The Marvellous Mahi of Margaret Mahy
Margaret Mahy (1936-2012) is New Zealand's most famous writer for young people and one of Aotearoa's most prolifically published writers, both here and also overseas. Her name now graces the best overall book of the year award in the New Zealand Book awards for Children and Young Adults (NZCYA). Storylines annually honours a person for their significant contribution to the broad field of children’s and young adult literature and literacy with the Margaret Mahy medal. Since 2019, publisher Hachette Aotearoa have offered the Margaret Mahy Illustration Prize. The Sapling website also regularly features a quirky interview with current children's writers in Aotearoa, known as The Mahy Questionnaire.
Dunedin Public Libraries have two events this June at the City Library which are focussed on the mahi of Mahy. Reading Allowed on June 12 includes a live reading of excerpts from The Changeover, Mahy's second published novel written for young adults and also her second novel to win the prestigious Carnegie Medal for books written for young people. Join us at The Cube on the ground floor on Wednesday, 12 June, at 5.30pm to hear some of the magic of Mahy read aloud.
The second event is Continued Sense of Wonder on Wednesday, June 19 at 7pm, in the Dunningham Suite, on the eve of the 2024 Yoto Carnegie Medals announcement in the UK. At Continued Sense of Wonder adults bring along and discuss books written primarily for young people. This is the first time that this event has been dedicated to the mahi/work of just one writer. What is your favourite story or poem written by Margaret Mahy? With Mahy there is no shortage of material to choose from. RSVP to join the informal discussion, bring along your favourite Mahy, for an evening which is part reminiscence, part new discoveries, and a whole lot of fun.
Mahy's fiction books featured above are only a fraction of her works. As well as publishing over forty novels, twenty short story collections, and 100 picture books, Mahy published poetry. Tessa Duder states in her biography of Mahy that it is very difficult to find everything she published, with some poetry and stories published in general collections of children's stories. Colin Gibson accomplished this feat with his bibliography of Mahy's works in 2021.
Mahy started off writing for the School Journal and according to A Nest of Singing Birds, she published over seventy-five stories and poems in it. Some of the volumes included content entirely by Mahy, and famously six stories from 1965, including A Lion in the Meadow (above), were picked up by overseas publishers in 1969, launching Mahy's mahi into the world.
Mahy worked as a children's librarian before becoming a fulltime writer in the 1980s. She visited Dunedin Public Libraries on more than one occasion, dressed in her vibrant attire. She literally left her mark here, in 1984, in The Haunting. You may even remember Mahy visiting the City Library or remember her visiting your school when you were young.
This talented writer was also an able artist. Among the library's treasures, in the Heritage collection, there is a copy of all of her original artwork for Bubble Trouble.
