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A Dangerous Vine
Margaret Rose Bennett, like her elder sister, Elizabeth, was named after the two English princesses. But Elizabeth is dead, and Margaret Rose still living, searching and reaching out for life and its meaning. And against the frankly odd, strained and curiously English household she inhabits in a New Zealand city, it is hard to make out the truth. So Margaret abandons what her parents think is learning English history, the French language, listening to comedy shows on the World Service and returning home on the 9.30 tram and maps out a course of her own. She studies Maori at University, makes friends with the wayward Emily (daughter of the soon to be Prime Minister of New Zealand) and shy, independent Prudence. As a trio they study hard for their degrees, work by day at the local Government offices and by night sing, drink and laugh with the local Maori people - and fall in love. A new world, an enchanting world, and one with an underbelly of struggle, colour, passion and even violence. Far removed from the closed, ordered life of Margaret Rose's family, but perhaps not so detached from their own, secret history...
Here is an extraordinary, poetic novel of a society trapped in a time of its own, undercut by a people that live and breathe with a vigour that bubbles and burst through the silent surface.
Here is an extraordinary, poetic novel of a society trapped in a time of its own, undercut by a people that live and breathe with a vigour that bubbles and burst through the silent surface.
- GenresFiction
448 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1999
3 people are currently reading
124 people want to read
About the author
Barbara Ewing
26 books58 followersBarbara Ewing is a UK-based actress, playwright and novelist. Born in New Zealand, she graduated from Victoria University of Wellington with a BA in English and Maori before moving to Britain in 1965 to train as an actress at RADA (the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art) in London.
She made her film debut in the horror film 'Torture Garden' (1967) for Amicus Productions, followed by 'Dracula Has Risen from the Grave' (1968) with Christopher Lee for Hammer Films. Both movies were directed by Freddie Francis. Her other films included 'The Reckoning' (1969), 'Eye of the Needle' (1981), 'Haunters of the Deep' (1984) and 'When the Whales Came' (1989).
The television role for which she is best known is that of Bradley Hardacre's mistress Agnes Fairchild in the Granada Television comedy series 'Brass', alongside Timothy West (1982–84). In 1986, she played Treen Dudgeon in the short-lived BBC series 'Comrade Dad', alongside George Cole and Doris Hare. In 1978 she had appeared in an episode of Euston Films' The Sweeney (S4-E7 'Bait').
Her 1989 one-woman show, 'Alexandra Kollontai', about the only woman in Lenin's cabinet in 1917 was a great hit in London, and at the Edinburgh and Sydney Festivals.
More recent TV appearances have included episodes of 'Casualty', 'Doctors' and 'Holby City' on the BBC, and 'The Bill and Peak Practice' on ITV, as well as appearances in various adaptations of Ruth Rendell mysteries.
She made her film debut in the horror film 'Torture Garden' (1967) for Amicus Productions, followed by 'Dracula Has Risen from the Grave' (1968) with Christopher Lee for Hammer Films. Both movies were directed by Freddie Francis. Her other films included 'The Reckoning' (1969), 'Eye of the Needle' (1981), 'Haunters of the Deep' (1984) and 'When the Whales Came' (1989).
The television role for which she is best known is that of Bradley Hardacre's mistress Agnes Fairchild in the Granada Television comedy series 'Brass', alongside Timothy West (1982–84). In 1986, she played Treen Dudgeon in the short-lived BBC series 'Comrade Dad', alongside George Cole and Doris Hare. In 1978 she had appeared in an episode of Euston Films' The Sweeney (S4-E7 'Bait').
Her 1989 one-woman show, 'Alexandra Kollontai', about the only woman in Lenin's cabinet in 1917 was a great hit in London, and at the Edinburgh and Sydney Festivals.
More recent TV appearances have included episodes of 'Casualty', 'Doctors' and 'Holby City' on the BBC, and 'The Bill and Peak Practice' on ITV, as well as appearances in various adaptations of Ruth Rendell mysteries.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
October 31, 2009
I am not sure if this book would be as enjoyable to those not from New Zealand.
It is set in New Zealand in the 1950's and attempts to look at some of the funamental cultural issues that are relevent for us today as when the story is set. I found it very thought provoking and the flavour has stayed with me a long time. The probing questions that are scattered through the book are deep and signifigant to all who are born in New Zealand.
A stunning peice of work.
It is set in New Zealand in the 1950's and attempts to look at some of the funamental cultural issues that are relevent for us today as when the story is set. I found it very thought provoking and the flavour has stayed with me a long time. The probing questions that are scattered through the book are deep and signifigant to all who are born in New Zealand.
A stunning peice of work.
May 17, 2018
Set in 1950s New Zealand (quite obviously in the city of Wellington to be precise, although the name is never once mentioned) this incredible story highlights racism from both the perspective of Maori and Pakeha (European) in an honest but completely non confrontational fashion.
Margaret (named after a princess) has lead a sheltered life growing up in your average European family with skeletons in every closet. When she finishes school and goes to university, studying nights and working in a Government department during the day on a Government scheme nonetheless (when did this outstanding idea get abolished I wonder?) the only thing Margaret can't control is which department she'll be placed in.
Margaret's parents are disgusted to learn that she has been given "The Bureau" which I assume was 1950s speak for what I know in 1980s speak as "The Department of Maori Affairs" but Margaret herself is lead down a path of enthralling education, warmth, sadness and understanding, both of this new and rich culture, and surprisingly of herself and her own.
Barbara Ewing is an incredible author who tells it like it is but leaves the judgement for the reader make and this reader was left astounded. I saw the beauty in the Maori culture, painted eloquently, and the faults in it too. I saw plenty of faults in the Pakeha culture along with some common sense and an awful lot of sadness in both cultures to be honest.
This book is insightful. It is beautiful. It is honest to a fault. And I think they should make it compulsory reading for kids in high school. It is a fabulous way to start a long overdue dialogue, to celebrate our two cultures and to begin to accept one anothers' faults, but ultimately to marvel at how far we have come in our quest for mutual acceptance. And we have come an awfully long way since the days of"The Bureau" although it goes without saying we haven't finished the journey yet.
Margaret (named after a princess) has lead a sheltered life growing up in your average European family with skeletons in every closet. When she finishes school and goes to university, studying nights and working in a Government department during the day on a Government scheme nonetheless (when did this outstanding idea get abolished I wonder?) the only thing Margaret can't control is which department she'll be placed in.
Margaret's parents are disgusted to learn that she has been given "The Bureau" which I assume was 1950s speak for what I know in 1980s speak as "The Department of Maori Affairs" but Margaret herself is lead down a path of enthralling education, warmth, sadness and understanding, both of this new and rich culture, and surprisingly of herself and her own.
Barbara Ewing is an incredible author who tells it like it is but leaves the judgement for the reader make and this reader was left astounded. I saw the beauty in the Maori culture, painted eloquently, and the faults in it too. I saw plenty of faults in the Pakeha culture along with some common sense and an awful lot of sadness in both cultures to be honest.
This book is insightful. It is beautiful. It is honest to a fault. And I think they should make it compulsory reading for kids in high school. It is a fabulous way to start a long overdue dialogue, to celebrate our two cultures and to begin to accept one anothers' faults, but ultimately to marvel at how far we have come in our quest for mutual acceptance. And we have come an awfully long way since the days of"The Bureau" although it goes without saying we haven't finished the journey yet.
October 25, 2021
I read this years ago, and it has stuck with me - the idea that there was a department of requisition for small parcels of Maori land = and down the corridor there was a department for consolidation of land creating parcels for the Crown. Other ideas too. Did the people of the time not find that unethical or bizzarre? Were they callous? Were they malevolent? Was it acceptable? Is 'othering' always with us, but now it is the 'victims' doing the 'othering'? We read history to understand how we got to the place we now find ourselves. This book has given me pause and food for conversation for decades. Interesting to read in the context of Sir Apirana Ngata's work.
September 4, 2023
A lovely story addressing the mainly hardships and societal intricacies of New Zealand in the 1950’s. The main character is painstakingly innocent and naive, and we follow her as she navigates adulthood, parental pressure, cultural differences and taking charge of her own life. I believe this story is best for those with an understanding of New Zealand history and Māori culture, otherwise it could be hard to understand and appreciate the issues addressed in this story.
June 3, 2022
I loved this book . It's quite different to her others but definitely not in a bad way!
July 15, 2015
*Overall*, I thought this was very good. It focuses on a white recent high school graduate in 1950s NZ, who is accepted into a civil service / university work-study program and assigned to work in the Bureau, the official title of which is never spelled out, but which handles Maori affairs. Hating French, and fascinated by the Maori language she hears at work, our protag manages to finangle special arrangements to take Maori as her required langauge for her Arts degree. She proceeds to blunder through the book trying to reconcile the fact that she loves the language and appreciates her co-workers with her "knowledge" that the language is dying and with the part where she keeps forgetting people outside of the Bureau are scathingly racist.
There is something a little bit odd about entering into a period/place specific race politics through the eyes of a white boundary-crosser: I do sort of feel like the protag's boyfriend Timoti, a Maori lawyer, would have been a perfectly interesting protag in his own right. But Ewing doesn't gloss over how *clueless* our white protag (Margaret? i think?) can be around her Maori peers even as she finds herself increasingly alienated from her white family/their expectations.
I trust that Ewing did her research on 1950s politics and race relations. She *didn't* do her research on 1950s education, though. Margaret has to write an essay on 'gender' in an English class. That wasn't even a distinct term in the 1950s let alone a field of academic enquiry. Given Margaret is stomping around complaining that obligatory French is 'useless' and chafing against colonial-cringe academic norms, that could have been done a *whole lot better* if the style of her literary courses was properly historicised. 1950s, you should have a lot of Leavisite plain criticism and waffle about 'taste'. The poets agitating for 'indigenous' (which, it becomes clear, does not mean Maori but home-grown white NZ) authors on the curriculum, although Margaret wasn't interested in their arguments, they seemed to be characterising the lit curriculum as Leavisite - but that didn't seem to be what Margaret was studying.
And *were* SS in English in NZ in the 1950s expected to be able to translate Beowulf after a lecture-only course? Apparently UCL does or recently did OE in lecture-only settings, so it's possible, but at the very least, Margaret-who-hates-French should have been WAY more pissed off about learning OE than she seemed to be.
There is something a little bit odd about entering into a period/place specific race politics through the eyes of a white boundary-crosser: I do sort of feel like the protag's boyfriend Timoti, a Maori lawyer, would have been a perfectly interesting protag in his own right. But Ewing doesn't gloss over how *clueless* our white protag (Margaret? i think?) can be around her Maori peers even as she finds herself increasingly alienated from her white family/their expectations.
I trust that Ewing did her research on 1950s politics and race relations. She *didn't* do her research on 1950s education, though. Margaret has to write an essay on 'gender' in an English class. That wasn't even a distinct term in the 1950s let alone a field of academic enquiry. Given Margaret is stomping around complaining that obligatory French is 'useless' and chafing against colonial-cringe academic norms, that could have been done a *whole lot better* if the style of her literary courses was properly historicised. 1950s, you should have a lot of Leavisite plain criticism and waffle about 'taste'. The poets agitating for 'indigenous' (which, it becomes clear, does not mean Maori but home-grown white NZ) authors on the curriculum, although Margaret wasn't interested in their arguments, they seemed to be characterising the lit curriculum as Leavisite - but that didn't seem to be what Margaret was studying.
And *were* SS in English in NZ in the 1950s expected to be able to translate Beowulf after a lecture-only course? Apparently UCL does or recently did OE in lecture-only settings, so it's possible, but at the very least, Margaret-who-hates-French should have been WAY more pissed off about learning OE than she seemed to be.
January 5, 2011
Very much enjoying this book, somewhat unexpectedly. Much more pithy than I'd anticipated, I'm almost loathe to read the final pages because then it'll be gone!
edit: well I did finish it, and the ending was somewhat disappointing, though probably realistic.
edit: well I did finish it, and the ending was somewhat disappointing, though probably realistic.
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July 26, 2009really enjoyed this!!
February 28, 2010
gave up on page 100. did not like it at all
September 1, 2012
Having lived in New Zealand, I enjoyed the book quite honestly nothing has changed, not a very flexible place. But as I have said before much prefer Barbara Ewing's Historical novels.
December 7, 2012
Not from New Zealand myself but I really enjoyed this.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews