We are asking quick questions of writers and thinkers coming to the WORD Christchurch Festival 2018 (Wednesday 29 August to Sunday 2 September).
Lloyd Jones is one of New Zealand’s most internationally successful contemporary writers. He has published essays and children’s books as well as adult fiction but his best-known work is the phenomenally successful novel, Mister Pip. The Cage is his most recent novel.
What are you looking forward to doing in Christchurch?
I'll be at the writers festival, but if I have a chance I will go for a wander in lovely Hagley Park.
What do you think about libraries?
The question betrays a concern about the place of libraries - and books - and their decline in our community. Less than a decade ago, few would have questioned the place of libraries. The sad and unavoidable fact is book-reading has lost its centrality to our culture. In NZ, few people read. Literature is marginalised in the school curriculum. Few teachers read. Fewer still are able to argue for the place of literature in the lives of anyone let alone young people. But to answer the question, I love libraries - at least those ones still with books on their shelves. I've always thought that, collectively, all the libraries in the world offer a repository for Human kind's thinking aloud.
What would be your desert island book?
One with blank pages or the collected works of Shakespeare.
Share a surprising fact about yourself.
I used to have hair.
Lloyd Jones' sessions at WORD Christchurch Festival 2018
Lloyd Jones in conversation with John Campbell Friday 31 August 1pm
The Freedom Papers Sunday 2 September 1pm
- Find works by Lloyd Jones in our collection
- Our page on WORD Christchurch Festival 2018
- More WORD Christchurch Quick Questions
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