Ray writes: "We read with keen interest the price obtained for Colin McCahon's The Canoe Tainui and someone then recalled that many years ago they found this previously unknown work by the artist in a second-hand shop. We have reason to believe that it was produced during his 'office period' ... Clearly McCahon was experimenting with his use of text on everyday objects and it would obviously take someone of considerable intelligence and wisdom to make the link between the text and the object. We are only sad that many of our great collectors no longer seem to be adding to their collections. We would be happy to hear from any interested parties, such as Te Papa, who may like to add this to our nation's treasure house ... "
What the flock was that?
A reader writes: "When leaving my parents' house, where I visit on a fairly regular basis in the late afternoon, my father's 'party trick' was to inflate a brown paper bag, go out on to their front porch and burst it with his hands. Why? Because next door there was a massive Phoenix Palm that would be full of hundreds of Sparrows who were roosting for the night. They would all be chattering and tweeting the news of the day to each other, until the humongous 'pop' from next door! Momentarily there would be dead silence, then the hundreds of them would take off. The sky would turn into a massive feathered cloud as they took off for parts unknown ... until next time."
Author's most wondificacious words Roald into one
The 100th anniversary of Roald Dahl's birth this week has been marked with a dictionary of his wonderful, made-up words, including:
