Every year, the Wellington Girls’ College Arts Committee induct an Old Girl into the Arts and Culture Hall of Fame. This was set up to recognise former WGC students who have gone on to make significant contributions to the arts. Some of our previous inductees include Katherine Mansfield and Jenny Wollerman. This year Anne French joins them.

During Anne’s time at WGC, she was heavily involved in English and the Languages.  She took French and Latin, and was part of a group who met several times a week outside of class to critique each other’s writing.  Anne focused on English when she was at university, and graduated with a Master of Arts in English in 1979.  Directly after graduating, Anne became the editor at the Oxford University Press and was appointed as New Zealand’s Managing Editor 3 years later. Anne has taken on many roles in her working life, including becoming the inaugural Writer-in-Residence at Massey University and the Managing Editor at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa.  She established the Te Papa Press in 1995, which is a publishing business within the museum.

Anne also gained early success as a poet, having won the PEN Young Writer’s Incentive Award in both 1973 and 1974.  Her first collection, All Cretans Are Liars, was published in 1987 and attracted considerable attention. All Cretans Are Liars won both the New Zealand Book Award for Poetry and the PEN Best First Book of Poetry Award in 1988.

In her spare time, Anne sings in Cantoris, a Wellington choir dedicated to early music, and also manages the Wellington Junior Symphony Orchestra.  As well as this, Anne has recently finished writing an opera libretto called The Long Lunch, which has been set to music by a Wellington composer Michael Vinten.

Anne has now moved into science funding and works as a consultant.  She says that the education she received at Wellington Girls’ College has definitely contributed to her career; she credits her research skills and ability to formulate new ideas to WGC.