NEW ZEALAND AUTHOR’S SUCCESS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3823, 21 June 1927, Page 74

NEW ZEALAND AUTHOR’S SUCCESS.

Mr Hector Bolitho, the New Zealand author, who has been visiting the United States and Canada, returned to England to find his novel “Solemn Boy” well into its second edition, this within two or three weeks of publication. While in Canada, he was the guest of the National Council of Education, and at all the big centres he spoke of New Zealand, some” times at public lunches where there were as many as six to seven hundred people. New Zealand thus received far-spread publicity during his tour, for he covered 16,000 miles of sea and rail during the tour. His greatest success was in New York, where, as the guest at a tremendous lunch, he spoke about the Dominion to a verv influential gathering. While in New York he arranged for the publication of his novel and four more to follow, also Lady Augusta Stanley’s Letters, which he has edited with the Dean of Windsor, and which were publised in England at almost the same time as his novel. This book has also passed through its second edition and is to so into a third edition early in May. Mr Bolitho was very enthusiastic about Canada, but he said:

I cannot help feeling, after living in Australia, South Africa, and Canada, that hiew Zealand represents the greatest trilimp in colonisation and new country government. Everywhere I went in Canada or in the United States, my parocnial pride was fed by the great respect everybody has for New Zealanders who, travelling in every country, seem to establish themselves as workers, thinkers and gentlemen.”

Mr Bolitho has been invited to return to the States and give lectures on New Zealand at several of the universities. He hopes to do this at the end of the year, when his new novel is finished. Like “ Solemn Boy,” the action of his new book will open in New Zealand, although the later chapters will be worked out against an English background.