Celebrating Our Writers: 1936, 1951 Part II: 1951 (New Zealand Writers' Conference‪)‬

[For Part I of this paper, see Journal of New Zealand Literature Issue 10, 1992.] Authors' Week 1936 was successful enough for its organisers to want to make it an annual event, but fifteen years passed before writers again became the focus of national attention. Between 8-11 May 1951, the New Zealand Writers' Conference was held in Christchurch to mark Canterbury's centennial in 1950. The Conference received funds from the Canterbury Centennial Association and the State Literary Fund; the organisers were Professor J.C. Garrett (a Canadian), and R. A. Copland of the university English Department. Vance Palmer was brought from Australia to be special guest-speaker, thus absorbing a large part of the funding. A. R. D. Fairburn, who had hoped to have his fare paid as another guest-speaker, sent a telegram advising, 'No fare, no Fairburn'. Fairburn did not attend, one of the few major writers not present.