Resident October 2024 – January 2025
Laurence Fearnley lives in Dunedin and has spent the past twenty-six years writing and publishing fiction, essays, and longer works of nonfiction. Most of her work is grounded in Te Wai Pounamu/the South Island, with a strong focus on the rural areas of South Canterbury, Otago and Southland.
Laurence studied at Canterbury University during the 1980s and worked for many years as a curator in various art institutions throughout Aotearoa/ New Zealand. She began writing novels in the 1990s and returned to university gaining a MA and PhD in Creative Writing from Te Herenga Waka/ Victoria University of Wellington.
Her books have been recognised in numerous national and international awards since 2001. The Hut Builder won the fiction category of the 2011 NZ Post Book Awards as well as being shortlisted for the international Boardman Tasker prize and was named as a Booksellers New Zealand Bestseller of the Decade. Four other novels have also been longlisted or shortlisted for New Zealand Book Awards: Room, (shortlisted for the 2001 Montana New Zealand Book Awards), Edwin and Matilda (runner-up in the fiction category of the Montana New Zealand Book Awards, 2008), Reach (longlisted for the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards, 2014) and At the Grand Glacier Hotel (longlisted for the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards, 2024). In 2018, To the Mountains: A Collection of New Zealand Alpine Writing (co-authored with Paul Hersey) won the nonfiction category of the NZ Mountain Book Awards
Laurence has been the recipient of a number of fellowships and residencies including the Artists to Antarctica Fellowship, 2004; the Robert Burns Fellowship at the University of Otago, 2007; the New Zealand Society of Authors/Copyright Licensing New Zealand Research Award, 2013; the Auckland Museum National Research Grant, 2016; and the Friends of the Hocken Research Grant (with Paul Hersey), 2016.
In 2016 she won the NZSA/ Janet Frame Memorial Award and in 2017 she was the joint winner of the Otago University Press Landfall essaycompetition. She was named a New Zealand Arts Foundation Laureate in 2019 and won the NZSA Peter and Dianne Beatson Fellowship in 2023.
While at Henderson House, Laurence began working on a series of essays under the working title Residencies: A Conversation about Writing Space. The collection focuses on the residencies she has held from Antarctica to Tasmania, the University of Otago to Auckland Museum, and examine the impact these writing spaces have had on her life and work. The stunning Henderson House residency and Central Otago will also feature in this work. She has also begun working on the final novel in her “5 Senses” series (Taste) which will be set in Alexandra with a focus on fly-fishing and kayaking in the nearby rivers.
Laurence enjoyed meeting up with local residents and authors while at Henderson House and presented a lecture to the U3A group. She has donated several books to the Henderson House library collection.