‘Red Hot Gospels of Highbrows’: R. A. K. Mason and the demise of Phoenix

Abstract

Phoenix magazine appeared in two distinct volumes during 1932 and 1933, published by the Auckland University College Literary Society under the editorships respectively of James Bertram and R. A. K. Mason. Its importance lies not so much in its contents as in its bringing together a group of writers who came to occupy the critical and creative centre of New Zealand literature during the middle decades of the twentieth century. In addition to Bertram and Mason, its editorial committee included, among others, Allen Curnow, Blackwood Paul, Jean Alison, Hector Monro, and J. A. W. (Jack) Bennett. No less significant than this role as literary catalyst was the encouragement its production gave to some of our most celebrated printer-typographers—Robert Lowry (printer of Phoenix), Denis Glover, and Ronald Holloway.