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Kōrero: Fiction

Nelle Scanlan

Image
Nelle Scanlan

Nelle Scanlan was the most popular New Zealand novelist of the 1930s and 1940s. Local readers were hooked on her Pencarrow series, four novels which followed the generational fortunes of the Pencarrow family. The books celebrate New Zealand's Pākehā pioneers and pioneering virtues such as hard work and independence. Scanlan's conservative politics were laid bare in the fourth book, which criticises New Zealand's first Labour government and its socialist policies. 

Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi

Alexander Turnbull Library, P. A. Lawlor Collection (PAColl-6337)

Reference: 1/2-052300-F

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

Ngā whakaahua me ngā rauemi katoa o tēnei kōrero

Me pēnei te tohu i te whārang

Lydia Wevers, Fiction – Women writers, 1920s and 1930s, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/mi/photograph/41924/nelle-scanlan (accessed 4 June 2026).

He kōrero nā Lydia Wevers, i tāngia i te 20 June 2013, updated 1 August 2015.