Stevan Eldred-Grigg

James Smithies (University of Canterbury)

Ed. by Jennifer Lawn, Massey University
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 9.1.2: New Zealand Writing and Culture.
Vol. editors: Doreen D'Cruz (Massey University), Jennifer Lawn (Massey University), John C. Ross (Massey University), Mark Williams (Victoria University of Wellington)

Dates

Born 1952
Activity 1977-ongoing

Places

Born in New Zealand
Active in New Zealand

Activities

Primary

Historian / Chronicler
Novelist

Resources

Stevan Eldred-Grigg's (1952-) writing spans the uneasy divide between history and literature. Always provocative, his publications have tended to polarise opinion. Despite his considerable contribution to New Zealand letters, he is a figure who has never been accepted with equanimity by professional historians and literary critics.

Eldred-Grigg was born in the Grey Valley on the West Coast of New Zealand, but was raised in suburban Christchurch by a mother with a working class background and a father who was part of an established and prosperous Canterbury farming family. This dual background has informed most of Eldred-Grigg's work, which has been almost exclusively based around historical and literary investigations into the New Zealand working class and gentry during both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He has stated that he was fascinated by the nineteenth century from...

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1203 words

Citation: Smithies, James. "Stevan Eldred-Grigg". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 03 April 2006 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=11700, accessed 09 June 2026.]