Sam Hunt is larger than life and lately, at the ripe old age of 70, he’s become increasingly preoccupied with death – namely his own.
Arguably New Zealand’s greatest living poet (for now at least, mortality being what it is), Hunt is the stuff of clichés; it’s impossible not to reach for expressions like “national treasure” or “cultural icon” when trying to describe him, because that’s just what he is.
Hunt was born in Castor Bay, on Auckland’s North Shore in 1946 – 13 years ahead of the harbour bridge – and it was clear from an early age that he would be a poet; he wrote his first precocious poem at the age of seven. Since then, he has written hundreds of poems, possibly thousands, but who’s counting? Certainly not Hunt. Read more...
