Adrienne Jansen

Adrienne Jansen is a New Zealand creative writing teacher, editor and a writer of fiction, non-fiction and poetry. She has worked closely with immigrants, and her writing often relates to the migrant experience.

Adrienne Jansen
Born	1947 Wellington
Occupation	Writer
Nationality	New Zealand

Biography

Adrienne Jansen was born in Wellington in 1947.^[1][2]

She worked as a writer at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa for 11 years.^[1] She was also heavily involved in refugee resettlement and teaching ESOL (English for speakers of other languages).^[1][3] In the 1980s, she helped set up the Porirua Language Project (now part of English Language Partners).^[4][5][6] This background and her years of experience of living and working among immigrants is reflected in her writing (both fiction and non-fiction), which often focuses on the migrant experience.^[7][6] She has frequently worked alongside migrants to help them tell their stories.^[4][8]

Her published work includes fiction and non-fiction for adults and children, collections of poetry, short stories broadcast on radio and poems and stories in anthologies such as 4th Floor^[9] and Best New Zealand Poems.^[10] Her stories have been highly commended in the Commonwealth Short Story Competition (“War”, 2002) and shortlisted for the BNZ Literary Awards.^[1] She worked with Guy Jansen in the last years of his life on his book Sing New Zealand: the story of choral music in Aotearoa.^[11]

In 1990, Jansen was a Winston Churchill Fellow, travelling to Canada and the United Kingdom to look at access to education for disadvantaged groups in those countries.^[1][2] She founded the Creative Writing Programme at Whitireia Polytechnic in 1993.^[1] This was the first full-year, full-time writing course in New Zealand, and it was designed by Jansen to be accessible to all and to encourage diversity and inclusiveness.^[12] She was coordinator of the programme until 1999 and taught fiction and editing as well as writing several online courses until most of the programme was disestablished in 2019.^[13][14] She was co-founder of Whitireia Creative Writing Programme's Escalator Press in 2013^[5] and her novel The Score was the first book to be published by this new imprint.^[4] In 2016, she helped set up Landing Press.^[15][5]

Jansen has appeared at numerous author talks^[16] and writing festivals.^[17][8] She has also run creative writing workshops for Māori writers (with Huia Publishers), Pasifika writers (with Creative New Zealand) and in Vanuatu and Indonesia.^[1]

Her manuscript "Light Keeping" was shortlisted for the 2021 Michael Gifkins Prize.^[18]

She lives in Titahi Bay, Porirua.^[16]

Bibliography

Non-fiction

• Neighbourhood Groups: ideas to get you started, co-authored with Sally Tripp (NZWEA, 1981; new ed. Whitcoulls, 1986)
• Having a Baby in New Zealand, co-authored with Ruth Dawson (Wellington Multicultural Educational Resource Centre, 1984), published in English, Samoan, Cantonese, Vietnamese and Khmer
• I Have in My Arms Both Ways (Bridget Williams Books, 1990, republished 2015)^[19]
• The Crescent Moon: The Asian Face of Islam in New Zealand, with photographs by Ans Westra (Asia New Zealand Foundation, 2009)^[20]
• Abdel’s Favourites from the Marrakech Café, with Abdelghani El Adraoui (Marrakech Café, 2013)
• Migrant Journeys: New Zealand Taxi Drivers Tell Their Stories, with co-author Liz Grant (Bridget Williams Books, 2015)^[2][21]

Children’s non-fiction

• Borany’s story (Learning Media, 1991), shortlisted for the LIANZA Elsie Locke Non-Fiction Award in 1992^[22]
• Thirteen flavours (Learning Media, 1995)
• Asli’s story (Learning Media, 2000)
• I say, you say (Learning Media, 2001)
• What’s the difference? (Learning Media, 2001)
• Fear (Learning Media, 2002)
• A pot of gold ; and, The clever farmer : folk tales from Vietnam (Learning Media, 2003)

Novels

• Spirit Writing (Harper Collins, 1999)
• Floating the Fish on Bamboo (Harper Collins, 2001)
• The Score (Escalator Press, 2013)^[4]
• A Line of Sight (Escalator Press, 2015)
• A Change of Key (Escalator Press, 2018)^[6][23]

Poetry

• A stone seat and a shadow tree (Inkweed, 2001)
• Keel & drift (Landing Press, 2016)^[24]
• All of us (with Carina Gallegos) (Landing Press, 2018)^[25][26]

As editor

• The Curioseum: Collected Stories of the Odd and Marvellous (Te Papa Press, 2014),^[27] shortlisted for the Publishers Association of New Zealand (PANZ) Book Design Awards 2015^[28]
• More of us (Landing Press, 2019)^[29]

External links

• Author Profile: "Jansen, Adrienne" on Read NZ Te Pou Muramura website

References

1. "Jansen, Adrienne". Read NZ Te Pou Muramura. 15 December 2018. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
2. "The Monday excerpt: the taxi driver who survived the Khmer Rouge". The Spinoff. 30 May 2016. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
3. Jansen, Adrienne (31 January 2017). "'We're thinking a lot about refugees these days': the story of the famous writer who arrived in New Zealand as a refugee and a nobody". The Spinoff. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
4. Carlisle, Talia (20 September 2013). "Scoring a novel with a difference". Stuff. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
5. "Connection: The Arts Communications Hui". The Dowse Art Museum. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
6. "Adrienne Jansen: A Change of Key". RNZ. 18 September 2018. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
7. Jansen, Adrienne. "Saneha and me: Losing and finding". 4th Floor 2016. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
8. "Adrienne Jansen". Verb Wellington. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
9. "Adrienne Jansen". 4th Floor 2016. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
10. Jansen, Adrienne. "A woman is kneeling in a stream". Best New Zealand Poems 2016. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
11. "10 Questions with Adrienne Jansen". Massey University Press. 7 August 2019. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
12. Jansen, Adrienne (Winter 2017). "Why Inclusiveness counts". New Zealand Author. Issue 309: 24–26.
13. Iles, Julie (30 July 2019). "Whitireia documents show enrolments close for 64 courses". Stuff. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
14. Jansen, Adrienne (Spring 2019). "Does it Matter?". New Zealand Author. Issue 318: 10–13.
15. "About Us". Landing Press. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
16. "Author talk: meet Adrienne Jansen". Wellington City Libraries Te Matapihi ki te Ao Nui. 14 March 2014. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
17. "Adrienne Jansen". Manawatu Writers Festival. 18 July 2018. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
18. "Michael Gifkins Prize 2021 shortlist announced". Books+Publishing. 16 June 2020. from the original on 16 June 2021. Retrieved 16 June 2021.
19. "I Have in My Arms Both Ways: Migrant Women Talk about their Lives". Bridget Williams Books. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
20. "A look at the Indian Muslim community in inner city". The Star Online. 27 July 2015. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
21. "Adrienne Jansen and Helmi Al Khattat - Stories from the Taxi". RNZ. 29 November 2015. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
22. "LIANZA Elsie Locke Non-Fiction Award". Christchurch City Libraries. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
23. Geddis, Penny M. (22 November 2018). "Book Review: A Change of Key, by Adrienne Jansen". The Reader: The Booksellers New Zealand Blog. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
24. Ricketts, Harry (21 December 2016). "NZ Books Review - "Keel & Drift" by Adrienne Jansen". RNZ. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
25. Green, Paula (13 November 2018). "2 poems and a conversation – All of Us by Adrienne Jansen and carina gallegos". NZ Poetry Shelf. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
26. Green, Paula (8 August 2018). "Poetry Box audio spot: Adrienne Jansen's wonderful 'Next year'". Poetry Box. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
27. Forster, Sarah (26 March 2014). "Book Review: The Curioseum: Collected stories of the odd & marvellous". The Reader: the Booksellers New Zealand Blog. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
28. "PANZ Book Design Awards 2015 Shortlist". Book Design Awards. Retrieved 8 December 2019.
29. "ELP Porirua poems feature in 'More of us'". English Language Partners New Zealand. 8 April 2019. Retrieved 8 December 2019.