Victoria University Press
Victoria University Press (VUP), founded in the 1970s, is the book publishing arm of Victoria University of Wellington, located in Wellington, New Zealand.[2]
Parent company | Victoria University Press |
---|---|
Founded | 1970 |
Country of origin | New Zealand |
Headquarters location | Wellington |
Distribution | Upstart Distribution |
Key people | Fergus Barrowman (publisher), Kyleigh Hodgson (editing and production), Craig Gamble (administrator), Kirsten McDougall (publicist)[1] |
Publication types | Books |
Imprints | Thumbsprint Press |
Official website | vup |
About
Publications
VUP is a scholarly publisher specialising in New Zealand history and public affairs. It is also a leading publisher of scholarly non-fiction, literary fiction, and poetry. Its highlights include the novel Gifted, by Patrick Evans, and television's Tim Wilson's Their Faces Were Shining. It has a backlist of over 400 books in print, and issues twenty-five new titles a year on average.[3][1]
VUP publishes vital work in New Zealand history. The history list, particularly social history, is viewed in broad, culturally diverse, and interdisciplinary terms, embracing studies of New Zealand's past and present and how these may shape the future.[1]
Books on Maori topics include important collections of writings in Maori by major figures such as Hirini Moko Mead and Āpirana Ngata, as well as Dame Joan Metge's widely read books on contemporary Maori society and cross-cultural communication.[1]
Notable authors
VUP has published works of many of New Zealand's strongest and most vibrant poets, including:
- Hera Lindsay Bird
- Jenny Bornholdt
- James Brown
- Brian Turner
- Dinah Hawken
- Vincent O'Sullivan
- inaugural NZ Poet Laureate Bill Manhire.
VUP has also published foremost writers such as:
- Barbara Anderson
- Catherine Chidgey
- Damien Wilkins
- Elizabeth Knox
- 2013 Man Booker prize winner Eleanor Catton
- Geoff Cochrane
- Bernadette Hall
- Bruce Mason
University funding
VUP receives funding from Victoria University of Wellington, which publisher Fergus Barrowman notes is extremely useful: "If we were independent with no funds at all it would be extremely hard. I don't know how some of New Zealand's independent publishers manage to do the books they do. University support is crucial for us. One of the great things is we can take commercial risks, like first books and short stories."[3]
Awards
Books published by VUP have won numerous Montana New Zealand Book Awards such as:
- Kate Camp, The Mirror of Simple Annihilated Souls (2011 Poetry Award winner)
- Brian Turner, Just This (2010 Poetry Award winner)
- Anna Taylor, Relief (2010 NZSA Hubert Church Best First Book of Fiction Award Winner)
- Jenny Bornholdt, The Rocky Shore (2009 Poetry category winner)
- Richard Boast, Buying the Land, Selling the Land (2009 History category winner)
- Eleanor Catton, The Rehearsal (2009 NZSA Hubert Church Best First Book Award for Fiction)
References
- "About Us". Victoria University Press. Retrieved 5 December 2013.
- "Victoria University Press". Zoomin.co.nz. Retrieved 6 December 2013.
- Dekker, Diana (28 February 2011). "The Life of a Publisher". The Dominion Post. Retrieved 5 December 2013.
Sources
- The New Zealand Writer's Handbook
- Writers & Artists' Yearbook
- Publishers Association of New Zealand
- Victoria University Press website