N.Z. 40 YEARS AGO

Press, 19 August 1978, Page 17

N.Z. 40 YEARS AGO

All Part of the Game. The Stories of A. P. Gaskell. Auckland University Press. 192 pp. $5.95 (paperback). New Zealand, 38 years ago, was a different place. Reading A. P. Gaskell’s masterful short stories, set in the New Zealand of the late 1930 s and early 19405, is like stepping into a dim, slightly musty, but well-remembered room. Gaskell — his real name is Alexander Gaskell Pickard, and he now lives in Hamilton — started writing shortly before the Second World War. He was not prolific, and has not continued to publish. This book comprises 13 stories which were published by the Caxton Press in 1947,

and six others first published elsewhere. Each of them shows the sure touch of a writer with a discerning eye for character, a keen ear, and a fine understanding of the concerns, passions and frailties of ordinary people. The anger and arson of a father who sees his son being led to alcoholism by a local country pub, the maudlin pomposity of a drunken and lonely old army officer, the self-centred arrogance of a city teacher sent to a small Maori school, the sweaty, steamy bonhomie of the small-town football team — Gaskell throws them all into vivid focus. —A. J. PETRIE.