Peter Hawes

Born in Westport, Hawes earned a Bachelor of Arts degree at the University of Canterbury, in Christchurch.

Whilst living in Barcelona, he wrote—in Spanish—a best-selling novel about the Spanish Inquisition: La Hoguera (The Bonfire), published in 1974.[1] After returning to New Zealand in 1975, he worked for television, as a researcher and journalist, and as a scriptwriter for various series, including Fraggle Rock, and Against the Law.

Several of his plays remain unperformed; for example, A Higher Form of Killing.

Hawes died on 29 October 2018.[2]

Novels

• La Hoguera (in Spanish) (The Bonfire), 1974
• Tasman's Lay, 1995
• Leapfrog with Unicorns, 1996

Plays

• Alf's General Theory of Relativity, 1981
• Ptolemy's Dip, 1982
• Armageddon Revisited, 1983
• Goldie: A Good Joke, a portrait of the early New Zealand painter C. F. Goldie, 1987
• 1946 The Boat Train, which examines the effect of the World War 2 on the lives of four women, 1991
• Aunt Daisy, 1989
• The 1944 Olympic Games, one-act play
• A Higher Form of Killing, about physicist Ernest Rutherford
• The Inquisition Dies, developed from material in La Hoguera

• New Zealand Book Council
• Trove, National Library of Australia