Find A Matter Of Timing: Poems By Lauris Edmond Drafted By Lauris Dorothy Edmond Shown In Document

work presents a collection of poems by Lauris Edmond, The poems deal with daily experience and personal relationships and on the ways in which individual lives are shaped by family connections and by large natural and social forces.
The collection focuses particularly on ageing, Trained as a teacher, Lauris Edmond raised a family before publishing the poetry she had privately written throughout her life, Following her first book, In Middle Air, written in, she published many volumes of poetry, a novel, an autobiography Hot October,and several plays, Her Selected Poemswon the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, Edmond wrote poetry throughout her life but decided to publish her first collection of verse, In Middle Air, only in, at the age of, The work was awarded the PEN Best First Book Award for, She began her editorial activities in, and inpublished a selection of poems by Chris Ward, Inshe edited the letters of A, R. D. Fairburn, a noted New Zealand poet of an e Trained as a teacher, Lauris Edmond raised a family before publishing the poetry she had privately written throughout her life.
Following her first book, 'In Middle Air,' written in, she published many volumes of poetry, a novel, an autobiography Hot October,and several plays, Her Selected Poemswon the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, Edmond wrote poetry throughout her life but decided to publish her first collection of verse, In Middle Air, only in, at the age of, The work was awarded the PEN Best First Book Award for, She began her editorial activities in, and inpublished a selection of poems by Chris Ward, Inshe edited the letters of A, R. D. Fairburn, a noted New Zealand poet of an earlier generation, It was a bold move on her part as the writer in question was not known for his progressive views, but the publication established her as an allround woman of letters.
At the same time, Edmond received the Katherine Mansfield Memorial Fellowship, which enabled her to stay in the south of France for several months, Her first work of prose was 'High Country Weather,' a book billed as a novel though in fact an extended shortstory of a deeply biographical character, telling however veiledly the

story of her own incompatible marriage to Trevor Edmondit was published in, at about the time of her reallife marriages dissolution.
The feminist awakening marked by that book was sustained in a collection of other womens stories published under her coeditorship two years later, As Janet Wilson wrote in the Guardian, She was friend to several generations of women, especially writers, who admired her as a pioneer for breaking with social convention and carving out a successful literary life at a time when this seemed risky.
InLauris Edmond won the Commonwealth Poetry Prize for her Selected Poems, The following year she was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for services to literature in theQueen's Birthday Honours, Additionally, inshe received the Lilian Ida Smith Award from PEN New Zealand inNew Zealands Massey University awarded her an honorary D, Litt. degree and inshe received the A, W. Reed Award for Contribution to New Zealand Literature from Booksellers New Zealand, an industry association in Wellington, New Zealand, After her death a biennial poetry prize was established in her name at the initiative of the Canterbury Poets Collective and the New Zealand Poetry Society, the Lauris Edmond Memorial Award for Poetry, the first prize having been awarded posthumously at the Christchurch Arts Festival to the late poet Bill Sewell in.
Her poetry, which continues to influence New Zealand writers, was not all about daffodils she could speak with a committed voice, as is evidenced in the poem "Nuclear Bomb Test, Mururoa Atoll," which begins:I am water I am sandI am a cell in the trembling earthI am a shaken pebble on the hurt sea floora young fish made ill by the predator poisoncoursing towards me across the oceanthat was my friendAlthough in life she stayed as far away as was possible from all forms of organized religion, in death her quotations do apparently find their way into various church settings in New Zealand, a proof if one be needed of their deep innate spirituality.
Lauris Edmond died unexpectedly at her home in Wellingtons Oriental Bay on the morning ofJanuary, A friend arriving for dinner that evening discovered her body, She was, the mother of six children, five of them daughters, one of whom Rachel, the fourth child committed suicide inthe event is dealt with, poetically, in Edmonds poem sequence 'Wellington Letter'.
Her only son, Martin Edmond b,, is also a writer. sitelink.