Nzwords Karori, Wellington, 13 June 2002
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HARRY ORSMAN AN ADDRESS GIVEN BY STUART JOHNSTON AT THE CATHOLIC CHURCH OF ST TERESA, NZWORDS KARORI, WELLINGTON, 13 JUNE 2002 It is a privilege to have years on, Harry would still convulse been asked to speak himself with mirth recalling his exploits about Harry Orsman. I with those unwieldy early tape-recorders have been trying to as he travelled the country collecting— bring some order to the and then sometimes erasing—oral thoughts and feelings evidence for his study of New Zealand that crowded in on language. How much would need to be learning of his death, by reflecting on packed into a sketch, inspired by Harry, AUGUST 2002 some of the meanings of the word entitled A Patient Scholar, or one NUMBER 6 ‘character’, as one might find them set capturing the essence of A Glad Teacher, PUBLISHED ANNUALLY out by a dictionary-maker like Harry. alive with the spirit of Chaucer’s Clerk: ‘gladly would he learn and gladly teach’. EDITORIAL In the literature curriculum that Behind the sketch of A Compleat Editor We dedicate this issue to the memory of Harry and I studied, an interesting by-way could lie Harry’s careful crafting of the New Zealand’s most accomplished, most was an unfamiliar 17th-century genre, reports of five royal commissions chaired durable, and most loved lexicographer, Dr Harold William Orsman CNZM that of the Character books: -collections by his good friend Thaddy McCarthy. (1928–2002), known to many simply as of brief sketches of various types of ‘Harry O’. person. At their best these Characters How fully Harry exemplified the The inaugural NZWords included the text were crisp, witty, single paragraphs, full of character of An Oral Historian. Or that of of an address by Stuart Johnston at a insights from the writer’s knowledge of A Prodigious Reader. Many of his Victoria University function marking the publication of Harry Orsman’s Dictionary particularly memorable individuals. I can students and colleagues could flesh out of New Zealand English in 1997. Here just a think of so many titles under which a the sketch of A Wise Mentor. He had a few years on in sadder times we print present-day writer could evoke the multi- remarkable gift for helping students who Professor Johnston’s warm and eloquent tribute to his friend and colleague, faceted, multi-talented personality of had got themselves into seemingly delivered at the Requiem Mass for Harry in Harry Orsman. Some of the 17th-century hopeless academic and administrative Wellington on 13 June this year. titles look promising: A Down-right tangles. There was no stylised tableau like In his regular contribution ‘From the Scholar, A Modest Man, A Good Old that of a kindly passer-by helping a lame Centre’ Graeme Kennedy also writes of Man. How easy it would be to fashion the dog slide over a stile; Harry’s way was to Orsman’s generous and invaluable legacy to New Zealand lexicography and to the paragraph on A Family Man. Or the lift them well clear of the obstacle, then New Zealand Dictionary Centre Character of a True Friend. For me the give the impediment a good kick or two specifically. latter would be triggered by memories for being in the way. Behind the sketch of As editor both of the first New Zealand from 45 years ago, when we were both A Generous Collaborator could lie dictionary (the Heinemann in 1979) and new householders, breaking in raw Harry’s unstinted assistance to the of the colossal work on historical principles sections in Upper Hutt, and sharing the editors of the supplements to the OED, that brought such deserved acclaim in his final years, Harry O’s own place in history frustrations of the do-it-yourself and of the Australian National Dictionary, as pre-eminent recorder of New challenged, and the hazards of getting and to many others. Think what could be Zealanders’ ways with words is assured. into town in time to take 8 a.m. tutorials. glanced at in the character sketch of A Much interesting work on New Zealand I can think of so many acts of generosity Mocker of Vanities. What rich memories vocabulary and vocabularies continues to and support from Harry over the years. would surface in recalling Harry as An be done, as evidenced by the three other contributions in this issue, all of which we He had so many friends who could say Organiser of Conferences! can be sure Harry would have read with the same. much pleasure. For all who venture into I could go on nominating such titles the field of New Zealand words Harry Orsman’s lexicographical endeavours will Many other Character sketches could for Character sketches illuminated by our be an inspiration and a reflect our experience of Harry—A knowledge of Harry, and you would note profound influence for a very long time to Storyteller, for instance, although a the paradoxes and striking contrasts come. further sketch would be needed, that of A between them. I would simply enlist on Teller of Inconclusive Stories, given the Harry’s behalf Walt Whitman’s famous Tony Deverson Editor, NZWords way Harry was prone to interrupt himself words: Associate Director, with uproarious asides that swept him off NZDC track. You all have your favourite Harry Do I contradict myself? stories, and will have a chance to share Very well then I contradict myself, them after Mass. I loved the way that, fifty (I am large, I contain multitudes.) THE NEW ZEALAND DICTIONARY CENTRE A joint project between VICTORIA UNIVERSITY OF WELLINGTON 1 and OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS Turning to another richly evocative selves. That volume of essays and poems Hardie Boys at Government House. A sense of the word, I reflect on the ways by twenty-eight of his colleagues and few months later there was the public in which Harry was ‘a bit of a character’. former students—the Festschrift Of installing of Harry as Doctor of Or, in the vernacular he delighted in, a Pavlova, Poetry and Paradigms—is Literature at the university’s graduation real dag of a joker. There was something testimony of a rare kind to the hold he ceremony (marked, very unusually, by a inescapably roguish in his personality. had taken on their minds and hearts. standing ovation from the large We can all vividly recall encounters with assembly of his academic colleagues), his overflowing zest for life, his I like one dictionary’s definition of followed a few weeks later by his irrepressible sense of fun, his reluctance the final sense of ‘character’ that shapes appointment as a Companion of the to conform to the bland pieties of social my regard for Harry. ‘Character: moral New Zealand Order of Merit. We know decorum, his impeccable sense of strength, especially if highly developed how much Harry enjoyed this mark of wrong—or right—timing on formal or evident.’ My focus in reflecting on recognition—as he told a reporter, he occasions, for choosing to share, too this aspect is here—Harry’s great was not only rapt, he was glad-wrapped. loudly for comfort, some subversive Dictionary of New Zealand English. I do not Then in 1998 he was awarded the insight. need to traverse the whole story of his Montana Medal for the non-fiction book journey towards this high point of his of the year. The more I came to know Harry over scholarly career—it has become so well almost fifty years—and I defer to Des known. The dictionary itself in so many He leaves a rich legacy, here in this Hurley, Maurice McIntyre, and Felix of its citations traces the growth of his volume, which will continue to inform, Kane, who knew Harry at St Pat’s, fascination with New Zealand English entertain, stimulate, and challenge for Silverstream; to Alistair Campbell, who from his childhood, ‘down Havelock’, many decades to come. Harry’s gifting met him at Weir House; and to others onwards. As Harry was fond of saying, of his intellectual property rights in the here who knew him for longer—the the project that began as a PhD thesis in dictionary and the transferring of his more I realised that what he had done 1951 rather got out of hand, and took rich store of research evidence—far was to create a highly colourful persona, the next forty-six years to complete. more than could be directly used in the a ‘character’, also confusingly called volume—have become the basis of the Harry Orsman, which he played hard It has been praised and honoured as ongoing collaboration between Harry’s whenever he was sufficiently provoked— a triumph of learning, as a masterwork publishers, OUP, and Victoria by the crassness of some figures in of scholarship. I want to honour and University, in the New Zealand authority, by the dullness of complacent praise it today as a triumph of character, Dictionary Centre, which is responsible conformity, or, most of all, by his finely of determination, of moral strength for maintaining and updating the DNZE tuned detection of unfairness or highly developed and plainly evident. database and for future revisions of it, injustice. Those who saw Harry only in How easy it would have been through for conducting research on New one of his more extravagant moments as those long years for him to let go of the Zealand language, and for preparing a lord of misrule could make the grave vision, to have found any number of other dictionaries and related mistake of thinking that this was the only reasons for abandoning the project and educational materials.