Niland's Funeral Service

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Ruth was already a distinguished writer, I had shoulder-length hair, a long beard and flared trousers (of which she reminded me at regular intervals in the decades that followed), and together we negotiated the future of the books of the Muddleheaded Wombat and his bush friends. From that point on I worked as her literary agent for 39 years and continue to look after her work and that of her husband D'Arcy Nilandon behalf of her children.Over the decades a very strong friendship developed between us. We were both expatriate New Zealanders who arrived in Sydney in our 20s to pursue our professional careers, Ruth as a journalist and myself initially as a book publisher and soon a literary agent. Though we had both married Australians, Ruth and I felt a very strong affinity with those green islands across the Tasman and, as the years passed, some nostalgia.Ruth Park's characters display the finest of human traits: some of the cast of the upcoming Sydney Theatre Company production of The Harp in the South.Photo: Louie Douvis"We're islanders", Ruth often said to me – and that was true in the sense that we both needed to be close to the shore, to see the blue Pacific sky and sea. Both of us felt claustrophobic away from the coast.We both had family in Auckland. D'Arcy's two younger brothers Beres and Joe both married and lived in Aotearoa, Beres marrying Ruth's only sibling, sister Jocelyn. Ruth's two oldest children spent quite a bit of time in Auckland with their grandparents when very young and the twins Deborah and Kilmeny Niland were born there. Ruth suggested the two Maori names we wanted to give our sons and we now have Tane, the Maori God of the Forests, and Rangi, the Sky God, in the Curnow genealogy. Ruth always took a keen interest in my family.Accepting accolades or being photographed were never in Park's comfort zoneAdvertisementStarting in 1981 after Ruth had returned from six years' living on Norfolk Island, she and I had many long chats both at...