"A Straight Steal": "An Affair of the Heart" and Maurice Gee's The Fat Man

Abstract

“An Affair of the Heart,” first published in 1936 and since then frequently anthologised, is one of New Zealand’s best-loved stories. It made a significant contribution to the reputation of its author, Frank Sargeson, who following Katherine Mansfield’s death was considered to be New Zealand’s most important writer of short fiction. Narrated by the middle-aged Freddy Coleman, the story tells how old Mrs Crawley, bent double from years of poverty and toil, sits night after night in the local shelter shed. She is waiting for the last bus and the return of her long-absent son, Joe, who never returns. Coleman wonders if Joe is in gaol or has escaped to America. He recalls how even during his own (and Joe's) childhood, Mrs Crawley was a pitiful figure who had been abandoned by her husband. Clad in a man's old hat and coat, she would scavenge for pipis, mussels, and kauri gum on the beach near her tumble down bach. She had three daughters as well as Joe, but Joe (whom she nursed past infancy) was her favorite child.