Author(s): Jean Devanny

New Zealand Fiction

The Butcher Shop first appeared in 1926. Despite big overseas sales it was banned in New Zealand and later Australia for being disgusting, indecent and communistic in other words for promoting revolutionary ideas about women and for a bold portrayal of the brutality of farm life. On one level, the novel is a fast-paced account of how passion and jealousy destroy the lives of a rich and cultured farming family; on another it is a fierce polemic for the freedom of women, which in its frankness was years ahead of its time.