtually any of them. A framework for future study is potentially provided by Judith Urlich's thesis 'Government communication in New Zealand: changing roles and conventions' (1995), although this pays little direct attention to individual publications or publications policies. The field is therefore open.

Science journal publishing

Scientific publishing is defined as the formal communication across time and distance of methods, results, and implications of scientific research. Its purpose is both deposition (archival aspects) and transmission (awareness aspects); fellow scientists (peers) are the prime target audience for science publications which comprise mostly articles ('papers') in learned journals.

     In New Zealand, Mäori had of old a practical interest in scientific matters (horticulture, fishing, medicine, geography) but without a written language their findings cannot be considered published. It was not until this century that their orally transmitted knowledge started being committed to the scientific record.

     Although sighted in 1642 by the Dutch explorer and trader Abel Tasman, New Zealand was not visited by western scientists until 1769. They recorded their observations in discovery logs, made public upon return to their homelands. These publications, mainly of a descriptive nature in the fields of plant and animal taxonomy and geography/geology, are exemplified by the logs of Captain James Cook, and of the scientists Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander who accompanied him. The first book published about New Zealand was an account of Cook's first voyage by John Hawkesworth (1773) based on material from the journals of Cook, Banks and others aboard HMS Endeavour . Ernest Dieffenbach's Travels in New Zealand was the first general scientific account of the country. Published in London in 1843, it attracted the attention of other scientists and travellers from the United States, France, Germany, and Austria. Consequently many detailed reports, books, and articles concerning scientific matters relating to New Zealand appeared from Northern Hemisphere publishers.

     Since the early colonial days (the mid 1800s) New Zealand has had an active scientific community. Scientific societies were formed in nearly every main centre and several major museums and universities were built. A national scientific academy was established in 1867. Initially named the New Zealand Institute, in 1933 it became the Royal Society of New Zealand. Sir Charles Fleming published a centennial history of the Society: Science, Settlers, and Scholars (1987). In it he lists one of the main reasons for federating local societies under the New Zealand Institute as 'to give a publication medium for New Zealand scientific research, such as none of the individual societies could afford'.

     The early New Zealand Institute publications were in two categories, published in a single volume: Proceedings , defined as 'a current abstract of the proceedings of the Societies . . . incorporated with the Institute' and Transactions , 'comprising papers read before the Incorporated Societies'. In 1885 the Board of the Institute also resolved to publish monographs, eventually bringing out a Bulletin series as well as occasional publications. Dissatisfaction with the annual Transactions (particularly the lag between submission and publication) led to the establishment of a quarterly Journal of Science in Dunedin in 1882. Too few contributors and subscribers meant that this journal folded after three years, to be resurrected in 1891 but lasting only one more year. In 1887, the New Zealand Medical Journal was established. It ran for ten years, was briefly discontinued, then resumed under the same name (restarting with vol.1) in Dunedin in 1900, where it is still being edited.

     The establishment of the Polynesian Society's Journal in 1892 was followed by that of the New Zealand Journal of Agriculture in 1910, and by the New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology in 1918. Neither of the latter has survived, but a greater variety of more specialised journals, research reports, and bulletins has emerged from various sources.

     The Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR) was established in 1926. By the Scientific and Industrial Research Act 1926, it was given a statutory responsibility for the dissemination of scientific research. It took over publication of the New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology (established in 1918) from the Board of Science and Art, established in 1913 primarily to print scientific papers. The editor of the New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology was also responsible for a Bulletin series initiated by the Board of Science and Art, the Annual Report of DSIR , and Geological Bulletins of the Geological Survey, previously published by the Mines Department. The Geological Survey had been established in 1865 and, with the Government Analyst and the National Museum, was part of the first government-funded scientific organisation in New Zealand. It became a prolific publisher of New Zealand scientific books and maps.

     Between 1938 and 1957, the New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology published alternating Parts A (Agricultural Section) and B (General Section). Science and scientific output greatly expanded in New Zealand, especially at universities which added active research to their teaching obligations. To provide publishing avenues for this expanded research effort, in 1958 the New Zealand Journal of Science and Technology was replaced by the New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research , the New Zealand Journal of Geology and Geophysics , and the New Zealand Journal of Science . Soon after, additional journals emerged:

      New Zealand Journal of Botany (est. 1963)
      New Zealand Journal of Marine and Freshwater Research (est. 1967)
      New Zealand Journal of Experimental Agriculture (est. 1973)
      New Zealand Journal of Zoology (est. 1974)

The relative importance of the generalist New Zealand Journal of Science decreased, and in 1984 it was replaced by the New Zealand Journal of Technology ; it folded in 1987.

     A perceived overlap between the New Zealand Journal of Experimental Agriculture and the New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research was remedied by changing the name and content of the former to New Zealand Journal of Crop and Horticultural Science in 1989. The New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research then concentrated on pastoral and animal research.

     Agricultural extension had been a prime role for the New Zealand Journal of Agriculture (1918-88), originally established as Journal of the Department of Agriculture (1910-12), later the Journal of Agriculture, NZ (1913-18). This journal remained with the Department of Agriculture until 1965 when a commercial publisher gave the contents a more popular focus. After a series of takeovers, it finally disappeared.

     Within the DSIR, direct responsibility for publishing had mostly resided within its head office, since 1944 as a separate unit, from which a Science Information Division emerged in 1975. The Science Information Division undertook to produce the Department's journals and bulletins series, as well as a variety of other science publications. The publications were produced using hot-metal typesetting and printing, predominantly at the Government Printing Office. Although established in 1864 as the Government Printing and Stationery Department for parliamentary documentation, the Government Printing Office became also an important publisher of science monographs, such as the monumental Flora of New Zealand series.

     In the late 1970s and early 1980s, computer developments and applications started to have an increasing impact on New Zealand publishing and on the scientific community. The Government Printing Office introduced computer typesetting in New Zealand in 1976. Developments in association with the Science Information Division of DSIR resulted in the ability to prepare input files outside the printing plant, for example at the Hansard office. This was a world first. The cost-effectiveness of this and other developments undoubtedly helped to further centralise the production of DSIR journals, bulletins, and other departmental publications.

     In 1989, following major changes in government structure, DSIR had to compete for research funds, which forced it to streamline its operations, including publications. Reorientation placed greater emphasis on the profitability of publishing scientific and popular-scientific books. The name of the unit was changed to DSIR Publishing in 1988. As DSIR Publishing now had to charge other divisions within DSIR and outside organisations for its services, scientific publishing became less centralised, even within the Department. For example, the Entomology Division assumed full production control of its monumental Fauna of New Zealand series. The 1989-90 financial year saw the biggest reorganisation of DSIR since 1926. As a result DSIR Publishing's books enterprise was closed down entirely, leaving only the journals and the Alpha series of educational leaflets. Printing was tendered to commercial printers, since the Government Printer, now GP Print, had been privatised.

     It was mainly for financial reasons that the DSIR in 1990 sought to distance itself entirely from its research journals. A Cabinet Committee on Education, Science, and Technology indicated that the potential of the journals should be investigated. After wide consultation with the scientific community, officials from DSIR and the Ministry of Research, Science and Technology found that publication of New Zealand journals was justified on several grounds, which included the 'profound' influence they have on the quality of research, and 'preservation of knowledge'.

     As a result of the external evaluation, the six journals were transferred to the Royal Society of New Zealand, separate from any government department, on 1 July 1991. The unit started operating under the banner 'Scientific and Industrial Research Publishing of New Zealand', SIR Publishing for short. With the transfer came an allocation of funds (supplementary to subscriptions) for three years. Funding has continued for these New Zealand science journals through an annual contract with the Ministry of Research, Science and Technology.

     Now the major national scientific publisher, the Royal Society continues to produce the quarterly Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand (successor to the Transactions 1869-1971) and the annual Proceedings of the Society, alongside the 'ex-DSIR journals'. Although experiments with various electronic formats for journal distribution have been conducted using CD-ROM and the Internet, the principal form of science communication remains that of articles printed in its seven quarterly scientific journals.

Newspapers

Newspapers assume special significance in the New Zealand publishing context. Unlike the situation in Britain, where book publishing was established well over one century before newspapers were produced, in its New Zealand colony newspapers came first. J.E. Traue comments, 'If New Zealand's cultural topsoil was deficient in monographs, it was enriched by the newspaper printing press,' and he demonstrates this by citing numbers of newspapers produced in New Zealand: 16 by 1851; 28 by 1858; and between 1860 and 1879, 181 newspapers were founded (1985, pp.12-13). The study of newspapers in New Zealand, especially for the 19th century, therefore assumes special significance in the history of print culture in New Zealand.

     This section is primarily concerned with publishing of newspapers, rather than with production aspects (see Chapter 2) and with the role of the media in the political process; note, however, that this distinction is on occasion difficult to draw and so the user can profitably read both sections. It is also heavily weighted to 19th-and early 20th-century newspapers, the period which has been most closely examined. Research into more recent aspects of the newspaper press have been largely concerned with control and ownership of the newspapers and with their role in the political process, which is not the primary interest of this section.

     The student of the history of New Zealand newspapers needs to be constantly vigilant about distinguishing fact from fiction, and this is as true for recent material as it is for the 19th century. Journalists and editors, perhaps because their stock in trade is skill with words, manufacture their own myths and history rather more than other writers.

     A considerable amount of information about newspapers is to be found elsewhere in this guide. Note in particular the section on Mäori newspapers later in this chapter, and also the sections in Chapter 6 which note newspapers published in New Zealand in languages other than English and Mäori.

History

New Zealand, as a British colony, took its models from that country and retained strong links to it. Newspapers were no exception. British immigrants were advised to arrange, before leaving, 'to receive a file of some weekly London paper' (Wakefield, quoted in Hankin, 1981, p.39); this provided important links to 'home' and reinforced the colonial's ties with Britain. However, no research has been carried out to establish more precisely the similarities between the British models and their New Zealand offshoots, nor to ascertain when and how divergence from the models occurred. Works about British newspapers such as Brown's Victorian News and Newspapers (1985) provide a starting point for such research, and Australian models should also be examined for similarities and differences.

     Harvey in 'Formula for success' (1993b, pp.208-209, based on Day, 1990) has characterised the establishment of newspapers during this period. In the 1840s and 1850s newspaper ownership was unremunerated, political advantage rather than financial profit being the main incentive. During the 1860s many newspapers were established with financial profit as the main motive: both large city dailies and small circulation weeklies were feasible, and newspaper management became a full-time occupation. The 1870s saw a rapid expansion in the number of titles and the opening of the trans-Tasman cable in 1876; and in the 1880s the telegraph and other factors resulted in a uniform news service and newspapers played a role in establishing the national identity.

     Newspapers were initially established in New Zealand as government organs, whether directly or indirectly subsidised, and were centred at or close to the main areas of European settlement. Government control of these early newspapers is an essential element to understand and has been examined in several studies, most notably in G.M. Meiklejohn's Early Conflicts of Press and Government (1953) and Rachel Salmond's Government Printing in New Zealand, 1840 to 1843 (1995). A still useful study of these early newspapers is Patricia Burns's 1957 thesis 'The foundation of the New Zealand press, 1839-50'. More recent is Patrick Day's The Making of the New Zealand Press (1990) which examines the shift of newspapers from a primarily political role to become profit-oriented businesses.

     As European settlement expanded and as land communication links (rail and road) were gradually developed, more newspapers were established. A newspaper was regarded as an essential requisite of every progressive town, as this 1875 rhyme suggests: 'Our printing press, telegraph, and steam, / Proclaim our town's advance no idle dream' (Hogg 1875).

     Newspapers (many of them short-lived) were established as a response to the sharp increase in immigration which followed the discovery of gold; the phenomenon of the goldfields newspaper in New Zealand has been briefly examined by Harvey (1994) but deserves more serious attention. The arrival of the telegraph in the mid 1860s caused a major shift in focus from local opinion to news from a wider catchment area, and the inclusion of overseas news became feasible when a cable link to Australia was established in 1876. Day (1986) notes some aspects of this in 'Julius Vogel and the press'. The 1860s and 1870s saw the founding of the major dailies, most of which are still publishing today.

     Surprisingly little attention has been paid to the period of consolidation which occurred from the 1880s. As settlements became more established, their newspapers became more stable. Chains of newspapers were now feasible in country areas such as Taranaki and Southland where there was sufficient population density to support them. They were established by such 'rag-planters' as Joseph Ivess and J.H. Claridge: Ivess is examined by Harvey (1988), and Claridge's activities are noted by C.J. Claridge (c.1965), J.C. Claridge (1975), and Stella Jones (1979, 1980). The consolidation extended also to the main population centres where some vigorous battles for circulation ensued during this period. The 1890s saw the introduction of technological innovations, chief among them mechanical typesetting machinery (primarily Linotypes), which had a major impact on the personnel of the newspaper trade and on the trade organisations. Curiously, this appears not to have been studied in the New Zealand context.

     Geographical conditions in New Zealand were particularly conducive to the establishment of small-town newspapers. (A study of the relationship between New Zealand's geography, its settlement patterns and its newspaper press is well overdue.) A short tongue-in-cheek but informative introduction to the difficulties which small-town newspaper operators faced is found in 'New Zealand's country press' (1906). This attributes the high rate of failure of such enterprises to lack of capital, especially during the initial period until a new country paper became firmly established.

     The weekly newspapers, which were usually particularly targeted to rural areas, were influential—older New Zealanders will recall the pink covers of the Auckland Weekly News —and require further study. No serious research has been carried out into the contents of these or into their influence, for example as a factor promoting social cohesion. An interesting small study could also be made of the uses which were made of these weekly papers beyond those immediately intended: E.H. McCormick, reminiscing about his childhood, noted:

     Up to World War II, the newspaper in New Zealand was essentially of two kinds: a large metropolitan paper, owned by a company or perhaps still under family control; or a small or medium-sized country paper, perhaps issued daily but more likely issued bi-weekly or tri-weekly, and very likely to be under the control of a working proprietor in the case of the smallest papers or, in larger towns, family owned and perhaps also family operated. World War II changed this. Skilled personnel was in short supply and many newspapers closed, never to reopen. (This, too, has not been well studied: for instance, a series of case studies to more closely identify the forces which caused closure could be carried out.) After 1945 the ownership of newspapers gradually consolidated into the hands of a small number of companies.

     Other factors also reshaped the face of newspaper publishing in New Zealand, although few of these, if any, were unique to New Zealand. Overseas ownership of the media was hotly debated, especially during the early 1980s. Competition from other mass media was of concern. Technological change, this time from hot-metal to electronic typesetting, and reskilling caused considerable anxiety in the newspaper trade, as Hill and Gidlow (1988) demonstrate. The rise of free community papers ('shoppers') is a phenomenon which warrants further study. The combination of changing demographics and changing economics of production have resulted in casualties, recently the Manawatu Herald , well over one century old, in May 1997.

     Media comment about newspaper publishing in the 1980s and 1990s is plentiful and is usually focused on the question of ownership and control, especially in relation to ownership by overseas companies or by investment houses. Some of the most informative of this writing is the media comment found in the monthly magazines North and South and Metro . Examples include Pat Booth's 'Catch a falling star: Christchurch's newspaper blues' (1991), Carroll du Chateau's 'Why two old bodgies couldn't save the Star' (1991, about the Auckland Star ) and Jim Tucker's 'Sunday snooze' (1994, about Auckland's Sunday newspapers). The indexes to current New Zealand periodicals can be used to identify similar material.

Sources

Harvey (1991a) summarises the history and current state of the bibliography of 19th-century newspapers published in New Zealand, concluding that they are 'bibliographically well controlled but . . . only to a limited degree'. To locate surviving copies the starting point is Harvey's Union List of Newspapers (1987). Still lacking is detailed bibliographical work to provide a full account of the number of newspapers published, where they were published, and their impact on New Zealand society, for by no means all newspapers published in New Zealand have been preserved. Harvey has made a preliminary beginning on this for 19th-century newspapers (Harvey 1989b). Other listings, compiled for specific reasons, also exist and are useful to the researcher; for example, the List of Newspapers Placed on the Register at the General Post Office, Wellington was first published in about 1883 and notes titles registered in order to be eligible for cheaper postal rates.

     Few New Zealand newspapers have been indexed. Those indexes to individual titles which have been compiled are listed in Peacocke's Newspaper Indexes in New Zealand (1994) and also Harvey (1987). Useful detailed indexes to a range of titles published in one city or region also exist in libraries throughout the country; an example is the index located in the Dunedin Public Library, to references about newspapers published in Dunedin city.

     The major collection of New Zealand newspapers is at the National Library of New Zealand in Wellington. Significant collections also exist at Auckland Public Library and at the Hocken Library, University of Otago (these are especially strong for local titles) and at the British Library, London. The National Library of New Zealand's microfilming programme has provided increased access to many newspapers.

     Scholefield's Newspapers in New Zealand (1958) remains the only general survey, but is not error free and should be used with caution. Much briefer general accounts are those by Cohen (1922) and Mills (1940) which incline towards the myth-making approach to newspaper history often favoured by journalists. Ruth Butterworth (1989) has provided a more recent, but regrettably short, overview.

     No recent studies have been made of newspapers in particular regions or localities, yet there is considerable scope for such studies, particularly for the 19th and early 20th centuries when local and regional interests overrode national interests, and when communications channels were not fully developed. Existing studies include F.A. Simpson's 'Survey of the newspapers and magazines of the Province of Otago' (1948) for Otago, A.A. Smith's Printing in Canterbury (1953) and A.E.J. Arts's A History of the Canterbury Master Printers' Association, 1889-1989 (1989) for Canterbury, and R.F. Johncock's Brief History of the Press (1991) for Hawkes Bay.

     Material about local newspapers and their history is frequently present in local histories. Two examples of the many which abound can be found in Tauranga 1882-1982 ('Communications', 1982) and in Bagnall's Wairarapa (1976).

     Newspapers in Mäori are noted later in this chapter. Newspapers in languages other than English and Mäori are noted in Chapter 6.

     The only detailed published history of an influential daily newspaper is R.B. O'Neill's 1963 study of the Christchurch Press . Other newspapers await similar detailed studies. More plentiful are studies which address specific periods during the life of a newspaper or a newspaper business. Two works based on work originally submitted as university theses are Salmond's Government Printing in New Zealand, 1840-43 (1995) which examines John Moore's role in the Auckland Newspaper and General Printing Co., and the role of the newspaper in the governmental process in a fledgling British colony; and Lishi Kwasitsu's Printing and the Book Trade in Early Nelson (1996) which notes the Nelson Examiner from 1842 to 1874. Frances Porter's Born to New Zealand (1989), a biography of Jane Maria Atkinson, includes in passing much about the day-to-day editorial concerns of running the Taranaki Herald during its early years. Harvey (1994) notes one year of the Inangahua Herald , Reefton, a case study of the setting up of a goldfields newspapers. R.C.J. Stone's biographies of the Auckland businessman Logan Campbell (1982, 1987) include much about the day-to-day running and financing of the Southern Cross . Many similar works have been published.

     Anniversary issues—especially centennial issues—of newspapers may provide useful information, although the user should take into account their often anecdotal and not always critical approach. Some which contain useful newspaper history (as distinct from anecdote, or reproductions of early issues) are:

      Taranaki Herald Centennial Issue 1952
      Taranaki Daily News Centennial Number, 14 May 1957
      The Otago Daily Times First Hundred Years, 1861-1961 , 15 Nov. 1961
      The Ensign 1878-1978 (Gore)
      120 Years: The Nelson Evening Mail, 1866-1986 , 11 March 1986

Theses are also an important source of studies of individual newspapers or of specific periods of their lives. An example of this genre is Graeme Robinson's 'The Evening Press 1884-94' (1967).

     An unusual, perhaps unique, source for newspaper history is a film running just over two minutes which depicts some of the activities involved in producing the Taranaki Herald in 1912 ( The Production of the Taranaki Herald and Budget , 1912). Its shot list notes: 'Public Offices and Office Staff; Editorial Room; Linotypes, setting the evening paper; Stereo room, casting plates for printing press; Machine room, Foster Rotary single reel press; Premises; Exterior shot of building, people rushing out with newspapers.'

     The only newspaper company history is Leslie Verry's 1985 study of Wellington based Independent Newspapers Ltd (INL). This contains histories of the individual newspapers which eventually combined to form INL, chief among them the Evening Post , the Dominion , Truth , the Waikato Times , the Manawatu Evening Standard , the Southland Times and the Timaru Herald ; and more recent history of the company and its mergers and takeovers. Verry's final chapter is titled 'How independent are Independent Newspapers?', the theme of much of the recent writing about newspapers in New Zealand.

     Much has been published about individual newspaper personnel, although it has not yet been collected into a directory of printing trade personnel. Starting points are the entries in biographical compendiums. The biographical entries in the Cyclopedia of New Zealand have been extracted and reproduced in Printing, Bookselling and their Allied Trades in New Zealand c.1900 (1980). The Dictionary of New Zealand Biography (1990-) notes the biographies of some newspaper personnel, and the earlier Dictionary of New Zealand Biography (ed. Scholefield, 1940) is still a valuable source. For the late 1870s and early 1880s useful biographical data about newspaper personnel (especially those who were itinerant, moving within New Zealand as well as between New Zealand and other countries, mainly the Australian colonies and California) is present in the New Zealand Press News and Typographical Circular and the Colonial Printers' Register .

     There are also many periodical articles and monographs with biographical content. An early Wellington newspaperman and his role in the New Zealand Colonist and Port Nicholson Advertiser (Wellington, 1842-43) can be found in Coleridge's 'Edward Catchpool, Master Printer in London and Wellington' (1993). The newspaper activities of Barzillai Quaife, the editor of the anti-government newspapers the New Zealand Advertiser and Bay of Islands Gazette and the Bay of Islands Observer published in Kororareka (Russell), New Zealand's first seat of government, are noted in Peter Kennett's biography (1991). From a later period Alexander McMinn's activities have been documented by Frean (1985). The activities of J.H. Claridge in establishing numerous newspapers in the early 20th century can be read about in at least four sources (C.J. Claridge, c.1965; J.C. Claridge, 1975; Jones, 1979, 1980). Autobiographical accounts by journalists include Robyn Hyde's Journalese (1934) and William Thomas's The Inky Way (1960).

     Politicians in New Zealand have often also been newspapermen, not surprising as the newspaper was, until the advent of other mass media, the primary vehicle through which politicians could express local needs. They have been well investigated by New Zealand historians. Some, like Julius Vogel, have warranted more than one study (Dalziel 1986, Day 1986). McIvor's biography of John Ballance (1989) includes much about Ballance's newspaper, the Wanganui Herald . The newspaper activities of a less successful politician, Joseph Ivess, are noted by Harvey (1988).

     Much unpublished biographical material still remains to be fully assessed. One example is the diary of David Burn, an invaluable and probably unique autobiographical account of the day-to-day activities of an Auckland newspaper editor and shipping correspondent during the 1840s and 1850s; a flavour of it can be found in Harvey (1990). Another example is T.S. Forsaith's 'Autobiographical memoranda' (1846-) which includes material about the Daily Telegraph (Dunedin).

     Press associations were formed for the purposes of controlling and disseminating news by regulating access to the telegraph. They played a key role in New Zealand's newspaper history. The New Zealand Press Association was established in 1879 as the United Press Association, continuing the activities of several similar organisations such as the Reuters Telegram Co. The United Press Association changed its name to the New Zealand Press Association in 1942. Throughout its 19th-century existence it was the cause of much contention, particularly because it acted as a cartel which represented the interest of its powerful members, the major metropolitan daily newspapers, and in effect ignored all others. It monopolised the supply of news to New Zealand's newspapers by its control of the telegraph and consequently was frequently criticised, for example by politicians—there was a parliamentary enquiry into its activities in 1880 (Press Telegrams Committee 1880)—and by newspaper proprietors who were not eligible to become members of the Association.

     The standard history of the New Zealand Press Association and its predecessors is James Sanders's Dateline-NZPA (1979). An earlier and still useful work is George Fenwick's The United Press Association (1929). The archives of the New Zealand Press Association archives, held at the Turnbull Library, contain a wealth of information about the day-to-day operation of

the news gathering process, for both overseas news and local news redistributed to newspapers through the telegraph system leased to the Association. This material will repay further investigation.

     Another relevant association history is that of the New Zealand Journalists' Association (1962), covering the period 1912 to 1962.

     The day-to-day activities involved in running a newspaper and the economics of the newspaper business have been an area of interest to researchers. Harvey (1993a, 1993b) examines available evidence about profitability, circulation, income, expenditure, advertising revenue and similar factors for 19th-century titles. Other publications deal with specific aspects. Advertising is noted in Roderick Cave's 'Advertising, circulation and profitability' (1989), Coleridge's Building a Paper Economy (1991) and 'Newspaper advertising in a pioneer colony' (1995), and by Kwasitsu (1996). Aspects of government advertising, an important form of patronage for early New Zealand newspapers, is noted in Harvey (1988-89); there is scope for further study on this, and the returns of government advertising published in the AJHR provide a starting point. Circulation figures for 19th-century newspapers are noted in Harvey (1988-89), and in Harvey (1996) which examines circulation figures in relation to population size for a range of titles.

     Aspects of the news-gathering process in the 19th century are covered by Day (1986) for the role of the telegraph, and by Rollo Arnold, who provides in Chapter 15 of New Zealand's Burning (1994) a study of the role of the 'own correspondent' (local correspondents) and also of the weekly newspapers. News gathering in more recent times can be read about in John Hardingham's The New Zealand Herald Manual of Journalism (1967).

     Harvey's 'Editors and compositors' (1990) notes, from contemporary accounts, some of the day-to-day activities involved in running newspapers in 19th-century New Zealand.

Further research

Despite the considerable number of publications which exist about New Zealand newspapers, particularly for the 19th century, much research is still needed. In addition to the lacunae noted above, more needs to be known about newspapers published in specific regions, and about news-gathering (including the role of the telegraph). More histories of individual newspapers are essential, for example to allow better knowledge of whether New Zealand newspapers differ from colonial papers published in other countries. This list can be refined and extended almost indefinitely.

     Many sources are available to further this research. The New Zealand Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) warrant attention: they include, for example, information about postage rates and subsidies for newspapers, about funding of the Mäori language newspaper Te Waka Maori , and about government patronage in the form of advertising. Significant archival material is available in libraries: demanding attention in this category are the New Zealand News archives (Turnbull Library), a major source awaiting further investigation and analysis. They include, among much else, detailed business records of the Lyttelton Times Co. Other extant business records of newspapers are noted in Chapter 2. Government publications, such as the AJHR, will reward further study. The registrations of newspapers required under various Acts from 1868, available at National Archives and some High Court registries, are also an untouched source.

Mäori newspapers

Many newspapers published in the second half of the 19th century used Mäori language, though not all were published by Mäori. The earliest titles were those published by the government or its spokesmen. Te Karere o Niu Tireni (in various titles, 1842-63) contained government announcements and correspondence, Te Pihoihoi Mokemoke i runga i te tuanui (1863) was established to counter Te Hokioi (see below), and Te Waka Maori (1863-79 and 1884) was under government control after its first few years. Newspapers produced wholly by Mäori begin with Te Hokioi o Niu-Tireni, e rere atu na (1862-63) under the auspices of the Mäori King Pötatau, and range from

Te Paki o Matariki (1892-) produced for King Täwhiao, to Te Wananga (1874-78) and Te Puke ki Hikurangi (1897-1913). These newspapers illustrate the high degree of Mäori confidence in printing their own language and are invaluable historical and cultural taonga. Periodicals in Mäori which used a newspaper format also included several of a religious motivation: The Anglo-Maori Warder (1848), Te Whetu o te Tau (1858), Te Haeata (1859-62) sponsored by the Methodist Church, Te Korimako (1882-88), and Te Hoa Maori (1885-97), published by the Plymouth Brethren, are examples. Most of these newspapers in Mäori took a particular stance on political or religious issues, but they all frequently also contain reports of hui, obituaries, waiata, advertisements, local news, correspondence and so on, which are all valuable sources of historical information.

     Periodicals in Mäori which can be defined as newspapers declined in numbers from the early 20th century. Although there were several Mäori magazines, it was not until the 1980s that Tu Tangata subtitled itself Maori News Magazine . Mäori newspapers began to flourish again from the 1980s. Some are listed in a 1986 Tu Tangata article, for example Te Iwi o Aotearoa, Maori Kuii-ee! (from Sydney), and in the 1990s Kia Hiwa Ra (Te Küiti).

     Brief overviews of the early Mäori newspapers are included in articles by Sheila Williams and by Nicola Frean in the 1990 issue of the Turnbull Library Record .

     Publications about Mäori newspapers have so far concentrated on extracts from them. Huia Publishers has produced three volumes in Mäori only, Te Pakiwaitara , Te Puni Wahine , and Te Mareikura . Letters to newspapers are included in the writings of Sir Apirana Ngata, and of Rëweti Köhere, edited by Wiremu and Te Ohorere Kaa. Individual stories in Mäori newspapers have been the focus of Margaret Orbell's articles in History Now .

     Study of Mäori newspapers has been hampered in the past by the location of scarce copies in research libraries. In an attempt to improve accessibility the Alexander Turnbull Library, in cooperation with other libraries which held copies, first produced microfilm copies through the National Library, then in 1996 produced microfiche copies, aiming to allow study through any library or institution with a microfiche reader. The complete set of Niupepa 1842-1933 has been purchased by a few major libraries, and digitisation of the papers is currently under discussion. However, the microfiche edition includes only those titles which began publication before 1900. Some later titles are available on microfilm from the National Library of New Zealand.

     Avenues for further study of Mäori newspapers are many. Bibliographic coverage is patchy so far. Ross Harvey's 1987 Union List of Newspapers gives place of publication, frequency, date ranges, title changes and holdings information for most early titles. Cataloguing of the early titles for the New Zealand National Bibliography in 1989, in preparation for microfilming, means a form of bibliography can be produced through the New Zealand Bibliographic Network. A 12-page booklet issued with the 1996 microfiche gives title, place of publication, language(s) used, frequency, alternate titles and continuations, inclusive dates, and number of microfiche, for the titles which were microfilmed. An Early Mäori Imprint project is currently in progress in the Alexander Turnbull Library and will include many of the titles above, but only a small part of its overall coverage will be periodicals, and those only from the 19th century. Bibliographic coverage as planned will therefore remain patchy; in addition, studies interpreting the content of Mäori newspapers will require further information about their context, ownership, and readership.

     There is therefore an urgent need for a distinct and detailed bibliography of Mäori newspapers including, for example, changes in size and pagination, title changes, supplements issued, editors, printers and publishers, addresses, and language, and summary of contents. Twentieth-century newspapers in particular need study, as they are excluded both from the microfiche available, and from the Early Mäori Imprint project. Studies of individual newspapers are also needed, and hopefully they will be written by Mäori with access to iwi support and resources. Comparative studies of, for example, production, readership, iwi linguistic variations, and the way Mäori owners and publishers used Päkehä printers, will not be possible until sufficient individual studies have been produced.

     Newspaper content is a rich source of historical material (used by Judith Binney and Anne Salmond among others) and more writers confident in using sources in 19th-century Mäori are needed. Indexing of the newspapers would help enormously. Mäori newspapers are also a rich source for linguistic studies. Elaine Geering's analysis (1993) of words 'loaned' from Mäori to English from the 1860s to 1900, drawing on articles in the Weekly News and Auckland Weekly News , is an example of this from an English language viewpoint. In contemporary times, an interesting comparison of print and oral cultures could be made between the growth of Mäori radio stations such as Te Upoko o te Ika and Te Reo Irirangi o Te Arawa, and modern Mäori newspapers.

Periodicals

Periodicals include glossy magazines, annual reports, newsletters, critical journals, conference proceedings, monographs in series, directories and almanacs. They are published for a variety of purposes by private firms, government agencies, educational institutions, political parties, individuals, church and community groups. Many periodicals are not strictly published items, for example, newsletters that are intended solely for the members of a club. In New Zealand most periodicals have been written in English, but some have been written in other languages, especially Mäori. They are usually published on paper but sometimes in microform and now electronically. Some periodicals are produced simultaneously in more than one medium. Some have been copied to other media, such as microform, for preservation.

     Periodicals, along with newspapers, have been very important in the development of New Zealand literature. In the 19th and early 20th centuries they were the main outlets for writing in New Zealand because of the commercial difficulties of publishing books here. The publishing of periodicals has until recently paralleled that of newspapers, and it is sometimes difficult to distinguish one from the other. The pictorial newspapers such as the Otago Witness and New Zealand Free Lance that were popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries have been considered as both newspapers and periodicals.

     Newspapers and periodicals have been published since the early days of European colonisation. Most had a short life span. In the 19th century periodicals and newspapers regularly failed because the population was too small and scattered to support them financially. In the 20th century there were additional reasons for their failure, such as shortages of staff and paper during World War II, and the competition from broadcast media, especially television. Periodicals have, in New Zealand, also had to compete for readers with overseas magazines like the Bulletin . Newspapers and periodicals also competed with one another, especially in the 19th and early 20th centuries, when newspapers regularly carried literary pieces and published weekly digests and pictorial issues.

     Most popular and serious periodicals published in New Zealand have lacked originality. They were usually modelled on British and Australian titles. In the last 20 years there has been a resurgence in periodical publishing with the success of general interest magazines like Metro and North and South and niche magazines like New Zealand Gardener and Marketing .

     Despite their undistinguished and often ephemeral nature, New Zealand periodicals are a valuable source of information, covering a wide range of topics. They can all conceivably be used for research. They often provide a record of an organisation and its business. However, there has been little research into periodical publication in New Zealand. Only literary periodicals have received much attention, although there has been a little done on directories and almanacs by Hansen (1994).

     The essays by McEldowney and Thomson in the Oxford History of New Zealand Literature in English (1991) and G.A. Wood's Studying New Zealand History (1992) are the starting points for research into periodicals in New Zealand. They give some history and cite the basic sources for research. Research into periodical publication is, however, hampered by the fact that there is no definitive listing of New Zealand periodicals. It is probably impossible to know how many periodicals have been produced because so many were ephemeral, short-lived and local. The Alexander Turnbull Library estimates that there have been at least 20,000 titles produced. The Union List of Serials in New Zealand Libraries , (3rd ed. 1969) has over 40,000 titles, but unfortunately the New Zealand titles are not distinguished from the overseas ones. According to the New Zealand Official Yearbook 1990 , 560 periodicals that accepted advertising were published in 1989. New periodicals have been catalogued in the New Zealand National Bibliography since 1966. Periodicals registered with the Post Office were listed annually in the List of Newspapers and Magazines Placed on the Register at Post Office Headquarters, Wellington (1886-1986).

     Some subject bibliographies of periodicals have been published, such as Iris Park's New Zealand Periodicals of Literary Interest (1962), and subject bibliographies that include some periodicals, for instance Ann Burgin's Women's Societies in New Zealand (1965). Periodicals are often cited in the bibliographies included in monographs.

     The best collection of New Zealand periodicals is held at the Alexander Turnbull Library, which is responsible for building and maintaining the nation's collection of serials published nationally. Local periodicals are only collected comprehensively for the Wellington region. Good collections of New Zealand periodicals are also held at the National Library, the Parliamentary Library, the Hocken Library, the larger public libraries, the university libraries and the libraries of the major museums.

     Periodicals need indexing to improve access for researchers. Although considerable indexing of New Zealand periodicals has been carried out, much of it is recorded on card indexes in libraries and is not readily accessible. The Index to New Zealand Periodicals (1941-86) is the most important index. This was continued as Index New Zealand and is available online as INNZ through Kiwinet. Other databases on Kiwinet include entries for periodicals, such as the Legal Index (LINX) and Newzindex (NEWZ) . Some periodicals issue their own indexes, for example Landfall , and indexes have been published for some periodicals, for instance J.J. Herd's Index to 'Tomorrow', 1934-40 (1962).

     Even when periodicals have been identified, the next problem is locating them. Many important older periodicals, such as New Zealand Building Progress and the New Zealand Tablet , are quite rare. The National Library of New Zealand has recently begun microfilming periodicals, for example Tomorrow , in an attempt to improve access. On-line indexing, and indexes on CD-ROM and microfiche, will also raise awareness and appreciation of periodicals as a research source, and encourage further research into their publication.

     The scope for further research into New Zealand periodicals is immense. There is a great need for subject bibliographies of periodicals to augment the basic bibliographical details given by library catalogues. Research is needed into the commercial aspects of periodical publishing. Some starting points are available: Here and Now and Comment published articles on these aspects in the 1950s and 1960s, and Nielsen Press Research have published media guides since the middle of the 1980s that give information on print runs, circulations, subscriptions and advertising rates. Coleridge (1995), Harvey (1993b) and Cave (1989) have published articles on the commercial aspects of the press in New Zealand in the 19th century. While these articles are mostly concerned with newspaper publication, their approach can be applied to periodicals. Anniversary issues of periodicals sometimes contain information about their publishing history.

     Some other areas that require research include: popular periodicals, especially women's magazines and sports magazines; the influence of overseas periodicals on New Zealand periodicals; politics and periodical publishing, for instance, the role of government in periodical publishing, the ideological underpinnings of periodicals, and the influence of periodicals on public opinion.

Children's books

From the earliest years New Zealand's isolation and small population have had a profound impact on local publishing for children. During the last century and early this century, New Zealand authors have had to find publishers overseas. As few copies of these early books made it back to these shores the authors were frequently popular overseas, but remained little known or unacknowledged in their homeland. Within New Zealand, the smallness of the market meant, until recently, that it was only commercially viable to publish texts or cheap booklets which were likely to be purchased in quantity by schools, or which were affordable for families. Publishing of well produced children's books as we know them today could only be a small sideline.

     The first recorded book for children featuring New Zealand was the anonymous Stories About Many Things—Founded on Facts , published in London by Harvey & Darton in 1833. From 1869 children's books with a New Zealand connection were being published in England at an average of one per year. Edward Tregear's Fairy Tales and Folk Lore of New Zealand and the South Seas , published by Lyon & Blair in Wellington in 1891 marks the true beginning of children's book publishing in New Zealand. Fittingly it focused on one of the themes which were to be dominant in New Zealand children's books for the next 70 years: the landscape (its wild strangeness to British eyes, and man's efforts to traverse and tame it) and the tales of the Mäori.

     Whitcombe & Tombs produced their first children's title, Johannes Andersen's Maori Fairy Tales , in 1908. Their third children's book, published in 1918 (Edith Annie Howe's Wonderwings and Other Fairy Stories , only the tenth New Zealand-published children's title) marked the beginning of a 14-year period when Whitcombe & Tombs dominated local trade children's publishing (as distinct from the publishing of educational books and readers), producing at least one title per year and 28 books altogether. At the same time they were producing their prolific series of Whitcombe's Story Books for the educational market. (For more detailed discussion of this aspect, see 'Reading and Literacy' in Chapter 5.)

     In 1930 Whitcombe & Tombs published Frank Acheson's Plume of the Arawas: An Epic of Maori Life . In 1938 Reeds picked it up and issued an edition of 5,000 copies as their first large scale children's title. As Whitcombe & Tombs' trade output waned, Reeds gained a dominance of local publishing that was to last 35 years. However, the field was not restricted to these two publishers, with other publishers issuing significant New Zealand children's books, such as The Book of Wiremu by Stella Morice (Progressive Publishing Society, 1944) and Turi, the Story of a Little Boy by Lesley Powell (Paul's Book Arcade, 1963). These titles were landmark New Zealand children's books, not only as early winners of the Esther Glen Award, but also as the forerunners of numerous later stories exploring the relationship between young Mäori children and their elders.

     Paul's Book Arcade (later Blackwood & Janet Paul) had their children's publishing heyday in the 1960s. Price Milburn, while predominantly an educational publisher, made a contribution to books available for children's leisure reading, beginning in 1961 with Smitty Does a Bunk written by Brian Sutton-Smith and illustrated by Russell Clark. From the mid 1960s Elsie Locke, Eve Sutton and Ruth Dallas each published several books helping children to look back at and appreciate our pioneering past. The same decade also saw the publication of several photographic books aimed at establishing a post-colonial New Zealand identity (for example, Pat Lawson's Kuma is a Maori Girl (Hicks, Smith, 1961), Gay Kohlap's David, Boy of the High Country (Collins, 1964) and Ans Westra's controversial Washday at the Pa (first prepared as a School Bulletin; reprinted by Caxton Press, 1964).

     New Zealand's most notable children's author, Margaret Mahy, was writing fantastic stories before local publishing was ready to diverge from the realistic. Apart from the stories published in the New Zealand School Journal , all of her books have been published overseas. Through the School Journal and other publications, Learning Media Ltd (formerly the School Publications Branch of the Department of Education) have been, and for many still are, the only vehicle in New Zealand in which writers of children's fiction can be published.

     Commercial publishing expanded in the 1960s and by the early 1970s overseas publishing houses—chiefly Ashton Scholastic, Collins, Heinemann, Hodder, Oxford, and Penguin—had set up offices in New Zealand. This provided an avenue for New Zealand children's books to reach both New Zealand and international audiences. However, it was (and remains) frequently at the cost of the reduction or removal of distinctively New Zealand features and idiom in order to make the books acceptable to the overseas markets and sell in the quantities needed to make publication viable.

     From the 1970s children's publishing generally pursued urban rather than the earlier rural themes. Books featured social problems and non-traditional family structures. As overseas, fantasy and science fiction stories became popular. Publishing of picture books in English and Mäori began with Jill Bagnall's Crayfishing with Grandmother (Collins, 1973), for which Hapi Pötae provided the Mäori text. Patricia Grace's The Kuia and the Spider and Te Kuia me te Pungawerewere (Longman Paul) followed in 1981. The 1980s witnessed the evolution of the 'teenage novel' as a specific genre, with notable early contributions by Margaret Mahy, Tessa Duder, William Taylor and Jack Lasenby.

     Since the 1980s there has been a continued growth in distinctively New Zealand publishing, encouraged by enterprising publishers who have actively encouraged new talent. Notable among these is Mallinson Rendel (perhaps best known for publishing Lynley Dodd's internationally acclaimed picture books, beginning with Hairy Maclary from Donaldson's Dairy , 1983) which matches high production standards with a rigorous selection policy. Mallinson Rendel publish casebound books, whereas most other New Zealand books for children are now paperback. Cape Catley and McIndoe are, similarly, literary publishers with a small output. When McIndoe ceased publishing children's books in recent years their children's editor was among those who set up Longacre Press, which has published books by acclaimed authors Jack Lasenby and Paula Boock.

     Ashton Scholastic (now Scholastic) has also established a reputation for encouraging local authors and illustrators and produces a steady flow of books, both literary and more popular. Harper Collins introduced the Tui and Tui Turbo series, in emulation of the 1980s British trend of producing uniform format series of books to encourage children to make the transition from picture books to novels.

     New Zealand was placed at the forefront of international books about children's books with the publication of Dorothy Neal White's About Books for Children (1949) and Books Before Five (1954). Babies Need Books , by Dorothy Butler, was an international success when first published in 1980 and continues to be reprinted. Betty Gilderdale's A Sea Change (1982) is the standard work on New Zealand children's books to 1978. >From 1970 to 1995 a vibrant periodical for children, Jabberwocky: New Zealand's Magazine for Children (Auckland) provided stimulating reading and opportunities for children's own literary efforts and comments to be published. This publication continues under the new title Allsorts & Jabberwocky .

     A variety of awards have encouraged writing and publishing for children. Lynley Dodd was the first recipient of the Choysa Bursary for writers of imaginative work for children. Numerous children's authors have had terms as 'writer in residence' at colleges of education and universities, or have received grants from the State Literary Fund (now Creative New Zealand). The New Zealand Library Association initiated New Zealand children's book awards with the Esther Glen Award in 1945 and later introduced the Russell Clark Award (for illustrated books) and the non-fiction award. In addition the Government Printer sponsored an award which became the AIM and is now the New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards.

     New Zealand children's book publishing is still in a healthy state in the late 1990s. Publishers demonstrate both an awareness of overseas trends and a growing interest in publishing books which reflect the New Zealand experience and Mäori and Pacific cultures and languages. The fine reputation of New Zealand's highly successful educational publishers, such as Learning Media Ltd and Wendy Pye, in overseas markets is also providing additional opportunities for non-educational books by New Zealand children's authors to be marketed internationally. One thing lacking is a willingness on the part of most local newspapers and magazines to provide opportunities (or even adequate space) for in-depth reviewing of children's books.

Educational publishing

This section is limited to a study of school and college textbooks published in New Zealand. It is based on Hugh Price's collection of these textbooks, which was used to compile an informal catalogue, School Books Published in New Zealand to 1960 (1992). This collection of books is to be deposited in the Alexander Turnbull Library.

     Before the publication of Price (1992) the subject was obscure because, on the one hand, there were known to be many titles and editions, while on the other hand A.G. Bagnall had elected not to list school textbooks in his New Zealand National Bibliography to the Year 1960 (see vol.2, 1890-1960, p.viii), except for the few that were written by 'authors of note'.

     In Price (1992) about 2,500 titles are identified. Many went through edition after edition (in the world of school books, reprints or new impressions tend to be claimed as new editions) so that the total number of books printed was enormous—an estimated total number of all the copies of the 2,500 titles printed is about 60 million (to 1960). Since that date we can perhaps add another half as many again. Sixty million is more that the total of print runs of all the books listed in Bagnall's bibliography—the recognised output of New Zealand's book publishers—so that we have the astonishing fact that most books published in New Zealand were educational books. This promotes them to the mainstream of New Zealand publishing, printing and book reading, and an economic base for New Zealand book publishing.

     This is an unfamiliar view, for we are used to identifying the books from our publishers and printers as those we see in bookshops and public libraries, and it reminds us that there is an alternative world of books out there—school textbooks. It is also a reminder that in earlier days schools were often authoritarian and unwelcoming, so that many children left them with a loathing for books, determined never to open another one if they could help it. (Of course, the distinction between school books and the books a reader will choose to buy or borrow, for interest or recreation, is dissolving with the growth of school libraries and the determination of some educational book publishers to issue more attractive books: for example, some infant reading books are now as well illustrated and well written as good children's picture books.)

     Nearly all the school books published in New Zealand before 1950 came from the Christchurch office of Whitcombe & Tombs Ltd, so that the strengths and idiosyncrasies of Whitcombe & Tombs governs all. They began publishing in the 1880s and by the turn of the century could take a full-page advertisement in an educational journal, offering a range of books for every subject in the primary school curriculum. Their vigorous publishing held the field for the next half century.

     Whitcombe & Tombs were able to publish books more cheaply than similar books that they could import from Great Britain, because they combined in one firm the three roles of publisher, printer and bookseller. As publisher-printers who sold many of their books from their own bookshops, they could choose not to take a full profit 'mark up' at each stage of the book's progress from manuscript to school room (publishing, printing, book-selling). This choice was not available to any other New Zealand publisher—indeed it was almost unique in the English-speaking world, for only one other book publisher, Angus & Robertson of Australia, combined within itself a considerable publishing department, a big book-printing plant, and a national chain of central city bookshops. (But despite this vertical integration, Angus & Robertson published very few school textbooks.) Inside Whitcombe & Tombs it was widely believed that their several printing works were kept alive during the Depression (1929-35) by orders, from their publishing department, to reprint school books.

     Whitcombe & Tombs's publishing office was well staffed with competent editors and designers (A.W. Shrimpton, editor for 40 years, had family connections with a book printing business in Oxford) and driven by George Whitcombe who aspired to publish all the books needed by New Zealand schools. Their printeries were well equipped, so that the books they produced stood comparison with comparable books produced in Britain (they were much better than those from Australia). Whitcombe & Tombs's growing chain of bookshops dominated the bookselling trade, with central city shops in each main centre, always well stocked with Whitcombe & Tombs's educational books, which were naturally more easily available than school books from the other side of the world.

     It was a winning formula, with two extra ingredients. One was the nearby Australian market, which was reached by Whitcombe & Tombs's bookshops in the main Australian cities, who were both wholesalers and retailers of school books to local schools. In fact, Whitcombe & Tombs published many school books for Australia (and some in Australia). For example, their 1946 catalogue shows many more arithmetic books for Australian schools than it does for New Zealand schools, and many more Australian history books than New Zealand history books. Each of the Progressive Readers (Primers) was published in both New Zealand and Australian editions, and there were specially adapted editions for particular Australian states. On the other hand, there was only a very small flow of Australian-produced school books to New Zealand.

     The other special ingredient was the publishing skill and flair of the management of Whitcombe & Tombs. As an example: they pushed ahead the astonishing series of school library books, Whitcombe's Story Books (1904-56) which, in its day, with about 450 titles, was the biggest series of children's books in the world. The Australian bibliographer Ian McLaren has produced a thorough bibliography of this series (1984), and reports that over 12 million of these story books were published.

     Another educational publisher was the New Zealand Department of Education. It issued the New Zealand School Journal from 1907, and gave one Journal a month to every school child, so, for example, three million Journals in 1953 (on average 10,000 every working day). After World War II, the Department published many Bulletins and English and arithmetic textbooks—and, after 1960, school readers too.

     After 1950 Reeds became active educational publishers. Ten years later educational publishing in New Zealand changed profoundly as several big overseas publishers set up publishing offices in New Zealand: Oxford, Collins, Heinemann Educational, Hodder, Scholastic and Penguin among them. These active publishers proved too much for Whitcoulls, which struggled on, but finally closed its publishing office in 1995. Overseas-based publishers grouped in Auckland and had their printing done overseas. The fine reputation of New Zealand teachers for teaching beginners to read has helped several specialised publishers—notably Wendy Pye, Shortland, Price Milburn (now Nelson Price Milburn) and Lands End—to sell junior reading books around the world, building on the export successes of Whitcombe & Tombs in the 1930s and before.

     Information about New Zealand's educational publishing to 1960 collected in Price (1992), and in its bibliography, are a departure point for further study. The New Zealand Education Gazette , from its beginning in 1921, to 1952, contains informative articles, reviews and advertisements. The New Zealand Book Publishers Association and its successor has annual figures about books published in New Zealand. Whitcombe & Tombs's various publishing account books, royalty records, and printing order books have reached the Alexander Turnbull Library. Two recent books add detail: Paul and Thomson's Landmarks in New Zealand Publishing: Blackwood & Janet Paul (1995), an account of a publisher who issued some educational books; and Price's bibliography of a writer of infant reading books, Beverley Randell: A Checklist (1996).

Religious publishing

From the advent of the book, religious publishing was the most prolific area of publishing. The New Zealand experience was somewhat different. From the first the religious instinct was weak in the colony and churches struggled for support, yet there were strong traditions of literacy, and in the 19th-century volumes of Bagnall's New Zealand National Bibliography to 1960 (in contrast to those of the 20th century) the proportion of religious works is reasonably high. Religious tracts and pamphlets were frequent in the 19th century, and as controversies invaded the religious scene they were reflected in pamphlet literature.

     General bookshops sold a variety of religious literature. They would not handle slow-selling denominational resources, and this encouraged the formation of specialist bookshops. Denominations and organisations like the Bible Society distributed their specialist literature from a shelf in the shop of some sympathetic retailer, often not a bookseller, although the ideal was to use a bookseller. In Auckland William Atkin called himself a church and general printer from his shop in High Street and was appointed Anglican diocesan printer. When Octavius Hadfield, as Bishop of Wellington, became prolific as a pamphlet writer he used James Hughes and then Lyon & Blair, although his key works were sent abroad for publication. Wesleyan bookrooms were started at the request of the Australasian Conference in Christchurch in 1870 and were linked with Armitage & Smith's business.

     The first Christian bookshop chain was the New Zealand Bible and Book Society, formed in 1873 by an interdenominational committee based in Dunedin. It used shops and colporteurs to sell books and tracts, and it also published a few books, including those by the notable literary Presbyterian minister in Dunedin, Rutherford Waddell. It also had a Wellington branch. The Auckland Sunday School Union set up a bookshop around 1900 in its building in Queen Street, and this too handled stock previously distributed by denominational shops.

     Publishing itself was limited to denominational yearbooks and official publications, denominational magazines, and religious pamphlets and tracts. The religious periodicals were very important because they supplied information to very scattered religious communities. Most Anglican dioceses began magazines in the 1870s. A Methodist monthly began in 1870. There had been various regional Presbyterian magazines from the 1860s, but in 1894 Rutherford Waddell began the Christian Outlook , which, from 1901 to 1910, became a combined magazine with the Methodists and Congregationalists. The Catholic Diocese of Dunedin published The New Zealand Tablet from 1873, the New Zealand Baptist began in 1883 and the Brethren magazine The Treasury began in 1899. Such magazines proved to be very long-enduring and were sometimes willing to engage in a little book publishing as well. Clearly readers wanted news as well as short edifying articles.

     Of other forms of publishing in the 19th century, little now stands out apart from Mäori publications. The largest New Zealand book of the 19th century was the Mäori Bible, later editions of which were produced by the British and Foreign Bible Society in London in association with its Auckland Auxiliary. New editions of the New Testament were produced in 1840, 1842 and 1844. The Old Testament was produced in parts by the mission press in 1847 and 1855, as a whole in London in 1868, and in a controversial new revised edition in 1889. Overall some 126,000 copies of the Bible or portions of it were produced. A range of other Mäori religious works was also produced, many of them on New Zealand presses, including hymn and service books, and sectarian publications. Mäori culture of the 19th century was deeply affected by its exposure to so much of the Bible.

     English literature included pamphlets reflecting hot controversies. Perhaps the most famous in the 19th century was the pamphlet from the Otago academic William Salmond, The Reign of Grace , which was published in 1888 by the stationer James Horsburgh. Typically such pamphlets were printed by the local newspaper and distributed privately, so were not as well known as they could have been. However a controversial book by Rev. J. Gibson Smith, The Christ of the Cross , was published by Gordon & Gotch in 1908. The smaller sects used publishing to spread news about themselves and their beliefs, and some of these works were quite substantial, for example the A.B. Worthington lectures, issued by a bigamist renegade Christian Scientist in Christchurch in 1891.

     Gradually colonial authors became known, but many of these were published abroad, including Lionel Fletcher, the Congregational minister in Auckland; A.S. Wilson, the Auckland Baptist minister published in Britain by Marshall Morgan & Scott; Frank Boreham, the Baptist minister in Mosgiel; and a number of women including the Methodist deaconess Rita Snowden, whose books probably kept Epworth Press afloat. J.W. Kemp, the very successful minister of the Auckland Baptist Tabernacle and founder of the Bible Training Institute, produced his own pamphlets, Bible Correspondence Course and magazine, while a little tract by R.A. Laidlaw, The Reason Why , written in 1913, was widely distributed. Tracts were part of the whole flavour of Protestantism, for it was word-centred, and produced and consumed very large quantities of books. The smaller religious denominations were particularly avid readers and book distributors. Literature held their scattered movements together, linked them to others of their faith in other countries and enabled them to compete with larger denominations.

     As local publishers emerged in the 20th century, the situation changed somewhat. Whitcombe & Tombs published little religious work, although they stocked a very fine range of religious books in their Christchurch shop. Once the Bible Society formed its national committee in 1918 some publishing initiatives were taken in local Bible production, for example an edition of Bibles for hotels. These were commissioned from the London printers.

     It was in children's religious publishing that a breakthrough came. There was a major demand for religious publishing for children, since Sunday schools annually awarded children books and certificates as Sunday school prizes. The Auckland Sunday School Union met some of this demand, but supplying the needs of Sunday schools was the origin of the first large scale New Zealand publisher. Alfred Reed was a Dunedin Sunday school superintendent who in 1911 began to import Sunday school material and distribute it to many Sunday schools in the dominion. This became a very successful mail-order business and he also printed various certificates and prizes. In 1922 he first published religious pamphlets and a magazine, and the collapse of the Bible and Tract Society in the late 1920s gave him opportunity to publish works by the popular Rutherford Waddell, beginning with The Dynamic of Service in 1926. In the early years Christian books and New Zealand history formed the staple business of his company. Alfred Reed's nephew A.W. (Clif) Reed took the company to Wellington and it eventually lost its religious focus.

     A gradual change, which might be called secularisation, was occurring. More and more religious bookshops emerged alongside the secular shops. A.H. & A.W. Reed were able to supply them both from their own publications, and from overseas publishers which they acted as distributors for. The most notable of these bookshops were the Presbyterian Bookrooms which commenced in Christchurch in the 1920s and spread to three other places. Bible and book depots opened in many different places, under private ownership. Many of the owners were Plymouth Brethren or Baptists. In 1949 a Brethren Trust, the Gospel Publishing House, was established, which took over several shops. Various Anglican dioceses opened bookrooms, while Catholics had both diocesan and independent bookshops. There were Epworth Bookrooms in Auckland and Wellington.

     The age of denominational shops came to an end after 1960. Denominational distinctiveness diminished and the overheads of running bookshops increased, while many customers took advantage of cheaper overseas prices. The Presbyterian Bookrooms closed down completely in 1975, and many other booksellers reduced to a single mail-order shop or sold out to more eclectic and specialist shops which concentrated on books.

     Evangelical bookselling meanwhile flourished. In 1933 Clif Reed entered an arrangement with Dr John Laird, the first General Secretary of the Crusader Movement, to distribute the British Scripture Union's Bible reading notes. Then in 1937 Reed opened a Crusader and CSSM Bookroom in his Wellington building. In 1946 the Bible Training Institute opened a well managed bookroom in a building it had purchased in Queen Street. Its emergence alarmed Reed and he sold the Crusader Bookroom back to the Crusader Movement. This was the origin of the Scripture Union Bookshop chain. Alongside this there emerged many small Christian bookshops in most towns and cities, run as independent bodies.

     This necessitated more local wholesalers of religious books. In 1963 the wholesale distribution of Christian books began to change when Bill Moore was appointed the agent for the evangelical American publisher Moody Press. This was the first of many agencies which he acquired in the next 20 years. His business was later acquired by Church Stores under the name Omega Distributors. In 1996 the large Scripture Union chain was integrated with Omega and two other evangelical booksellers.

     It was in this context that later religious publishing continued. The Presbyterian Bookroom was very active in publishing in the 1950s, including doctrinal works like Rev. J.M. Bates's Manual of Doctrine (1950), and devotional works by William Bower Black. But the whole enterprise became too expensive to the church, and the chain was reduced and then closed in 1975. The Bible Society produced revisions of the Mäori Bible in 1925 and 1952, and some general Bible production for the English-speaking market in New Zealand. The Methodists started a Board of Publications, which issued editions of C.T. Symons's Our Fathers Faith and Ours (1946, 1947, 1953, 1959), but inadequate resources inhibited other publishing. Catholic publishing was largely centred on the Diocese of Auckland, which produced the magazine Zealandia . In 1950 an Auckland priest, Fr Ronald Knox, wrote the popular work, The Gospel Story which was published by the Youth Movement of the diocese. The Catholic Publications Centre was later established, and this issued a small range of works, notably those by Bishop John Mackey. There were a few other small publishers but they were not large scale or commercial in orientation.

     Serious readers interested in New Zealand theological thought were largely served by the proximity of the larger Australian market. Australian publishers, including the Joint Board of Christian Education, Lancer Books, Albatross and Scripture Union, all published jointly for the trans-Tasman market. Some secular publishers issued religious works. Over the decades Ormond Burton has been published by Forward Books of Wellington, H.H. Rex by Paul, Bishop Brian Davis by Caxton Press, and Sister Pauline O'Regan by Bridget Williams Books. The key theological works were likely to receive international attention if they were published by one of the British or American theological publishers, so key works like Professor John Dickie's systematics, The Organism of Christian Truth , were published abroad. A departure came with the Geering controversy of the late 1960s over the historicity of the resurrection, for the general publishers Hodder & Stoughton added his works to a New Zealand list, and commissioned a response from the prominent Auckland academic E.M. Blaiklock. Lloyd Geering's lesser works were published by a small trust in Wellington, and this was not untypical of local serious authors. Blaiklock and J.O. Sanders, the evangelical missionary statesman, were extensively published by American and British houses. Fr Ronald Cox wrote works which were picked up by a London publisher.

     The Charismatic movement was very successful in New Zealand and a flurry of pamphlets was issued debating the validity of the movement. David and Dale Garrett became symbols of the movement through their Scripture in Song music. There were also popular books published by such authors as Barry Smith and Ray Comfort, and these were read far beyond New Zealand. The typical reader of such publications read for excitement, for stimulation and to discover new spiritual experiences. Changing tastes in religion have meant that some of the latest religious works tend to advocate the New Age rather than Christianity, and the stock in secular shops largely reflects this change in taste.

Music publishing

Most of the history of music publishing and music publishers in New Zealand remains to be written. Very little has been documented, either of the companies or individuals involved in the industry, or of the actual material published by them, so any analysis of output, trends or influences has not been carried out. John Mansfield Thomson's The Oxford History of New Zealand Music (1991) does mention a number of early New Zealand music publications, but in the music history context rather than as a more specific publishing history. However, his survey does point to the desirability of further exploring the relationships between the social context and publication patterns, for example the proliferation in publications of nationalistic songs which occurred during any period of conflict.

     Early music publishing was usually in the hands of individual printers or lithographers, with some involvement by the newspaper presses. Identification of the individuals or firms involved has barely started, nor has the relationship between many of the publishers, printers and composers. Entries in works such as the Cyclopedia of New Zealand are few and far between, and it is apparent that the early music publishers had this work very much as a sideline, making tracing their development more difficult. Research through more general printing and publishing trade listings could well prove fruitful.

     Three companies attained a long term prominence in the industry. Arthur Eady (and its various off-shoots), Charles Begg, and the Wai-te-ata Press are the most important New Zealand music publishers, yet there has been almost no work on either their company histories, or their publications. Work on other individual firms, including the Brett Printing Co., the Dresden Pianoforte Agency (later Bristol Pianos), Whitcombe & Tombs, Price Milburn, Maoriland, Sevenseas, the Lyttelton Times, Daly's, and Newson & Stroud is also urgently required as the source material is becoming scarcer and is deteriorating. It is regrettable that the fates of the publishing records of most of these companies are currently unknown.

     There is no bibliography of the actual published items. Given that the earlier national bibliographies did not include sheet music, there is still much to be found and documented. The somewhat ephemeral nature of some printed music makes the search for the early published items all the more urgent. Recent technological developments resulting in the relatively easy production of scores from the personal computer has made research into recent publishing history even harder because there has been an increase in the self-published, or published-on-demand titles. The lists compiled by Ross Harvey ( Music at National Archives , 1991b), and Elizabeth Nichol ('New Zealand music registered for copyright 1879-1900', 1984) act as a starting point for music from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Various issues of The Canterbury Series of Bibliographies, Catalogues and Source Documents in Music also serve as useful references and pointers to other avenues of investigation. A survey of the music publishing history should also take note of the various music periodicals such as Music In New Zealand (1931-37) which sometimes contained complete musical works, either of a New Zealand origin or from overseas.

Directories

Directories are books which are designed to provide specific information about particular people. The directories discussed here were business-residential directories, lists of householders along with their addresses and occupations. Directories of this type were usually published annually and often contained elements of the almanac which had preceded them. The purpose of business-residential directories was, and still is, commercial: to bring buyers and sellers together. They were produced in large numbers in New Zealand from the 1860s and, while they are still produced in a reduced format, their popularity began to dwindle in the 1950s with the emergence of the telephone book and the yellow pages.

     The first business-residential directories produced in New Zealand were based on English examples. They were compiled, published and distributed by immigrants, usually British. Yet the conditions that publishers such as Henry Wise, John Stone and Arthur Cleave met in the colony were radically different from those they had encountered at 'home'. Directories had existed in Britain since the street guides of Elizabethan times, but the rural, under-populated and non-mechanised society of New Zealand was very different from the highly urbanised factory economy of 19th-century Britain.

     Directories in New Zealand fulfilled three main functions: to boost the local and regional economy by bringing producer and consumer together; to provide a compendium of useful information to benefit the local population as well as the would-be migrant; and to create in printed format a resource which would help meld isolated communities together.

     Directories commonly contained as many as eight distinct sections. These included an almanac, an alphabetical list of residents, a list of occupations together with names of those who practised those jobs, a street directory, official information pertaining to local and central government, non-official information, advertisements, and a selection of maps. In the earliest directories, those which preceded the publications produced by Wise and Stone, the almanac was an essential ingredient. An almanac gave directions for the current year in the form of tide tables, new constellations, seasons, the physical landforms and so forth. It was of great assistance to early settlers because subsistence farming and fishing helped those newly arrived through lean patches.

     Between 1840 and the early 1870s there were literally dozens of directories published annually throughout New Zealand. Nearly all of these were regional, providing information about the local community. Most small directories were produced by newspaper proprietors. Moody's Royal Almanac for the Year 1842 was the first almanac ever printed in New Zealand. It included a trade and official 'Directory of names, &c.'. Other early directories included Chapman's Auckland Provincial Almanac and Goldfield's Directory of about 1869, and further south the Otago Almanac and Directory , published between 1858 and 1859 by William Lambert of the Otago Colonist newspaper. These directories were not only for local consumption: Lyon & Blair's 1876 Almanac and Descriptive Handbook of the Province of Wellington answered 'the questions continually asked by the people at home [the United Kingdom]' and the provincial government ordered 500 copies for sale in Great Britain.

     There were two early efforts at providing New Zealand with a national directory. The first was The New Zealand Directory published in Melbourne and Wellington between 1866-67 and 1867-68. The second was Wright's Australian and American Commercial Directory and Gazetteer published in New York in 1881 and 1882-83. These were short-lived and it was not until Wise's went national in the early 1870s that New Zealand finally had a directory of some substance which was destined to survive for over 100 years. Between the early 1870s and the mid 1950s, three firms dominated the market. These were the directories published by H. Wise & Co. (NZ) Ltd, directories published by Stone Son & Co. Ltd, and Cleave's directories which covered the Auckland provincial district. Their directories represented a break with the past because the almanac component was either dropped (by Wise) or included (by Stone, but only reluctantly). What Wise and Stone also had in common was a desire to promote large scale business, both within the colony and between New Zealand and other countries, most notably Australia and Great Britain. Wise was to create the country's premier national directory while Stone (in conjunction with Cleave) produced its provincial directories.

     Wise produced his first directory of Dunedin in 1865 and in 1872-73 went national with his Wise's New Zealand Commercial Directory . In 1881, Wise won permission to refer to his directory as the official New Zealand Post Office directory. Wise's continued to publish their mammoth directories in a single volume until the mid-1950s, when they adopted the provincial format copied from Stone's, who had ceased producing directories in 1954. Wise's continued producing directories from their Dunedin office until 1972 when they sold the publication rights to Universal Business Directories in Auckland, who still produce them today, albeit in a reduced format (and now also on CD-ROM).

     John Stone's first directory of Dunedin appeared in 1884 and within three years it had grown to include all of Otago and Southland. By 1891 Stone was producing a directory of Wellington and by the turn of the century Canterbury, Nelson, Marlborough and Westland were included too. For the next 60 or so years, Stone was a formidable rival to Wise. As Stone's directories did not include the Auckland provincial district, his position was strengthened by his 40-year working relationship with Arthur Cleave. Cleave's directories covered the Auckland provincial district between 1889 and 1930. The last of Stone's directories were published in the mid 1950s, after which time the cost of producing such a detailed work became untenable.

     By the late 1960s Wise's, too, were having problems in sustaining the production of such a publication. Smaller, nimbler rivals such as Cook's New Zealand Business Directory , which listed occupational groupings only, had emerged in the mid 1930s, as had the Business Who's Who . In addition, the postwar growth of New Zealand's cities meant canvassing on foot was no longer feasible. There were more towns, too, as company towns like Tokoroa (a forestry town) and Twizel (built to house hydro-electric workers) emerged. As the number of domestic dwellings increased, so had the numbers of telephones, as well as a newer reliance upon the telephone directory and its Yellow Pages. The Equal Pay Act 1972 made the cost of paying female canvassers prohibitive. All these factors conspired against Wise's.

     Information for the three main sections of business-residential directories (the alphabetical list of names, the names attached to the list of occupational headings, and the streets directory) was acquired by means of a house-to-house canvass of the country's metropolitan areas and of homes in the surrounding countryside. The name of the head of the household was listed, as well as male lodgers aged 18 years and over (21 years in some cases). The spouse was excluded unless he or she owned property on his or her own account, as were children over the age of 15, even if they were in the workforce. Those who only rented property were also usually excluded. Official information (such as customs tariffs) was gleaned by writing to the particular government department concerned. Non-official information (such as the names and opening hours of recreational bodies, cultural societies and church groups), was had, again, by writing to the representatives of those bodies. Maps were seldom compiled from scratch as copies of local street maps were usually provided by a local printer or by the town council. For maps of the country, the assistance of the Surveyor General was usually called upon. Business houses were solicited for advertisements.

     In the case of small directories, the publisher was usually the owner of a newspaper who had ready access to type, paper and the necessary printing skills. When directories grew larger, a local printer or publisher was commissioned to produce the item. Stone's, operating from Dunedin, at first used the presses of the Evening Star . Later they bought their own presses, not only because it was cheaper but because the production schedules were tight and the company could not afford to allow their printing needs to become secondary to those of the Star .

     Both Wise and Stone encouraged buyers to take out subscriptions to their directories. This made the economics of producing directories easier as the number of directories to be printed could be estimated with some accuracy. Copies were also available through most bookstores and from catalogues. Wise and Stone aimed not so much at the householder but at those in business: hoteliers, mercantile houses, and manufacturers. Wise's, however, as the publisher of the country's quasi-official directory, had to provide one free reading copy in each Post Office.

     It is remarkable that for such a small country, New Zealand should have possessed not one, but two firms producing outstanding directories, three, if Cleave's is included. Clearly the emergence of significant directories rested largely with the personal initiative displayed by Henry Wise, John Stone and Arthur Cleave. Wise's directory had succeeded in part because the Post Office had assisted him, while Stone and Cleave had boosted their fortunes by promoting those of the provinces. But there are other reasons. Nineteenth-century New Zealand was settled by Europeans whose culture was a print-based one and they needed a printed resource which helped them come to terms with, and understand, a new country. Secondly, New Zealand was settled by small craftsmen and -women, and the business-residential directories described in this section were a necessary aid to people in business who had neither the time, expertise or finances to advertise their wares and skills for themselves.

     There have been few studies of the directory-publishing industry in New Zealand. Keith Maslen's pioneering study of Wise's directories which appeared in the BSANZ Bulletin in 1988 was a start. Maslen's study was complemented by a 1995 study of Stone Son & Co. (coincidentally Wise's rival) by Michael Hamblyn in the same journal. This was followed by the same writer's 1996 thesis 'Kei hea to whare? Titiro ki roto: John Stone's New Zealand directories 1884-1954'. Prior to this research, A.C. Penney of Wellington had produced Almanacs and Directories: The Alexander Turnbull Library Collection of New Zealand Almanacs and Directories (1979). In 1994 Donald Hansen published The Directory Directory , based on the holdings of libraries nationwide. Another recent publication is Maslen's 1994 'Early New Zealand directories: a brief guide' which details almanacs and directories held by the Hocken Library in Dunedin.

     Future research remains to be carried out on almanacs and directories printed in Mäori. As well, work on the emergence of the telephone directory and the Yellow Pages needs to be done. This is particularly so as the telephone directory played a major role in dislodging the business-residential directory from its position of pre-eminence. Research is also needed on more recent directories specialising in sport, commerce and the arts, such as the Air New Zealand Almanac published between 1982 and 1989.