Geoff Walker salutes and farewells Ray Richards - Eulogy delivered at funeral

Kia ora koutou katoa.

E nga rau rangatira ma, tena koutou.

I’m Geoff Walker and I’m a long-time friend, colleague and former employee of Ray Richards. I want first to extend my deepest condolences to Barbara, Nicki, Bron and their families.

Ray was my first publishing mentor. He gave me my first job in publishing 38 years ago and it’s been one of my life’s great pleasures and privileges to work with him as colleague and friend during all that time.

I’m here to tell you about Ray’s extraordinary professional achievements, in a career in book publishing that lasted an almost unbelievable 77 years. It just has to be a record. Perhaps others overseas have continued working this late in their publishing lives – but surely nobody began at the age of 15. Publishing was in Ray’s blood and he found it impossible to relinquish.

That’s how young Ray was when he began working as an office boy at Reeds in Wellington before the war. After the war he returned to Reed as an editor.

And then began a remarkable publishing career which is unparalleled in the NZ book world. Someone recently described him as ‘the grand old man of New Zealand publishing’. I don’t think he would have minded that. This courteous, gentle man had a sharp analytical mind and, at a crucial moment in this country’s history, an ability to read the cultural winds and produce some great books.

It’s not stretching things too far to claim that Ray essentially created New Zealand publishing as we now know it. It’s a big claim, but I think it’s true. From the mid-1960s Reeds under Ray created a new kind of New Zealand book and set up New Zealand’s first commercial publishing culture.

We don’t see much of these books these days, but there are some of them over there. The novels of Barry Crump, the first big tourist colour books, a big Maori publishing programme, the books by Peter McIntyre the painter, the T P McLean rugby tour books, natural history books, lots of New Zealand history, and so on.

This was all new. These were New Zealand books, by our writers, for us. It was the flowering of a specifically Kiwi publishing culture, which continues to this day, and it was led by Ray Richards. Ray has described this period as being ‘like a runaway train – unstoppable’. It’s easy to forget just how successful Reeds’ publishing was. They never printed less than 5000 copies – that’s double what a publisher would print today.

I was a long-haired leftie young editor, an enthusiastic new member of the team. And I was in awe of the man guiding this revolution – he was charming, canny, passionate about New Zealand culture, and possessing a very sharp commercial eye for what would work in the marketplace. He was a hands-on publisher, building strong personal relationships with many of his authors. And he was a brilliant editor himself.

But any life this long is also a rich tapestry in which there are ups and there are downs. Reeds ran into financial trouble in the 1970s. Ray ended up in bitter conflict with the owners. There were staff redundancies. As Ray himself has described it: ‘The team fell apart.’ Ray and Barbara’s beloved daughter Meredith died while overseas. Like the other Reed editors at the time I remember this vividly. It was the lowest of lows. And it was Barbara who said one night to Ray: ‘I don’t know about you, but I’m moving to Auckland. Do you want to come?’ It was time to leave and start a new life.

And so in 1976 they did. In Auckland they set up on their own as a book publisher and Ray became the first executive director of the Book Publishers Association, making a major contribution to New Zealand book publishing in a different way. In the same year he established in partnership with Barbara the Richards Literary Agency, which then became the second part of his publishing career. Barbara was an integral part of it and so were Nicki and Bron at various times.

For decades Richards Literary Agency was New Zealand’s biggest and strongest. Ray specialised in children’s books and he had a huge stable of children’s writers. He achieved considerable success in selling foreign rights, particularly to the United States, and he earned the gratitude and loyalty of many of our leading authors. To the end Ray was still working personally with fine writers such as Joy Cowley, Witi Ihimaera and Tessa Duder. He still represented Maurice Gee.

It isn’t possible to talk about Ray’s life and his achievements without mentioning Barbara. I want to pay special tribute to the remarkable woman who is Barbara Richards. Ray and Barbara were married for 64 years, and all through Ray’s life Barbara has been his partner in every respect. When he was a publisher she was his confidante and supporter – and yes, also cooking hundreds of dinners for authors and having the occasional penniless one sleep in the spare room. When Ray was a literary agent Barbara was literally his partner, his colleague in the business. She is also charming, loving and considerate – and a fine artist. That’s her portrait of Ray over there. So let’s be clear: Ray could not have achieved what he did without her presence beside him.

Ray Richards, we salute you, for a life that made a huge difference, not just to your family, friends and colleagues – but also to New Zealand’s culture.

E te rangatira – haere, haere, haere. From all your friends and colleagues in the book publishing world, farewell Ray. . . .

Footnote:
Thanks to Geoff for making his address available to me to share on the blog.