Campbell, Alistair Te Ariki - Literary papers of Alistair Te Ariki Campbell

Alistair Te Ariki Campbell was born in the Cook Islands, the son of New Zealander Jock Campbell and Teu (nee Bosini) of Penrhyn. Following the untimely deaths of his parents, he and his siblings were sent to their father's family in New Zealand and eventually to an orphanage in Dunedin. He was educated at Otago Boys' High School and then at Victoria University College, graduating B.A. in 1953; he then attended Wellington Teachers' College. As a student in Wellington he boarded at Weir House and wrote for various student publications.

Alistair Campbell lived and worked in Wellington thereafter, including as an Editor for the Department of Education's School Journal 1955-1972 and as a Senior Editor for the New Zealand Council for Educational Research, 1972-1987. Since 1960 he has lived in Pukerua Bay. He took the addition Te Ariki to his name in the 1990s after visiting the Cook Islands and meeting family there again.

Alistair Te Ariki Campbell's published work includes seventeen collections of poems, four novels, two plays, a children's story, and an autobiography. His poetry has been set to music a number of times. He has published with a number of presses including Pegasus, Reed, Pemmican, Hazard, Oxford University Press, HeadworX, and his own Te Kotare Press, which he set up c1980.

Among his many friends are poets from the 1950s 'Wellington Group', and among his many awards are those of Writer's Fellow at Victoria University in 1992, and an Honorary Doctor of Literature degree (D.Litt.) from Victoria University of Wellington in 1999. He won the NZ Book Award for Poetry in 1982 with his 'Collected Poems'. In 2005, he was awarded both an ONZM in the New Years Honours list, and the Prime Minister's Award for Literary Achievement in Poetry.

His literary archives have been collected by Victoria University since 1993, and are held as taonga in the Library's J. C. Beaglehole Room. Most of his archives for the period prior to 1993 are held at the Alexander Turnbull Library.

Commentaries on Campbell's poetry are included in 'The Oxford Companion to New Zealand Literature' ed. Roger Robinson and Nelson Wattie, (1998) which is online at http://www.bookcouncil.org.nz/writers/campbella.html, and on the New Zealand Book Council website at http://www.bookcouncil.org.nz/writers/campbella.html.

Alistair Te Ariki Campbell's most recent book, It's love, isn't it? : the love poems, was published in 2008 in memory of his wife Meg.