Description
Book SynopsisOn a Sunday afternoon in the spring of 1969, thousands of people defied Auckland city bylaws and came to party in Albert Park. A rock band played on the rotunda. Some people held hands, some danced alone, some sat under trees with guitars, flutes and bongos and made music of their own. They wore kaftans, ponchos and leather-fringed jerkins, floppy hats, headbands, beads and flowers. Poetry and political diatribes were delivered from a podium, improvised from an upturned tea chest. There were bikies, balloons, bubbles, sack races and a lolly scramble, lots of dogs and a pet possum. Someone brought a canoe and paddled it around the fountain, until it capsized. As the afternoon wore on there were joss sticks, skyrockets and what some will have recognised as the musky smell of marijuana. . . — From the Prologue In Jumping Sundays, award-winning writer and broadcaster Nick Bollinger tells the story of beards and bombs, freaks and firebrands, self-destruction and self-realisation, during a turbulent period in New Zealand’s history and culture.
Trade Review‘I picked up the package at the post office and thought, “what the fuck is this?”, thinking maybe the inheritance had finally come through! It turned out to be Jumping Sundays. Well, that was part of my inheritance, in fact, because I lived through most of it. Not that I was a big maker of it at all. I steered well clear of the Jumping Sundays, and I’ve never been in a protest. I was always just doing what I was doing, making my poems. But the book reminded me of things I’d forgotten, and it made me aware of things I was only vaguely aware of at the time. I loved reading the book and think that Nick Bollinger has done a fine job.’ — Sam Hunt
