Ian Cross

Ian Cross 1925 - 2019

Ian Cross wrote extensively as a journalist and author. His most successful novel was The God Boy, published in many countries, it became one of New Zealand television's earliest dramas, adapted by the author for the stage and premiered in 1999, and an opera composed by Anthony Ritchie. The novel is currently published in the UK Penguin Classic Series.

Cross was the first holder of the Burns Fellowship at Otago University after which he became the public relations manager for the then iconic carpet firm Feltex. He was also a successful broadcaster as a media analyst and later executive chair of the NZBC from 1977 before retiring in 1986. A former editor of The Listener in the early '70s, his non-fiction writing included two books, The Unlikely Bureaucrat, about his broadcasting career, and Such Absolute Beginners, a memoir of youthful experience. He was a holder at different times of the Nieman Journalism Fellowship at Harvard University. He served in various voluntary positions including the writers' organisation PEN, the Arts Council, the Indecent Publications Tribunal, and Downstage Theatre. 

He passed away in 2019 at the age of 93.

Photo credit: Maarten Holl/Stuff