Author(s): Kevin Ireland

Literature | Aotearoa New Zealand Non-Fiction | Poetry | Aotearoa

As he enters his 90th year on the planet, Kevin Ireland describes his third memoir as a process of "sweeping up all the reflective wrappers and the tinsel, and describing how, in the setting sun, they glitter with the brilliant romance of nostalgia."
Unlike his earlier two memoirs, one of which won a National Book Award, this is not a systematic chronicle of lasting interests and colourful occurrences, but a reflective, almost absent-minded, rummaging through 30 episodes – representing a month – at the back of his brain. The method is open and experimental, and it allows the ordinary and everyday to take a rightful place among the souvenirs of his ‘life’.
Matters that once seemed significant are relegated to obscurity and events and intersections that were once thought to be minor are now allowed space to reveal how they stealthily altered viewpoints and added to a store of vital experiences. In his 90th year Ireland no longer believes that the highpoints of an existence are always decided by important events. Some of them do have lasting results, but this memoir deliberately sets out to uncover the enduring worth and power of happenings that may have seemed simple at the time but were complex and entirely out of the ordinary in their effects. Overlooked memories return to us in our old age with a new and astonishing energy and with all the buzz of their magic reborn.

Contents: Introduction - with whys and wherefores 7 1 Day one - losing my marbles? 9 2 A disorderly procedure 13 3 The virus, etcetera 19 4 The Mai Thai 24 5 A line on the waters 28 6 The truth in tall stories 34 7 Fantasies, fibs and delusions 39 8 Laughter in the skies 45 9 A note on Peter Bland ... 51 10 ... and a quick word on Karl Stead 56 11 Remembering Bevan 61 12 A consolation of birds 66 13 Slaving for the pharoahs ... 72 14 ... then at a modern flour mill 77 15 Mac, Jim and Liam 83 16 Doing good v. meddling 91 17 Talking of football, fathers and funerals 98 18 Love and poems 107 19 What really happened in those 'upright' days 111 20 Ballroom dancing and Somervell's 116 21 John Graham, Oxford Street and murder houses 121 22 Craigie and Shirli 128 23 Croquet, tennis, then a double two 133 24 Peter, Coral, Kennedy, Khrushchev and Roy Thomson 139 25 In praise of an absence of action ... 144 26 ... and a loud cheer for getting things done 149 27 Boarding houses and bedsitters 153 28 Philip ii, Lord Baden-Powell, Pax and Don 158 29 Perfect enjoyment 164 30 A day for a paper dart 168 Index 172