John Seymour’s Funeral

A number of former and current book trade identities attended John Seymour’s funeral in Lower Hutt last Friday – the 13th.  These included Bob Ross and Helen Benton, Bruce McKenzie, Pat Sullivan, Paul Greenberg, Tilly Lloyd, David Hedley, Tony and Andrew Tizzard, Rob Clarke, and Russell Pitt. Lincoln Gould, current CEO of Booksellers NZ, also attended.

Book trade tributes were given by publisher and author Ian F Grant and John Schiff, former CEO of Booksellers NZ.

Ian Grant spoke first: “I can’t remember exactly when John and I first met – but I do know why. It would have been about books.

“I certainly vividly remember one of the book launches that has gone down in NZ publishing mythology. The launch of Gordon McLauchlan’s The Passionless People in Eketahuna in 1976. It was very much John’s vision and was a remarkable event that went on for hours – with parades and plays and music and attracted wide-eyed TV reporters from the ‘big smoke’.

“At that launch the Australian publisher of the company John worked for asked if I was interested in writing a cartoon history of NZ. John published it four years later and campaigned for it to be chosen for the Book of the Month scheme that had recently begun. Both of us then became involved in running that scheme for several years and then worked together, with Bob Ross, Kate Fortune and others, in the NZ Book Trade Organisation, an attempt to harness the strengths of NZ publishers and booksellers in a combined marketing effort.

“In the late 1970s and into the 1980s we were involved in running Winter Book Seminars, often held in Rotorua, where younger people from publishers and bookshops learnt more about the book trade and enjoyed long evenings in the hot pools.

“By this time John was running the ANZ Book Co in NZ. One early book we did together was Rowling: The Man and the Myth, a biography of Bill Rowling. It was 1981, election year and the year of the infamous Springbok tour. It so happened there was a book trade conference in Nelson at the same time as a National Party conference and John and Ross Miller pushed leaflets about the Rowling book under the doors of the unsuspecting National Party conference attendees, including Rob Muldoon. He and they were not amused the next morning. But it made for very satisfying newspaper headlines.

“Probably the most successful book we did together – and it was reprinted many times and became a movie in some countries and a TV series in others was Bread & Roses, the autobiography of Sonja Davies. The first of numerous editions was in 1984.  John had read an interview with her and saw the potential for a book and Diane and I knew her a little so we put up a compelling argument about why we should publish her book and not the very large publisher she had verbally accepted an offer from.

“For a long time we were a little smug about the advice we’d received from many luminaries in the book trade at the time: don’t touch it – who wants to read about a left-leaning trade unionist – and a woman to boot!  As John showed then and on many occasions: you either have flair for seeing a good book, a nose for it, or you don’t. And the conventional wisdom is often wrong.

“By 1984 I was director of the NZ Book Marketing Council and John was on the council and later its chairman. As I remember it, Kate Fortune and I appointed a bright young lady to work with me – her name was Liz Melhuish.  I wouldn’t claim official matchmaker status, but John and Liz were soon friends and then very good friends, and then a wonderful partnership in all things.

“About this time, and with all the energy of comparative youth, four of us, John, Gordon McLauchlan, Graham Beattie, managing director of Penguin, and I had a little thing on the side. With tongues firmly in cheeks, we called our short-lived enterprise Four Star Books but, by the time we’d published a couple we decided we didn’t really have time for this extra-curricular activity!

“Over several years John built up ANZ Books in NZ with some very good publishing but some disastrous decisions by the company in Australia brought it all to an end.

“Before long, John, by now a Wellington resident, was general manager of GP Publications, the publishing arm of the Government Printing Office, which was corporatised as part of the Rogernomics  policies of the then Labour government. In short order key people, like John, from the private sector, hugely improved the organisation’s performance. John cajoled me into becoming publishing consultant in 1987 and I became publisher after Gavin McLean left. We – and particularly John, Gavin and later Ann Clifford  - sprang from practically no-where to producing more NZ books than any other publisher. It was fun while it lasted. The end came with the ill-advised decision to sell the Government Printing Office. This, in turn, after buying the golden goose for practically nothing, was the foundation of Graeme Hart’s subsequent fortune.

“It was effectively the end of John’s publishing career, but he went on to do other things, and he kept other book trade links. But I’ve always thought it both unfair and a great loss that the two successful book publishing enterprises he built up ended so prematurely and disappointingly.   Nevertheless, we have every reason today to celebrate the considerable contribution John Seymour made to the NZ book trade. And personally, Diane and I will greatly miss the long lunches in Masterton with John as he travelled north to sell books and visit family.”

John Schiff followed: “As with Ian, I too met John through books – when I joined the Booksellers Association in 1987.  John was what I would call an industry player – he was not only interested in his publishing company, but in the wider trade issues – always thinking of the bigger picture.  In the late 80s, booksellers and publishers began to investigate new ways of working more co-operatively, given the tiny size of the industry.  As President of the Book Publishers’ Association, John was at the forefront of cajoling publishers into taking a more collaborative approach.  He was tireless in his efforts, writing papers, talking about ways to bring the 2 sides together, strategizing, lobbying – never wavering, despite some opposition from entrenched parties.  Tenacious was John’s middle name.  By the beginning of 1990, Booksellers NZ was born, a new organisation that arose out of the Booksellers Association, with bookseller and publisher members.  Barriers had been broken down and this was a major development for our industry.  John certainly had a major input into bringing this to fruition. 

“Of course, he was doing this at the same time as running GP Publications – and there were no doubt many late nights and much weekend work.

“Philip King was the inaugural President of Booksellers NZ.  When I rang him to tell him that John had died, he was of course stunned.  His first reflection was ‘I remember so well at Booksellers conferences that John and I would head off for a run first thing in the morning, no matter how late and how much was drunk the night before!  He was always there, living it to the full – connecting with people, socialising, lobbying, and having a lot of fun.’

“Ian mentioned that after the sale of GP Books, John kept his toe in the water – he did this by taking on the role of Southern North Island rep for Nationwide Book Distributors.  This gave him the opportunity to keep in touch with the industry and I am sure that he was a valuable member of the team. 

“I have a quote from a long-standing industry colleague of John – Jeff Grigor – bookseller from Timaru.  And this is what he has to say of John – ‘I can’t think of anyone more upright and honourable – he was a brilliant publisher.  He never criticised anyone, no matter how badly he had been treated – he just took it on the chin and got on with life’.  That says it all, I think.

“John and I remained close friends and I will miss our regular Indian/Asian meals in town – when we chewed the fat over politics, family and friends, art (including of course updates on daughter Ava and Peter’s work), the Translation Centre , his four wheel driving, his travels, philosophy (mostly over my head) and, of course, his dearly beloved book trade.  I will miss him dearly.”

Footnote:

My warmest thanks to Ian Grant and John Schiff for their words about our old mate John and for making them available to the blog. Sadly I was overseas at the time of the funeral otherwise I would have been there but I did raise a glass of fine Chardonnay to John at the time and recalled our running days together and thought of the huge contribution he made to the world of books over many year. RIP John. You will be missed by many.

Photo of John courtesy Andrew Tizzard.