The Ship of Dreams Masculinity in Contemporary New Zealand Fiction

This is the first critical study to investigate, at length, how masculine subjectivities are represented in contemporary New Zealand fiction. Notoriously self-contained and private, Kiwi men are often reluctant to talk about their personal feelings and embarrassed at the thought that any private emotional difficulties could be exposed to critical examination. One must go to their imaginative literature to make contact with the reality that underlies the often calculatedly deceptive surface. In his investigation of these issues, author Alistair Fox demonstrates the crucial importance of Pakeha and Maori cultural predispositions influencing masculine identity in New Zealand, often at the cost of great psychic pain for the men involved.