Obituary Mr lain Lonie

Press, 28 June 1988, Page 39

Obituary Mr lain Lonie

PA Dunedin Mr lain Malcolm Lonie, the Dunedin poet and editor of the Otago University Press, died recently, aged 55. Mr Lonie had four volumes of his poetry published: “Recreations” (1967), “Letters from Ephesus” (1970), “Courting Death,” and most recently “The Entrance To Purgatory,” 1986.

Born in Cambridgeshire, Mr Lonie came to New Zealand at the age of 10 and went to school in Palmerston North.

He gained a Bachelor of Arts degree in classics at the University of Otago. He went on to achieve first-class honours in classics at King’s College in Cambridge. Until 1974 Mr Lonie worked at the universities of New England New South Wales, Sydney, and Otago, where he held the position of associate professor in classics.

Mr Lonie then worked on an Otago Harbour Board dredge for about a year. At the beginning of 1976 he received a Wellcome fellowship to research

medical history, and at the same time was granted entry to the National Library School in Wellington. Choosing the fellowship first, he spent a year studying the recorded history of Greek medicine in England. On his return to New Zealand he began but did not complete the one-year diploma course at the library school. He then worked for the Otago Catchment Board where he wrote and edited reports and established a library until about 1980, when he returned to England. He continued his research but about three years later his second wife Judith, a speech therapist and also a poet, died.

Mr Lonie returned to New Zealand with their son.

After another spell with the Catchment Board, Mr Lonie became an editor at the printing firm, John Mclndoe, Ltd.

He stayed there until earlier this year when he was appointed editor of the University of Otago Press.