Eleanor Catton

Early life

Catton was born in Canada where her New Zealand father was a graduate student completing his doctorate at the University of Western Ontario. She grew up in Christchurch after her family returned to New Zealand when she was six years old; she spent a year living in Leeds where she attended Lawnswood School. She referred to this experience as "amazing, but a real eye opener" due to the toughness of the environment. She attended Burnside High School, studied English at the University of Canterbury, and completed a Master's degree in Creative Writing at The Institute of Modern Letters, Victoria University of Wellington. Catton is related to author Bruce Catton.

Career

Catton's 2008 debut novel, The Rehearsal, was written as her Master's thesis and deals with reactions to an affair between a male teacher and a girl at his secondary school. That year, she was awarded a fellowship to the Iowa Writers' Workshop.

In 2009 she was described by the British Daily Mail as "this year's golden girl of fiction". In 2011, she was the Ursula Bethell Writer in Residence at the University of Canterbury.

2013–present: The Luminaries and Man Booker Prize

Catton's second novel, The Luminaries, was published in 2013. The novel is set on the goldfields of New Zealand in 1866. It was shortlisted for and subsequently won the 2013 Man Booker Prize making Catton, at the age of 28, the youngest author ever to win the Booker. She was previously, at the age of 27, the youngest author ever to be shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize.

At 832 pages, The Luminaries is the longest work to win the prize in its 45-year history. The chair of the judges, Robert Macfarlane commented "It's a dazzling work. It's a luminous work. It is vast without being sprawling." Catton was presented with the prize by the Duchess of Cornwall on 15 October 2013 at Guildhall.

In November 2013 Catton was awarded the Canadian Governor General's Literary Award for fiction for The Luminaries. In January 2014 it was announced that Catton would be awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of Literature in May at Victoria University of Wellington, where she has studied. On 18 March 2014 she was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to literature.

Cattongate

During an interview at the Jaipur Literary Festival in January 2015, Catton said in passing that the governments of Australia, Canada and New Zealand were countries led by

Prime Minister John Key said he was disappointed at Catton's lack of respect for his Government and claimed she was aligned with the Green Party. The next day he said her views should not be given any more credence than those of the Mad Butcher or Richie McCaw although both of them were offered a knighthood by John Key. McCaw turned the honour down.

In January 2015, on air RadioLive host Sean Plunket called Catton a traitor and an "ungrateful hua". The Taxpayers' Union also released a media statement showing Catton had received around $50,000 in Creative New Zealand support over her career. Jordan Williams of the Taxpayers' Union argued that: "if Ms Catton isn't thankful for the support by the New Zealand Government while she wrote The Luminaries, maybe she should use some of the substantial royalties to pay the money back".

In a blog post responding to the affair, Catton commented that her reported remarks were a condensed part of a larger interview, and she was puzzled why her comment at the Jaipur festival had generated such controversy: "I’ve been speaking freely to foreign journalists ever since I was first published overseas, and have criticised the Key government, neo-liberal values, and our culture of anti-intellectualism many times." She goes on to say:

The criticism of Catton caused a media storm, including the publication of numerous cartoons, and was described by one commentator as 'Cattongate'. In an opinion piece, Bryce Edwards quoted numerous commentators who supported Catton's right to express her views. He said the 'Catton controversy' reflected the hollowness of public debate in New Zealand, and of the media and politics, and is increasingly of concern to some academics, researchers, and journalists. He also said that for some people, the saga also relates to the more recent Dirty Politics scandal.

Personal life

Catton lives in Auckland with her husband, American expatriate author and poet Steven Toussaint, and teaches creative writing at the Manukau Institute of Technology. They married in January 2016.

Philanthropy

In 2014 she used her winnings from the NZ Post Book Award to establish the Lancewood/Horoeka Grant. The grant offers a stipend to emerging writers with the aim of "the means and opportunity not to write, but to read, and to share what they learn through their reading with their colleagues in the arts". Recipients have included Amy Brown, Craig Cliff and Richard Meros.

Awards and honours

Novels

Other published works