When John Summers moved to a small town in the Wairarapa and began
to look closely at the less-celebrated aspects of local life - our
club rooms, freezing works, night trains, hotel pubs, landfills -
he saw something deeper. It was a story about his own life, but
mostly about a place and its people. The story was about life and
death in New Zealand. Combining reportage and memoir, The
Commercial Hotel is a sharp-eyed, poignant yet often hilarious tour
of Aotearoa: a place in which Arcoroc mugs and dog-eared political
biographies are as much a part of the scenery as the hills we tramp
through ill-equipped. We encounter Elvis impersonators, the
eccentric French horn player and adventurer Bernard Shapiro, Norman
Kirk balancing timber on his handlebars while cycling to his
building site, and Summers's grandmother: the only woman imprisoned
in New Zealand for protesting World War Two. And we meet the ghosts
who haunt our loneliest spaces. As he follows each of his
preoccupations, Summers reveals to us a place we have never quite
seen before.
General
Imprint: |
Victoria University Press
|
Country of origin: |
New Zealand |
Release date: |
July 2021 |
Authors: |
John Summers
|
Format: |
Paperback
|
Pages: |
200 |
ISBN-13: |
978-1-77656-421-7 |
Categories: |
Books
|
LSN: |
1-77656-421-9 |
Barcode: |
9781776564217 |
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