Volumes I and II of , two novelettes 55 pages and 39 pages in length respectively, were published separately under the pseudonym of The Inhabitant in 1881 in Ashburton (or possibly Dunedin),

For a discussion of the possible publisher see: Dominic Alessio, “”, 1, 1 (October 1998), 59.

recounted the tale of a wealthy Bostonian named Julian West, who having fallen asleep in the year 1887, awakened in the year 2000 to see a wonderfully advanced society which had resolved all the problems plaguing the industrialising 19th century world. The divisions of the old Boston, namely poverty, unemployment, labour-capital conflict, corruption, class barriers, and inequality of wealth, had all been resolved in the new society as a consequence of the nationalisation of the economy by the state, which in turn had allowed for the complete social and political equality of all citizens regardless of sex. As a result of the novel’s readable prose (a practical problem facing many late 19th century utopianist/SF works), as well as Bellamy’s sincere and logical vision of a potential socialist utopian future, quickly became an international best-seller and went on to establish Bellamy ‘as one of the United States’ most widely read and ideologically influential writers’ (Bowman xix-xx). Everett F. Bleiler in his history of early Science-Fiction says that may well be ‘the most international American book since the work of Edgar Allan Poe and James Fenimore Cooper’ (xxi).

Bellamy’s ideas went on to affect in varying degrees the Fabians of Britain, Russian Revolutionaries in 1917, Zionist leaders in Europe and Palestine, labour leaders throughout the British settlement colonies, and Theosophists the world over. His ideas also influenced such writers and thinkers as Charles Beard, John Dewey, Anton Chekhov, Eugene V. Debs, Anatole France, Maxim Gorky, George Bernard Shaw, Leo Tolstoy, Thorstein Veblen, Edward Weeks, and H.G. Wells. The vogue for SF and utopianism which resulted from Bellamy’s novel was even ‘such that Gilbert and Sullivan... thought it worth a whole operetta, . (first performed in 1893)’ (Amis 38). Nor was New Zealand itself immune to the popularity of Bellamy’s message. William Pember Reeves, later Liberal Minister of Labour from 1892-1896, celebrated the novel in 1889 on account of the fact that Bellamy had ‘mastered, and digested the creed of Socialism... without being dull...’ (Roth 231). Although there is no evidence to show the number of people who read Bellamy in New Zealand, one year after Reeves’ comment local newspapers in Auckland, Christchurch and Dunedin were announcing that they were quickly selling out of copies of the popular book. According to one correspondent from the : `For some weeks past the first query on the lips of every second person whom one met in the street or elsewhere was “Have you read ?” (Roth 232). Even as late as the 1960s the former New Zealand Prime Minister Walter Nash said that he regarded Bellamy as ‘probably one of the greatest, if not the greatest, prophets of the development of world conditions’ (Bowman xx).

The relationship between Bellamy and New Zealand, however, may not necessarily be only one way. It now appears highly likely that the New Zealand novelette is the principle source for the frame story of . This conclusion appears all the more certain when is compared to Bellamy’s 1898 short story “”, on which its influence is pervasive. In both (GR) and (LB) the narrator (John Brenton Hope

Later in the text Brenton reads Bredford.

Where the two works differ is in intent. The author of GR appears primarily concerned with producing an entertaining and romantic story, and even quite possibly a promotional piece aimed at attracting settlers to New Zealand. The flight into the unknown reads like a fevered dream or prophetic vision, the author indicating a passionate thirst for knowledge and new experiences, an innatus cognitionis amor, like Dante’s Ulysses: ‘we wandered and searched, like children on a holiday, ever eager to see, to know, and to discover...’ Parts of Volumes I and II can even be likened to a Boy’s Own or an American dime novel with an emphasis on technological wizardry, Hope’s adventures on Venus, and his companions’ dangerous return journey amongst the stars. By contrast Bellamy’s prime concern is to stress the need for a type of socialist transformation that would end ‘the old laissez faire capitalist order’ (Lipow 23). LB is therefore more concerned with a concrete and practical reality. Its utopia is firmly grounded upon the earth and appears achievable; it is not simply an adventurous dream as in GR, the focus of which soon leaves the planet altogether.

This divergence in intent raises another difference between the two works, namely the means by which these utopias come about. Whereas the Inhabitant attributes the rise of utopia to the advent of telepathy, Bellamy envisions it as the result of nationalism wherein the old predatory capitalist monopolies have been peacefully and gradually absorbed into one central governmental monopoly which operates in the interests of all. Telepathy, therefore, plays no part in LB’s cooperative Boston of AD 2000. Bellamy did, nevertheless, credit the rise of a utopian society to telepathy in “”, published in 1898. In this short story the shipwrecked narrator is rescued by the telepathic inhabitants of a group of South Sea islands cut off from the rest of the world by savage currents. Here, as in GR, the fact that one’s every thought is public, so that wicked intentions cannot be concealed, has resulted in all having only honourable thoughts, or (in GR) in the isolation of those who have socially undesirable motives. And here again the narrator finds both a friendly guide to educate him in the ways of this telepathic society as well as the love of a beautiful woman.

In the history of SF appears to form an important bridge between Bellamy’s “” and another noteworthy and influential SF work of the late nineteenth century, namely , which was written in 1871 by the British novelist, dramatist, politician and statesman Edward Bulwer-Lytton. That the writing of GR was influenced by Bulwer-Lytton is suggested by the following: (i) the inhabitants of Bulwer-Lytton’s utopia (which is located in the centre of the earth) are winged people (despite their otherwise human appearance), as are the non-humanoid alien `Venuses’ which Hope meets in volume II; and (ii) the scene in which Moxton uses `magnetism’ to control the movements of a stick is reminiscent of the rod used in to control the power of vril (an energy which permits the transfer of thought and mind-control). Susan Stone-Blackburn, who discusses the treatment of psi powers in , calls Bellamy’s short story

It should now be evident that the trail was blazed not by Bellamy in 1888 but by The Inhabitant in 1881. It was not long after this that psi powers developed into a staple of modern SF: ‘The notion that new mental powers would be developed in the course of man’s future evolution became commonplace in the early 20th century’ (Pringle 35).

Bellamy scholars (including his biographer Arthur E. Morgan), have suggested that Bellamy may have borrowed some of his ideas for LB from John Macnie, a Scottish-born American educator and Professor of French and German who in 1883, after GR and before LB, published a dystopian novel entitled . According to Morgan in both and LB:

Bleiler, in discussing the merits of such a possible connection, does point out that both Macnie and Bellamy were in correspondence with one another before their works were published (735). The possibility that Macnie himself was influenced by GR cannot be excluded at this point. Certainly he was familiar with New Zealand for he devoted a great deal of space to the material progress which the Antipodes were supposed to have made over the course of centuries and refers to New Zealand (which he terms ‘Maoria’) many times. In fact the protagonist of from the future - Ismar Thiusen - is identified by Macnie as originating in the North Island of the country (58).The question now arises how Bellamy (if he did not borrow the plot of GR via The Diothas) came across The Inhabitant’s novelette, for he never visited New Zealand. It is possible that someone visiting New Zealand brought back a copy to the United States, a copy that eventually made its way into Bellamy’s hands. It is even possible that the publisher sent copies of the book to American publishers for possible reprinting or distribution.

In addition to its probable influence (either directly or indirectly by way of Macnie) on Bellamy, GR is unusual among SF works of the time in being primarily science-fictional, in other words taking the real world and technological innovation (as opposed to fantasy) at its starting point, rather in the mode of an earlier and more famous SF author, Jules Verne. Bleiler designates such a position as being quasi-scientific as opposed to pseudo-scientific ‘which suggests falsity’ (xi). GR is also of interest for ostensibly introducing a number of innovative technologically-related firsts for SF which have now become quite common to the genre.

The Inhabitant’s attempts at verisimilitude are evident early on in Volume I which begins not in the time of the author and reader, in 1881, but in a scientifically-advanced 1950. The chemical potion that puts Hope into a state of suspended animation, which he enters in order to experience for himself the future, has been concocted by ‘John Malcolm Weir, the greatest chemist of the day.’ In addition, the Hope of 1950 is himself a renowned scientist whose concepts have been, at least in part, responsible for the technological developments that have led to the world of 2143: ‘You first started the mechanical world on this new track. You found out the power which so swiftly drives us through the air and over the earth...’

is also interesting for its depiction of space travel. While a number of space-travel stories were published earlier, there was perhaps only one, Percy Greg’s (1880), which provided so detailed and extensive an account of the difficulties involved. Otherwise many of these earlier works ‘tended to turn a blind eye to the problems involved in moving outside the Earth’s atmosphere’ (Pringle 50). By contrast the Inhabitant’s vision of the shape of things to come, both on his journey to Venus and during his friends’ return, includes: accounts of the absence of gravity on a spaceship and the need for exercise to prevent muscle fatigue; the problem of meteor damage to a ship (avoided by the spaceship Star Climber having a defensive cannon powerful enough to destroy a moon á la Deathstar); possible regions in space, passage through which would disable a spaceship; the need for a cooling device on board to prevent damage from the extreme heat generated by a planet’s atmosphere during take-off and re-entry; the apparent use of a planet’s or comet’s rotation and/or atmosphere to increase (in a sling-shot like effect) or decrease a space vessel’s speed; initial landings in a planet’s ocean (reminiscent of American manned capsules returning to the Pacific or Atlantic); the problems of fresh air and monotony on a long space voyage; the reasons why Venus is chosen over the moon as a destination for the voyage (there is no atmosphere on the moon and apparently one on Venus); the description of Venus from space ‘like a moon at three-quarter’s full’, which is strikingly reminiscent of today’s television images of the view of Earth as seen from space; the fact that before a launch can occur a suitable window of opportunity is required: ‘Early morning was the time appointed for their leave-taking; then the planet would bring us round to the appointed place...’; and the depiction of walking in a low-gravity environment that so clearly resembles the frustrations, dangers and humour of the first moon walks: ‘Don’t fool about Weir. I believe a good jump would send one clear altogether’.

As far as the primary propulsion system of the Star Climber is concerned, it is not driven by anti-gravity or any such similar power common to late-nineteenth-century space flight (for example ‘apergy’ in Greg’s ), but while in the atmosphere of a planet it uses metallic wings that, like those of a hummingbird, flap so rapidly that they cannot be seen at full speed. This picturesque but improbable image aside, the Star Climber can also achieve alternative velocity in space or during take-off by a variant of the more conventional means of rocket-propulsion:

Such a method of take-off as described from the planet Venus, looking ‘like a falling tower across the firmament’ and leaving a ‘fearful deafening roar’, is very much akin to late twentieth century images and after-effects of modern American, Soviet or European rocket launches.

Another technological innovation of interest found in volume II includes the use of a spacesuit which is worn by Hope’s companions to explore a passing comet: ‘they prepared their air-pipe supplies - something like a bagpipe in appearance; they could breathe in the air through a mouthpiece... With these on they could walk in a vacuum for an hour or more.’ Part of this spacesuit includes glasses tightly fastened over the face ‘so that the atmosphere could touch no part of his body.’ John J. Pierce in states that the French novelists Georges LeFaure and Henri de Graffigny who worked collaboratively in the late 1880s and early 1890s were ‘apparently the first to think of... space suits’ (40).It now seems clear that this particular necessity of space exploration first makes its appearance in GR and as early as 1881.

Other apparent technical firsts for GR include the equivalent of a kind of shuttle-craft or lunar rover in volume II which is used by Hope to explore the planet Venus; he calls it ‘the Midge’ and it is described simply as a kind of fantastic ‘boat’ that can ‘run, or fly, or swim’. The author of GR also appears acutely aware of the need to maintain an air-tight environment during space travel, and consequently volume II includes, quite possibly for the first time in the history of SF, the use of an airlock as we know it today. Such a device first makes its appearance with Hope’s friends during their reconnoitre of a passing comet: ‘The sliding doors were shot back and closed again behind them, then Weir opened the outer one and stepped out.’ may also be the first story in which a person travels into the future via induced suspended animation rather than simply by sleep; none earlier is mentioned by Bleiler in his history of the early years of SF.

Louis-Sebastian Mercier’s Memoirs of the Year Two Thousand Five Hundred (1772) is the first known work which displaces its protagonist into the future, however it is only a dream sequence and the protagonist does not deliberately attempt to transport himself to the distant future.

Other aspects of GR worth mentioning, which if not unique to nineteenth century SF/utopianism are interesting in their own right, include the future relationship between the sexes and the physical description of the new cities. The society described in GR is a free-love society. Whereas sexuality in any physical sense never influences the behaviour of West and Edith Leete in LB, it does play a part in the relationship between Hope and Edith Weir: ‘It was with us, then, like Danty’s [sic] lovers, when they ceased to read of the loves of Launcelot and the Queen.’ When Hope is about to embark for Venus he wonders whether Edith will follow him, an issue which constantly dominates Hope’s thoughts during his Robinson Crusoe-like period of isolation in volume II. A further likeness between GR and LB—although one common to utopian tales of the future beginning as early as Thomas Moore, and probably reflecting contemporary preoccupations over fin de siècle urban reform rather than further similarities between GR and LB—is that for both The Inhabitant and Bellamy the future assumes millennium-like dimensions of a Golden Age. The cities of the future are depicted in both works as the apotheosis of an urban planner’s dream. When Hope is shown the urban landscape of the 22nd century for the first time, he sees ‘an immense city. The streets were as thickly peopled as the old London streets, but they were four times their width, and planted with trees along either side.’ West’s description of Boston in the year 2000 is similar: ‘At my feet lay a great city. Miles of broad streets shaded by trees and lined with fine buildings... stretched in every direction.’

Possibly one of the more interesting developments in GR relating to the genre of SF as a whole, aside from the technological innovations already mentioned and the novel’s potential influence upon Macnie and/or Bellamy, is its treatment of the alien ‘Venuses’. Unlike many later SF works of the post- kind, the two Venuses which Hope encounters (one male and a smaller female) are not menacing bug-eyed monsters (BEMs). Instead they are given some basic character development and attempts are made at apparently realistic xenobiological characterisation. When the two races first meet there are some introductory problems of communication as the aliens do not speak English and hand gestures are required to initiate a greeting. First contact description between the races also appears particularly credible. The smaller female shrinks back with fear as Hope first approaches; there is a rather moving description of Hope and the male alien initiating physical touch; and there later occurs an exchange of gifts and hospitality between the two species after some confidence is established between them. The alien couple also appear to have a belief system, evidenced by the fact that while later agreeing to act as Hope’s guides, before doing so they enact a kind of ‘solemn covenant’ which Hope presumes to be an oath of secrecy: ‘wherever your native home may be I will always hold it as a sacred thing.’ A believable exploration procedure is also evidenced by the fact that Hope’s companions, before they begin their return journey home, ‘collected fruits, flowers, and the smaller animals, to be taken back.’ Such an accumulation strategy resembles James Cook’s exploration in the South Pacific or even more modern inter-planetary expeditions to the moon or Mars.

GR is not by any means the first work to develop the concept of life originating away from Earth. As early as the 2nd century AD., the Greek author Lucian of Samosata was peopling the moon and other heavenly bodies with strange races. Most of his creatures, however, fitted ‘more into supernatural fiction than ancestral science-fiction’ (Bleiler 455) and were intended for satiric purposes like Swift’s creations in .By comparison, those later SF authors who did develop a concept of intelligent alien beings such as the ‘Martials’ in , tended instead to restrict their descriptions to a type of humanoid: ‘Until , interplanetary fiction had typically peopled other worlds with beings little different from ourselves’ (Pierce, ). The Martials in Greg’s story, for example, are essentially just shorter and weaker human beings. According to Pierce, it was for plot reasons having to do either with a need to develop a human-alien romantic interest (Edgar Rice Burroughs) or a malevolent BEM threat (H.G. Wells), that ‘for the most part, the story of aliens in science fiction before 1934 is one of missed opportunities’ (Pierce, ). The Venuses in volume II of GR, however, are a visibly physically and psychologically distinct species from homo sapiens:

Although at times GR may read like a safari adventure with its descriptions of various ‘huge lion-like animals’, ‘tigers’, and strange landscapes, the planet Venus and its creatures appears to represent a more believable alien-world creation. What is more the author at times seems sympathetic to the aliens (who often become parabolically displaced by SF authors in time and space with native peoples). As early as volume I, and before contact has been made, Hope concludes that if alien life does exist on the planet then Earth colonists will just have to find another world to develop: ‘...we must seek another planet - for over earth’s over-crowded happiness..’ Similarly the Venuses are described as having a degree of mental ability: ‘There was intelligence, knowledge, in every line of their features...’ Such an apparently more enlightened late-nineteenth-century point of view in GR contrasts remarkably with the actual history of European colonization of the Americas and Australasia, many of whose indigenous peoples were either displaced or eradicated during the settlement process. In discussing contact experiences in SF, John Pierce states that Florence Carpenter Dieudonné in her SF work (1887), is ‘ahead of her time...in defending the rights of aliens’ ( 59). Similarly Kingsley Amis states that sympathetic attitudes to native peoples [read alien species] can only be found to have developed in American SF from the middle of the 20th century onwards (95). The empathy for a non-human species in GR appears to put the work ahead of its time in the genre of SF as a whole. Such an attitude in 1881 New Zealand SF may well reflect a kind of noble savage mentality that was re-affirming itself in the wake of late-nineteenth-century social and environmental concerns, as well as a European/New Zealand sense of guilt or shame over the realisation that colonisation in many cases had disastrous effects on those colonized.

Initial sympathy for the aliens aside, there are also paternalistic elements towards the Venuses that mirror late-nineteenth-century cultural attitudes of racial superiority towards native peoples. Although in volume I Hope stated that colonization would not proceed should there be life on Venus, that idea is quickly forgotten by volume II; for even after Hope has befriended the Venuses he has grand plans for the alien world: ‘They had come to find a future home for the growing millions of their native earth, and here all around the tropical zone was a region fitted with everything necessary.’ The imperialistic/militaristic is also visible by the fact that Hope has his own version of a frontier fort to which he can retreat if attacked, his ‘little castle’ with its ‘formidable...powers of defence’; he additionally carries around with his person a revolver whenever he travels beyond the confines of his private sanctuary.

There are a number of other acts which Hope undertakes which could be interpreted as examples of Victorian cultural superiority. Soon after contact with the Venuses, for instance, he names them. What is more he chooses the classical/mythological appellations of Philomenia and Hyperion, and in using such classical designations appropriates automatically the legacy of the Greco-Roman heritage and all its intonations of civilised authority. This was a favourite tactic of late-nineteenth-century empire propagandists: ‘in the Protestant countries... classicism as the uniform of civilization’ (Pieterse 19). Such a naming process is in fact very similar to the way in which Robinson Crusoe names Man Friday, although Hope does recognise that ‘he would learn their own names as soon as he could master their most strange speech.’ In addition Hope tends to view the Venuses, despite their intelligence, as ‘children’ whose minds ‘had little that was superior to humanity.’ Furthermore, the Venuses’ level of sophistication as reflected by their material culture is also implied to be inferior, as evidenced by the description of their little boat as ‘rude’. Their apparent sexual behaviour towards one another from a mid- to late-Victorian perspective could also indicate a relatively uncivilised culture, although at the same time it may represent to the author a kind of innocent nobility of which he is envious: ‘they seemingly grew quite unconscious of any onlooker, in their soft and lover-like play together.’

It does not take too long, then, for Hope to try to begin civilising the two Venuses whom he encounters. He shows them the benefits of fire while simultaneously teaching them to cook the local ‘fish’; in the process he comments that they will soon be ‘as completely civilised in these respects as the inhabitants of the earth.’ The Venuses, therefore, are presented as a kind of simplistic and primitive noble savage, and the planet Venus itself as a kind of Terra Nullius/Garden of Eden. The implication appears to be that there is much which humanity could teach these people and that the planet is well-suited to human settlement. The theme of colonization is itself raised by the apparent promotional and/or reformist nature of GR. The novelette, apart from its SF/utopian theme, also appears to be an example of a sub-genre of literature designed to either attract emigrants to the supposedly Arcadian lands to be found in the Antipodes or to advance the benefits of political or social legislation. The reader has simply to substitute the advanced but overcrowded utopia of Earth in the 22nd century with that of Europe in the late 1870s or early 1880s, and then replace the descriptions of the vast and supposedly nearly uninhabited lands of a Venus rich in wildlife and natural resources with either New Zealand or Australia, for the booster intent of the publication to become readily apparent. The author, in fact, has included kangaroos as one of the exotic animal species on Venus in volume I. Even the choice of The Inhabitant as nomenclature is important, as the pseudonym was one common at the time to guidebooks in Great Britain and the United States.

, therefore, in addition to its possible influence on Bellamy and its cutting-edge position in the writing of SF, particularly with regard to the use of telepathy, technological realism, and alien xenobiology, is also of interest as a kind of cultural barometer. Like much other SF it can be used as an alternative means to analyse popular perceptions from a specific historical period, in the same way that more modern SF sources such as films like or the old television series can be used to examine the Cold War paranoia of the 1950s or a change in American opinion towards the Vietnam War in the late 1960s. GR is also of interest from a literary point of view. Although there are obvious holes in the plot (telepathy is relatively important in volume I but appears to be forgotten in volume II), and although at times Hope’s lamentations for Edith in volume II can appear repetitive at best, the work does read quite well as a work of fiction and is not quite as dull as a good deal of similar SF/ utopian material produced during this period. The episode regarding Hope’s companions on the comet, particularly Weir’s fall off the face of the comet, is particularly gripping and is literally a cliff-hanging conclusion to the second volume. All that remains to be done is to perhaps find volume III (if it exists at all?) and to continue the search for the identity of the author.

James Francis Courage

I wish to record my thanks to Courage’s sister and literary executor, Mrs. Patricia Fanshawe of Surrey, for permission to publish this story. I am also grateful to the staff of the Hocken Library, especially Janine Delaney, for assistance with researching Courage’s available literary manuscripts and papers, and to the staff at the Alexander Turnbull Library.

Living in England, Courage worked in and managed Wilson’s Bookshop in Hampstead for some ten years till 1950-51 when, prompted in part by psychiatric problems, he devoted himself full-time to writing. During 1952, especially, he worked on a number of short stories and in September submitted a sequence to Michael Sadlier at Constables, who were then publishing his novels, for publication in a single volume. Although his proposal was rejected, a number of his stories were published individually in magazines such as , and . It was not until 1973, 10 years after Courage’s death, that Charles Brasch collected 15 of his stories into a single volume, (Christchurch: Caxton Press, 1973).

One of the stories written in 1952 was ‘’. Two versions are extant in the Hocken Library: a manuscript dated 9/4/52, which has the title ‘’ and a revised, undated typescript, which is now published for the first time.

Dunedin, Hocken Library, MS 0999, Courage : 37 (manuscript); 34 (typescript).

The novel is set in Sumner, Christchurch, where Courage boarded as a boy when attending Mr. Clement Wiggins’ Dunelm Preparatory School in Christchurch. His manuscripts record that he began working on the second version of the novel on 21/3/52 and completed it on 27/5/53.

Ibid. Courage: 65

The story is also of interest in its use of a female narrator, which I have not encountered elsewhere in Courage’s fiction, and in her flirtatious sexuality. Bridget Bridges, with her petunia lipstick, silky blouse, sheer stockings and urge for “a good time” is a Jezebel in spirit, if still “a fairly innocent kid” at the time of which she writes. In the novel, too, Courage explores feminine sexuality and romantic machination with the three Garnett sisters in a complicated pursuit of the same man, Geoffrey Macauley.

The narrative voice in ‘’ is plain and colloquial and Bridget seems to be of a lower social class than the rural gentry who were often Courage’s focus. “We hadn’t much money at home,” she tells us. Courage wrote to Sargeson in 1949, in admiration of his writing, “At last - somebody who speaks for New Zealanders in their own tone of voice.”

Wellington, Alexander Turnbull Library, MS papers 0432-152, Sargeson. Letter from Courage dated August 28, 1949

A close inspection of changes made from manuscript to typescript seems to support this focus on the colloquial. In the second paragraph, for instance, Jezebel changes from “a fairly innocent girl” to “a fairly innocent kid” while grandmother “lit up” rather than “brought out her ideas” about Jezebel. There are a good number of other such movements to a more direct and vernacular voice from the draft, perhaps under the influence of Sargeson. Another shift from draft to typescript is in a more favourable construction of Jezebel’s character. Her age moves from 16 to 17, she has known Donald for a fortnight rather than a week, and the sentence about her family being without “much money” is added. In the draft we read, “a year or two later… I got into trouble with a man” but in the typescript this becomes,“ a long time later… a man got me into trouble”, putting the responsibility more squarely on the male.

A final point of interest is the use of the grandmother as mentor of the young Bridget. Though she appears only briefly as a framing figure at the start and end of the story, she provides the story with its title and focus and a degree of ironic humour. In many of Courage’s other stories and novels he has a more fully drawn and sympathetic grandmother figure, based on his own close relationship with his maternal grandmother, Ida Peache.

Courage was a dedicated writer who struggled on the other side of the world with a range of personal and literary problems. He wrote once to Sargeson, “I suppose we all have our crosses - you no less than I - but I often curse the day I ever decided to write a word.”

Ibid. Letter from Courage dated May 9, 1954

“Oh, how I’d love to have been Jezebel,” said my grandmother one night, in one of her laughing moods. I think it was a long time since she’d looked into the Bible, but whenever she felt suddenly younger she’d remember bits of it, or fancy she did. “Oh, how I wish I’d been Jezebel!” she cried, smiling at me over the supper-table in the kitchen. “She may have been eaten by wild dogs in the end, but she had a good time first. You take my word for it, Bridget, Jezebel had a real good time first.”

I was just past my seventeenth birthday and was living for a year with my grandmother in town. It wasn’t until a long time later that a man got me into trouble. In fact, I was a fairly innocent kid at this time when my grandmother suddenly lit up about Jezebel. I was surprised. I went to bed thinking of Jezebel. Because, you see, the next afternoon was a holiday and I’d promised to meet Donald at the tram-stop up the road and go out with him. So I lay thinking of Jezebel and a good time before I went to sleep.

Donald was just a boy who worked in a chemist’s shop in Christchurch. I’d met him on the tram when I was on my way to the classes at the Art School. I’d come down from the country to attend these classes because my family thought I could draw and so might become a teacher. We hadn’t much money at home in Rangiora. Anyway, there I was, staying with my grandmother in town. I’d known Donald, to speak to, for about a fortnight when my grandmother mentioned Jezebel that night over supper. I didn’t know much about Jezebel, except that she’d painted her face, but I thought she must have known all about good times.

“Where are we going?” I asked Donald at the tram-stop next day. I’d put petunia lipstick on my mouth before coming out. “Somewhere nice?”

“What about Sumner? We can have a look at the sea.”

“But Sumner’s miles away,” I said.

“Won’t take long.”

“All right.” But I knew it took over forty minutes in the tram. I purposely hadn’t brought a coat as I had on my silk blouse, and the sun seemed warm.

“If I had my motor-bike we’d get there in no time,” said Donald. We pushed ourselves into the Sumner tram at Cathedral Square and sat at the back, in seats I’d chosen.

“When are you getting this motor-bike?”

‘Oh, I’m saving up.” He was wearing an old sports coat, a filthy pair of gym-shoes and no hat. He had a strip of pink tape on his glasses. “I’ve got my eye on a three-speed Alderson,” he told me.

“Why do you always cut yourself shaving?” I asked, looking at his face.

“It’s these damn spots on the chin.” He went red. “I’m taking sulphur, but it’s foul muck. We sell it at the shop.”

He glared at the conductor, paid our fares and sat back beside me. Presently he got more cheerful.

“Well, how are you, Bridget?” he asked, quite cockily.

“Who said you could call me Bridget?” I hated my names, both of them. Bridget Bridges was too much, somehow.

“Well, I’ve got to call you something, haven’t I?”

“All right.” I giggled. “Ever hear of Jezebel as a girl’s name?”

He was looking out of the window at some motor-bike that went honking past us. “Gosh, see that?” he cried. “New year model, with a big tank.” He breathed hard, excited.

I leant back, closing my eyes and hoping he’d put an arm around me. But just then the tram reached Heathcote and began to run along the estuary. Donald talked about sailing.

“How’s your mother?” I asked him at last, breaking in.

“Same old bag. How’s your grandmother?”

“All right, I suppose.” I laughed. “But it’s nice to get out for a good time, sometimes.”

“You girls have all the fun.” He looked at me and I began to long again for that good time I hadn’t had, but for some reason he began chatting about his work at the chemist’s shop. I don’t think he’d even noticed my silk blouse, the ribbon I’d fixed round my hair, or my sheer stockings.

At Sumner we left the tram and walked along towards the old pier. Sand and dust were blowing across the promenade. There were lots of people about. A girl from the Arts class went past us, looking the other way. I could have killed her because I knew she’d seen us and had thought us common.

“Gosh, the sea smells good.” Donald puffed out his chest. “It gets the benzine right out of your clothes.”

“Yes,” I said, though it was only rotting seaweed I could smell and I hated that girl.

We went on to the pier. There was a chocolate machine, a weighing machine and a Tell-your-character machine. The chocolate machine was empty.

“Aw, never mind,” said Donald. “You’re not hungry, are you?”

“Not a bit,” I cried. “Let’s read our characters.”

The character-machine had a handle. We put in our money, whizzed the handle twice and two pieces of cardboard fell out. Donald’s card said he was of a happy nature, though inclined to sulk and was close over money.

“Go on, that’s not you at all,” I laughed. He tore the card up and let the bits flutter away.

My own card said I was ambitious, fond of work in the house and loved children. To tease him, I wouldn’t let Donald read it.

“Come on, let’s have a look,” he begged.

“No.” I hid it behind me, hoping he’d try to grab it. “It’s silly, really.”

“Why’s it silly?”

“Well, it is. You know more about me than the card does.”

Just then a dog ran past our legs, along the pier. “A spaniel, a cocker,” Donald cried. “Here, boy, come here!” He whistled, trying to catch the dog as it ran. “I’m all set on buying a cocker myself, one day,” he told me. “You can train them to go into rabbit-holes if you start them as pups.”

I dropped my character-card through a crack in the pier. “Come on,” I said, “let’s have a good time.” I took Donald’s arm and we strolled on along the pier.

“Funny thing about dogs,” he said, “they can see only in black and white. Some chap’s proved it in Russia.” He kept his hands in his pockets.

“Would you like me if I was a dog?” I asked.

“I might.”

“Even love me?”

His face went red again. “Now you’re asking things,” he said, looking down at his gym-shoes.

“Don’t you want a girl?” I asked.

“I’ll tell you this — I’ve never been out with one before to-day.”

“Really.”

“Honest. I’ve never wanted to, much. And I was saving up for the bike.”

We stood at the end of the pier. The tide was out so we spat over the railings on to the sand.

“Let’s climb up the Cave Rock,” I suggested.

We left the pier. I skipped on ahead over the sand to the base of the big black rock standing up by itself, like a volcano, at the end of the beach. At the top were seats round a hut with a weather-mast. Donald and I sat down. My hair was blowing round my face, but Donald had the kind of hair that stayed flat. I was excited by the climb and the view of the bay and the far mountains. I could draw them, I thought.

“A penny for your thoughts,” I said to Donald.

“Ships used to get sunk on the bar of the estuary down there.” He pointed with his shoe.

I began to sing, because I was privately proud of my voice and singing would be part of a good time.

“Ever hear records of Carmen Miranda?” Donald asked.

“Who’s she?”

“Some screecher in America. South America, I think. I’d like to go to Brazil.”

“What? Just for fun?”

“I saw some Brazilian stamps in a window in Victoria Street.”

“Would you take me to Brazil with you?”

“I don’t know,” said Donald. “It’s pretty hot there.”

I leant against him. “Do you like me?”

“Well, what do you think?”

I sighed. I was beginning to get very cold on top of the rock, in the wind from the sea. Donald had lit a cigarette and the smoke blew in my face.

“Sorry,” he said. He nipped off the burning end of his cigarette, took out the box and put the unsmoked bit back. He hadn’t offered me a cigarette because I’d told him I never smoked.

“Let’s go and find a tea-place,” I said. “Somewhere noisy. With music. Let’s have a good time.”

We walked back across the promenade and into the town, to a shop with a tea-pot and a bunch of red nasturtiums in the window. The place was so full that we had to wait, leaning against the wall. There was no music.

I combed my hair. “Do I look all right?”

“Of course.”

“Pretty, ugly, or just middling?”

“What’s wrong with you, anyway? All these questions!”

When we sat down I lolled a little on my elbow and looked round under my lashes. The tea, when it came, was very strong, with a sort of after-taste of soda; the cakes were cousins to the Cave Rock. But I didn’t mind, really. We were getting nearer to a good time and I felt more like Jezebel every minute. Donald looked thoughtful.

“Everybody in New Zealand drinks fifty pounds of tea a year,” he told me. “Or a hundred. I forget which it is.”

“You know an awful lot of odd things.” I meant it.

“I don’t really.” He was a bit offended. Presently he gazed up at the fan in the ceiling. I could see he wanted to talk about electricity and Lake Coleridge or something.

“Have you ever been drunk?” I asked, lolling further.

“Well, I was kind of squiffy, once. It was beer, at Christmas.” He pushed his glasses closer behind his ears. “But my Dad was always tight, so that was a warning.”

“A warning of what?”

“Just a warning. It runs in families.” He blew his nose. “How are your Art classes going?”

“I’ve been painting a glass of milk. All white. It’s harder than you’d think.”

He nodded. “It must be.”

Presently he paid for the tea out of a little green purse his sister had given him. We went out into the road, to find that the sun had clouded over with a fine cold rain. Donald said we must go home. I was shivering as we waited under an awning for the tram.

“Just when we were beginning to have a good time,” I said, “it has to rain.”

“The weather-forecast said bright.”

“They must’ve been guessing.”

The tram was full of raincoats. We pushed until we found a seat at the back. My blouse clung to my neck, my legs were damp. Donald took off his coat, lifted it and dropped it round my shoulders. The coat had a mannish smell that I liked. I began to feel happy again. I snuggled close to Donald, looking at him sideways and feeling him near to me.

“You’re quite handsome really, Donald,” I told him.

He put an arm round me, to stop me shivering, holding himself tight against the seat.

“Do you mind being called Bridget?” he asked.

“No. I was only kidding about Jezebel.”

“Jezebel?” He’d forgotten. “That’s a darn silly name, anyway.”

“Oh, I don’t know.” I didn’t think it was.

He leant his head towards me so that his hair rubbed against my ear and cheek. We sat for a long while without speaking. I told myself I was having a good time at last, though I wasn’t sure of it and didn’t know what it was I wanted or how it happened. All the same, just sitting with Donald on a tram-ride, wet and shivering, didn’t seem to deserve my being eaten by wild dogs at the last.

“When I get my motor-bike I’ll ask you to come on the pillion,” Donald said, against my ear.

I nodded. “If my grandmother lets me.”

“I’ve got to save up a lot yet.”

“I suppose we can have a good time then,” I said.

“Haven’t you enjoyed it, to-day?”

“Oh, yes. But this is the nicest part, now.”

“What’s all that red smudge on your mouth?”

“Just red stuff. Lipstick. It’s been there all day.”

I was still shivering when we said goodbye at the tram-stop. Donald hadn’t even kissed me. I ran home. The next day I had such a cold that I had to stay away from the Arts class, and after that I had a cough and bronchitis. Donald didn’t even call to ask me why he hadn’t seen me again on the tram. My grandmother nursed me in bed for a fortnight. One day I asked her if she still wanted to be Jezebel.

“Oh, that creature,” my grandmother snorted. She was feeling old and her corns were hurting her feet. “That creature! I wonder she was ever allowed inside the Bible at all. I’ve no time for Jezebel.”