New Poet Laureate announced

New Poet Laureate announced

The National Library is delighted to announce Christian Karlson Stead of Auckland as the new Poet Laureate for 2015 - 2017.

Chris Szekely, Chief Librarian of the Alexander Turnbull Library attributes Mr. Stead’s international presence as a poet, teacher, editor, literary critic and novelist as central to his nomination and appointment as New Zealand’s new Poet Laureate.

“Karl Stead has been a constant contributor to New Zealand’s literary landscape across a range of disciplines for over sixty years but by his own admission, it is poetry that is central to his life as a writer,” says Mr. Szekely. “His Collected Poems contains poetry written in 1951 yet he continues to create new works of freshness and originality with poems written in 2015.”

On receiving news of his appointment as Poet Laureate, Stead commented, “poetry has been somewhere near the centre of my consciousness for the past 70 years, so this affects me more than any other honour I could have.”

From its inception as the Te Mata Estate Laureate Award in 1996 through to 2007 the Laureates have been Bill Manhire, Hone Tuwhare, Elizabeth Smither, Brian Turner and Jenny Bornholdt. Since 2007, when the National Library took over the appointment of the Poet Laureate, the Laureates have been Michele Leggott, Cilla McQueen, Ian Wedde and Vincent O’Sullivan.

Karl Stead will be formally inducted into the role later this month.

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Biography:

C.K. Stead was born in Auckland in 1932. He began writing poetry while still at school and was first published as a student. His awards for poetry have included the Jessie Mackay award, the New Zealand Book Award for poetry, the King’s Lynn Poetry prize, the Hippocrates Prize for poetry and Medicine, and the Sarah Broom prize. His Collected Poems 1951-2006 received a Montana Prize in 2009.

Other literary awards and prizes include the Katherine Mansfield Short Story award, the New Zealand Book Award for fiction (twice), and the Sunday Times/E.F.G. Private Bank short story prize. In 2011 he received the Prime Minister’s Award for fiction. He has had novels translated into 11 European languages.

As an academic Stead has an international reputation as an expert on 20th century poetic Modernism. He is also well-known as a critic of New Zealand literature. He was Professor of English at the University of Auckland from 1967 to 1986 when he stopped teaching to write full time. He is still Professor Emeritus.

Stead was awarded the C.B.E. in 1986 for services to New Zealand literature. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1995. He was Senior Visiting Fellow at St John’s College Oxford 1996-1997, awarded an Honorary Doctorate by the University of Bristol in 2001, and the Bogliasco Fellowship in literature in 2007 and 2011. He was Auckland City’s Distinguished Citizen for 2007, the year in which he was awarded the ONZ.

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