BY THE BOOK

SCI-FI GUY

An unassuming tax inspector who breaks the law by night experiments with a virtual-reality headset in dystopian novel Chevalier & Gawayn. It’s the 11th science-fiction book by internationally known author Phillip Mann, still writing aged 80. He’s also a theatre director and academic who founded New Zealand’s first university drama-studies course (at Victoria University in 1970). Winner of the Sir Julius Vogel Award for services to science fiction in 2010, Mann’s also patron of the Phoenix Science Fiction Society – a group of Wellington sci-fi fans, who meet monthly (new members welcome).

GOOD CALL CAPITAL CRIME KING-MAKERS

Wellington author Sally J Morgan, who grew up in Yorkshire, had a close call – she nearly accepted a ride with serial killers Rosemary and Fred West. This inspired her debut novel Toto Amongst the Murderers, in the background of which the Wests roam the countryside. In a live online announcement with six finalists including Booker-nominated novelist Andrew O’Hagan, Sally was awarded the £10,000 Portico Prize 2022, for the book that “best evokes the spirit of the north of England”. As a fourth-generation Wellingtonian with roots in the city dating back to 1850, Alistair Luke is passionate about sharing its history through his writing. The architect (who is also married to an architect, Sharon Jansen) has written debut novel One Heart One Spade, which tells the story of Detective Lucas Cole negotiating the capital’s criminal scene in 1977. His relationships at home and work, a missing woman, and a deceased drug dealer add to his troubles. Calling eager young writers: the Michael King Writers Centre is running its second Signals Young Writers Awards, which offers writers aged from 16 to 23 the chance to be published in the centre’s journal Signals. The fiction, creative non-fiction, and poetry winners each win $150 and the overall winner an additional $150, thanks to Penguin/Random House publishers. Entries close 29 July.

Slam’it that’s good

PHOTOGRAPHY BY EBONY LAMB

From performing at slam events to the publication of his first book, Jordan Hamel has honed his craft. He talks to Chris Tse about poetry and an impending move to America.

Born and raised in Timaru, Jordan has become a fixture of Wellington’s poetry scene, with charismatic and arresting performances. He is a former national slam poetry champion and represented Aotearoa at the World Poetry Slam Champs in the US in 2019. He is the co-editor of Stasis Journal and of the climate-change poetry anthology No Other Place to Stand (Auckland University Press). In his other life he is a policy advisor at the Ministry of Justice.

Jordan’s debut collection, Everyone is Everyone Except You (Dead Bird Books) unpacks traditional and modern constructions of masculinity, and explores how the stressors of modern life impact on mental health, relationships and sex. His poems swing wildly between obscenely funny and earnest, and are full of heart and life lessons. In the standout poem “Suitcase (Everything, everything will be alright, alright)” he comforts a distressed mate who has learnt his parents are separating on the eve of the final 1st XV match: “what’s a team without a captain and what’s a captain with a lip that rattles like an empty can.” The poem ends with his mate pleading, “don’t tell the boys for God’s sake don’t tell the boys.”

Chris: How were you introduced to poetry?

Jordan: Probably like most people, in high school. We studied Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, James K. Baxter and Hone Tuwhare, and that got me more excited because it was maybe a bit more contemporary and relevant. Also, it was about the time I got obsessed with music and singer-songwriters – people like Patti Smith and Leonard Cohen. The part of music that I really liked was the lyrics.

When did you start writing poetry?

Like every teenager I had a lot of feelings. I have a couple of journals at home that my parents won’t throw out but I would much like to destroy. It was, I guess, like an urge – I’ve got these feelings and I’ve got to put them somewhere. What was the moment when you realised you were a poet?

The most visceral moment for me, when I first thought of myself as a poet and not just someone who scribbles away, was the first time I performed – at Bush Bash alongside Hera Lindsay Bird, who was my hero and whose book I had obsessed over. In front of a big crowd it went really well and it gave me that endorphin hit you get the first time you have a crowd cheering for you. That was the moment I thought I could start taking it more seriously, and committing more of myself to it.

How did slam poetry help you to develop your craft as a poet?

I sort of fell into slam poetry. I really loved it and the opportunities to get up and perform and experiment. It both helped and hindered my craft, in that I almost felt like I had to learn to write twice. When I was writing the slam stuff, I wasn’t thinking about how words should look on a page to a reader. It made me re-learn a few things, but now I’m at a stage where I can put some bombastic elements into it and I can think about how it can come off the page as well. I think it can be a really fun way of elevating stuff, or making it more exciting or unexpected – chaotic but in controlled ways.

Why do you think some poeple engage with poetry more when they hear it read or performed, as opposed to experiencing it on the page?

I think it’s the oral tradition – we all grew up being told stories. When you hear something it can make more sense. You’re not only listening, you’re “reading” the person who’s telling you the story. You’re hearing their intonations. You’re hearing how they want you to hear it. When you have words on a page often you can’t – sometimes you can. Good writers are good at guiding the reader.

When you start writing a poem, do you know whether it’ll be more suited to performance or the page?

Sometimes I’ll think it’s one and it’ll become another; sometimes it will start off as a poem and become a short story. I almost find short fiction is closer to spoken-word poetry than page poetry, because it’s storytelling, and that’s what I really like. It’s always something I think about – whether it will look better on the page, what form it will look better in, whether it will translate.

Does Wellington inspire your writing?

It does. Not the city or the geography of it – I don’t really have an affinity with the natural world. But Wellington does inspire my writing because of the people. I just really like people – I find people interesting. I don’t think I could live in an isolated place and write good work without some sort of connection to others. Wellington is the perfect microcosm, with a lot of wonderful people and writers.

You’re about to head to the US to study creative writing. What will you miss about the poetry scene in Wellington?

Oh God, so much! The main thing is I’ll miss all my friends. I’ll miss going to events and seeing everyone. I’ll miss doing events and performances. There’s a comfortability about it here now that I didn’t feel three or four years ago. I like being in a place where everyone knows everyone, and everyone knows you, and that extends to the poetry community. Wellington’s a pretty special place – there’s a lot of amazing writers and performers here.

What’s your most memorable performance or event in Wellington?

The launch of Solid Air, the Australasian spoken-word anthology at the National Library. One, because the National Library is a rad venue; and, two, because it was the first time I had seen a lot of poets like Tusiata Avia, Hinemoana Baker, and David Eggleton read. I remember coming off stage really happy – I just felt good. All these people from different walks of life coming together for this amazing event and this amazing book.

What’s your tip for people who are curious about poetry but don’t know where to start?

If you want to get into poetry, whatever that may mean to you – try a lot of stuff. Turn up to events, slams, open mics; talk to your friends and find out what poems or poets they like; read widely; decide what you do and don’t like; and ask yourself why you have a reaction to something. That’s how I think you build a language within yourself, knowing what works for you Humour features in your work. What draws you to humour?

It’s a great coping mechanism. There’s always been humour in poetry, but why I’m drawn to it is I’ve always enjoyed making people laugh. It always came naturally to me, I guess. But I never wanted to do stand-up – I can’t imagine anything more terrifying than having to get on stage and make someone laugh. But in poetry, humour can be much more unexpected. I think it can be much more effective. And it’s a really good way to communicate stuff, expecially stuff that can be tough or challenging, or bleak – humour can be a good delivery system. It can go wrong – you see it a lot in bad comedy, and you see it in some bad poetry.

What’s the easiest or hardest poem you’ve ever had to write?

One is a performance piece – “Jordan, I love you, but you’re bringing me down”. I was getting into performance poetry, so I wrote it for the stage and to be a public piece. I found it really hard to write that because it’s interrogating how I felt over the last however many years about myself and depression and things like that. The writing of it was hard, but what was almost harder was the performing of it. I remember the first time I performed it in front of my parents – they were in the audience at the slam nationals. In a similar vein, the last poem I wrote for my book, ‘Good Kiwi Lad’, is not necessarily as autobiographical, but was me interrogating stuff around sexuality and queer sexuality, the role it’s played in my life. That’s something I hadn’t mined in such a direct way before. I knew it had to be in the book; it was the hardest one to put in there, but I’m really glad I did.

Can you talk about how you chose the title of your book?

I couldn’t think of a title for so long! It got to the point where I had to pick a title, and I had nothing. My dear friend Rebecca K Reilly [author of Greta & Valdin] said, “send me a list”. I sent her a list – poem titles, random thoughts, lines from poems, and we went through them and talked about why they were terrible. We got to Everyone is Everyone Except You. It was a line I had written into an old poem that I then put into the book, and I liked it because it was vague, but it was lyrical, and it summed up a lot of what the book’s about – community but also isolation, how you see yourself internally versus in the context of other people. I liked how it sounded – it’s soft and flowing. And it makes you look twice, because it doesn’t make sense the first time you read it.

What’s next for you and your poetry?

I’m going to the University of Michigan in August to undertake a Masters in Fine Arts in creative writing. I’ve never studied creative writing before so I’m really excited for that. I’m really excited not to have a job and just to write and learn and study again. Hopefully I’ll come out with a really good manuscript at the end, some sort of masterpiece.

The Holloway way

BY MELODY THOMAS PHOTOGRAPHY BY ANNA BRIGGS

Aro Valley has a strong and nostalgic place in Wellington folklore, often as a great place for short-stay youthful hi-jinks. Melody Thomas visits a couple who came, stayed and grew.

Driving from Te Aro up the winding road towards Karori, you might have looked back towards the city and spotted a rambling two-storey house sitting high on the hill above Holloway Road. Surrounded on all sides by dense bush, the old house perches perilously, paint peeling and washing flapping from the second-floor balcony. Maybe, like me, you’ve wondered who on earth lives there, how they get their shopping up the hill, and whether that washing ever gets dry.

If you had time to look more closely, you might also have noticed two smaller houses just below the big one, similarly enmeshed in greenery. These three buildings come as a set, sharing a single address, and are colloquially identified by those who live there as Top House, North Cottage, and South Cottage. Over the years a roster of interesting, unusual, and sometimes down-and-out characters have lived in them and the tiered garden surrounding them have expanded and contracted accordingly. But for 40 years they have all orbited around one constant: Rebecca Hardie Boys.

You might recognise the name. Rebecca is the brain behind Hardie Boys Beverages. Actually, she’s the brawn too, spending her weekdays out at the factory in Wainuiomata brewing up effervescent treats including her natural ginger beer, or hauling great crates of bottled brews to 80 or so cafés all over Wellington.

But evenings and weekends find Hardie Boys at home on the Aro hillside with her partner, artist, cabinetmaker, film-maker and chief fixer-upperer George Rose, fermenting great ceramic jars of sauerkraut, knocking off one of the thousand jobs on the to do list, or getting wrist-deep in the earth alongside the others who make up this flourishing little community.

This part of Aro Valley was once known as Mitchelltown, and it was the first suburb established by settler Wellingtonians. The first cottages here, including the North and South Cottages, were built in the 1860s and 1870s. But by the 1970s many of them, at this point belonging to the Crown, had begun to succumb to rot, neglect and fire. An article from The Evening Post at the time described Holloway Road as “sagging stairways with most of the tread rotted away”, leading to “sagging, open doors and damp, musty rooms where glass from broken windows crunches under-

foot.” In the late 70s the community began to reestablish itself, with people moving back into the dwellings and, eventually, beginning to negotiate the possibility of tenants purchasing houses from the Crown.

Rebecca first arrived here in 1982, on the run from the “claustrophobic” towns (Nelson and Palmerston North) where she’d spent her childhood and university years, “carrying a broken heart in my backpack”. A friend was living at Top House with her two young children, and offered Hardie Boys a bed for the weekend while she looked around for a flat.

“I arrived in the middle of the night to an old empty house up a zigzag track. Not even sure it was the right place, I found a bed and crashed. The next morning – amazing! – I was five minutes from town but in the middle of the bush!”

Even though these houses are clearly visible from the opposite hillside, finding your way up to them is a complicated endeavour. I’ve come on a clear autumn Saturday morning, with an hour to chat before the households descend on the garden, as is their habit.

As I’ve climbed up from the valley floor, the atmosphere has changed from dark and damp to warm and dry. A kākā freewheeling overhead shrieks its prehistoric cry, adding to the effect of stepping back in time. By the time I knock on the door of the North Cottage I’m fairly puffed, and just about recovered

when Rebecca and George open the door and welcome me inside their home.

North Cottage might be where Rebecca and George now rest their heads, but it was in Top House that they built their life together. They met in 1984, the details involving either a bad first impression and a boat (if you ask Rebecca) or the discovery of a long-haired beauty stoned and prostrate in a gutter (if you ask George). Eventually they got together, and in 1988 George moved into Top House. A year later their first child was born, their second following in 1992.

The rambling old house on the hill became a family home, with children joyously exploring a world without television: racing and yelling up and down the stairwell, making DIY radio shows on their tape player, and tracing the journeys of ants around the dining-room walls.

“It was a wonderful place to bring a family up,” reminisces Rebecca.

The Holloway Road houses were still being sold off by the Crown, first being offered to original owners, then to long-term sitting tenants, and finally on the open market. But when it got to Top House, the process got stuck on title and access issues.

Rebecca and George found bringing up their kids in a home that might at any moment be ripped out from under them incredibly stressful.

“We were tied between wanting to make the house warmer and less grotty, but being reluctant to spend our own money on it or to ask for improvements in case we got booted out… and the girls grew up with the threat of ‘maybe we’ll get evicted’ breathing at their door,” says Rebecca.

An eviction notice was served, but in 2010, after the girls had grown up and moved out, Rebecca and George lawyered up. In 2012, they finally purchased the property, the title having been redrawn to include two “uninhabitable” workingmen’s cottages.

“But we had no money left,” says Rebecca, “So we had to rent out the only habitable house.”

Which meant moving themselves into the North Cottage, which was completely derelict.

“It had no sewers, no power, no electricity, no nothing. The floor had collapsed, we had an office chair that would just run across the floor on its own,” says George.

“This bathroom was underground,” says Rebecca.

“And underwater!” adds George.

Now the couple can laugh about it, but this was an extremely difficult period, especially for Rebecca. George explains: “For her it was like ‘I’ve lost everything I’ve waited 25 years for, I’ve just moved into this horrible, unfixable hole’. Whereas I saw it like ‘Great we can do this place up!’ I thought it was a wonderful project.”

Today, the North Cottage is a world away from the “unfixable hole” they moved into. But the transformation is ongoing, so beautiful, carefully considered details sit side by side with those yet to be tackled, like a before and after picture brought to life; a warm clay wall on one side of the dinner table / peeling, watermarked wallpaper on the other; an immaculately tiled

bathroom with stunning handmade mosaic relief / a tiny, cobwebbed outhouse. There’s not much that could honestly be called new: the stunning floor tiles were salvaged from a skip on its way to the tip, the ceiling panels made from plywood gifted to George by a neighbour, who’d found it on a demolition site. The overall effect is complementary: the “new” house appears to be not so much replacing the old, as slowly embracing it.

Over coffee at the dining table, under lights with makeshift tinfoil lampshades, Rebecca and George share far more than I can use here (including one yarn involving a grand party entrance complete with flaming penis). They outline the complicated, messy process of trying to live according to their values, alongside other people. They have tried hosting Woofers and bringing in tenants, but neither were quite what they were after.

“We saw this property as the most beautiful, wonderful property in Wellington. Beautiful, close to the city, able to grow your own vegetables, the song of native birds. We thought it was too valuable to run as a tenant-landlord situation,” George says.

The sum of these buildings seemed to be worth more than its parts. So in 2020, George and Rebecca decided to advertise for people who wanted to live “like flatmates”, but across three separate dwellings. They

employed a lawyer, and drew up a protocol setting out the ways in which residents would be expected to live and contribute.

“Each house has autonomy. We’ve kept the bedrooms as private spaces, but we're free to walk into any of the bathrooms and kitchens, because all the houses belong to everyone. We charge a weekly fee to keep the place running, but it’s very cheap, and the main thrust is not gathering money, it's to try and live in a better way,” George says.

As of now, this is a community of seven, including Rebecca and George, a Czech couple Pavla Neuhöferová (30, performance artist) and Daniel Dvořáček (29, software developer), who are away hiking the Tongariro circuit when I visit, Hannah Blumhardt and Liam Prince, a couple in their 30s who work in zero waste advocacy, and Grace Yu Piper, a 30-year-old contemporary jeweller who commutes between here, her job at Pātaka in Porirua, and her studio at Nautilus in Owhiro Bay.

Before coming here recently, Liam and Hannah spent nearly three years travelling the country with their organisation The Rubbish Trip, a zero-waste roadshow delivering presentations and workshops on reducing New Zealanders’ waste footprints. During that time they stayed in comparable communities, so the place felt instantly familiar. Liam describes his first impressions as “magical in a sense like stepping back in time, and into a bit of a jungle.”

Hannah calls it “the good life in the middle of the city.”

Perhaps surprising is the absence of certain kinds of characters “alternative lifestyles” typically attract: wellness fanatics and conspiracy theorists. One loved resident recently left because she didn’t want to be vaccinated, and the community couldn’t find a way to operate collectively while keeping everyone safe. Everyone else is fully vaccinated. Among the red flags for Rebecca and George when wannabe residents apply are “musician”, “gluten free”, “5G” and, presumably – now that the word has been properly ruined – “freedom”. Yes, there are regular comments about supermarket monopolies, “Zookerboog”, and the social ills caused by overreliance on screens. But there’s enough truth in all of that that excessive zeal is easily forgiven.

“They’re hippies, but they’re not woo woo,” says Hannah, “I’m not a woo woo person. I like evidence-based not-destroyingthe-planet. I’m not that bothered about my own vibrations.”

“The protocol” lists five activities that residents are expected to participate in, mostly revolving around the production, preparation, and sharing of food. If this might seem like a bit much, Hannah points out that almost everything listed in the protocol was something she and Liam were trying to do already.

“I actually find that the way we live is less time-consuming. It’s so much more convenient to not have to go to the supermarket!” says Hannah.

It’s early days for the seven members of the current community, and who knows, they may find they need to tweak the protocol at some point. But it does feel closer to sustainable than many of the communal models I’ve seen. Everyone here has work and friends outside of the community, most travel to the city daily and so remain connected to the wider world, but they also share the benefits of

coming together regularly on the land and at their tables, to share “the wins and frustrations of the day” (as the protocol says), along with the food they’ve collaborated to produce.

I finish my visit with a two-hour tour of the garden and the other houses. We stroll past apple and feijoa trees, clamber up a steep bush path through stands of kawakawa and bay trees, and nibble on the last of the season’s beans and the first of the mizuna. I get to stand out on that high balcony at Top House with Grace, looking down the verdant valley with the sun beating on my face, the washing flapping beside me (drying fast thanks to the wind and all-day sun). At the South Cottage I climb a ladder to the cosy loft shared by Hannah and Liam, admire the tambourines collected on their travels and the bikes they haul up from the road to their verandah each day. When I eventually leave it’s with three bottles of cold ginger beer clinking in my backpack, and renewed excitement over my own home garden, and the things I might begin to coax from soil to table.

George and Rebecca also send me off with advice for anyone wishing to follow in their footsteps:

“It’s easy to become paralysed by the size of your wishes and ideals, so small steps are crucial,” says George, “Pick up the skills you do have and use them as a way to step forward with an eye on the path of what you believe in.”

“If you wish to grow your own food all you have to do is pick up a spade and then plunge it into the ground. Doing too much research stops you from picking up the spade,” adds Rebecca.

“Oh,” says George, “and it doesn't matter if you mess up.”