William Robin Taylor ONZM, 1938 – 2015
The Blue Lawn is arguably, William Taylor’s finest writing in a notable career as an author for young people. His fiction was published worldwide to significant acclaim.‘William Taylor’s stories exhibit his sympathetic understanding, his compassion, his warm-heartedness and his joy in their exhilaration and faith in life.’ –Tom Fitzgibbon, Beneath Southern Skies.
Taylor has written novels for adults but now regards these as his ‘apprenticeship’ for his successful fiction for children and teenage readers. Born in Lower Hutt, he worked in banking before beginning his teaching career, which included a year in London, and culminating in becoming principal of Ohakune Primary School, 1979-86, a time when he was also a solo parent, part-owner of a restaurant and mayor of Ohakune (1981-88).
His early ‘apprentice’ novels show the hallmarks of his children's fiction: contemporary realism in rural and smalltown settings; concern for justice and compassion for victims; compelling narrative; and acuteness in dialogue, with the occasional smattering of exuberant humour in his more lighthearted works.
In 1991 he was the winner of the Esther Glen Award with his comedy novel Agnes the Sheep, and in 1998 he received the prestigious Margaret Mahy Medal and Lecture Award.
The Blue Lawn - eBook
About the Book:
One Tree House brings this much-loved, award-winning and historic children's book to a new generation of readers.
David is 15 and the star of his school's rugby team. Theo is 16, an outsiders. Initial hostility turns to a growing attraction neither boy understands. A powerful novel of relationships between young men who don't yet understand what they are feeling and have nowhere to turn for help.
Our new Classic e-collection supports our literary history, classroom learning and reading for pleasure.
Winner of the NZCYP Award for Senior Fiction, 1995. First published 1994.
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