Robin Hyde / Iris Wilkinson: adding to the archive

Image: Penny Vernon with her twin lens camera, 17 July 2025, photographer Jane Wild

Robin Hyde’s distributed archive continues to grow. Sometimes the photograph, the book or the letter takes its own time. In this case a photograph which features Robin’s son Derek Challis took over forty years to be developed. The story behind the photograph demonstrates the way documentary heritage can surface beyond the formed collections. This is particularly apparent when an archive is collected after the subject’s death. In this case Iris Guiver Wilkinson (1906 – 1939) now better known as Robin Hyde has left a trail of letters and photographs across the country and beyond reflecting her vivid and tumultuous life. More letters continue to be found and through digitisation and transcription they add to the distributed archive in collections, both public and private. 

Image: Derek and Ellynne (Lynne) Challis with Jean Sweetman, Grey Lynn, 1980s, photographer: Penny Vernon

The photo had been waiting to be developed in Penny’s twin lens Rolleicord camera since the 1980’s. I met with Penny in her apartment off Karangahape Road in July 2025 to hear about the photographs, developed in 2021, and what happened next. The photo above features Penny’s mother Jean Sweetman greeting Derek and Lynn Challis at her Grey Lynn villa. They had met to talk about the Iris Wilkinson / Robin Hyde letters in the Sweetman family. 

Twenty years before the photo was taken the writer Gloria Rawlinson was embarking on the biography of her friend Iris Wilkinson. She tracked down the Sweetman Family in Te Uku, near Raglan  in the Waikato by sending a series of letters to several Sweetmans. Penny’s father was Hardy Sweetman, older brother to Harry Sweetman, who met sixteen-year-old Iris when she was a schoolgirl at Wellington Girls’ College in 1922. Gloria wrote to Penny’s father in March 1966 and asked Hardy to send her:

“a brief account of your brother as you remember him, with, perhaps a little about his background, schooling, interests etc.?”. 

Just six days later, on 31 March 1966, Hardy sent back a 4 page longhand response describing Harry, 

…”the youngest of eight of our family whose parents came to Te Uku in 1885 so he grew up in typical back block conditions until he became a PO cadet at the age of 15.” 

 Hardy recalls his letters from Iris, who wrote to him after Harry’s death. He offers to make these letters available to Gloria:

“My daughter is going to Auckland tomorrow and if I can, I will go with her and could drop at your place some letters of Iris’s and others which may give you a line on Harry’s character. You will, of course have realised the “Timothy” in the “Godwits Fly” is drawn on him.” 

The Godwits Fly is an important book for the Sweetman Family. This book connects their family with Timothy Cardew as the character of Harry and Eliza Hannay as Iris. Penny has collected copies for all the Whanau. This took some effort since The Godwits Fly went out of print soon after publication in 1938. Getting a copy before 1970 required “liberating” a public library copy. It was republished in 1970 and has been in print in New Zealand since then.

 

Ngā Pātaka Kōrero - Auckland Libraries · The Godwits Fly

Penny talked about the importance in the family of the letters from Iris. They were kept in a tin container for safekeeping and then delivered to Gloria as soon as she made her inquiry.

 

Ngā Pātaka Kōrero - Auckland Libraries · Important Letters

           

The late arrival of the two photographs with Derek and Lynne required a visit to the Challis home in Te Henga to present the prints. Penny’s brother remarked: “If we’re going to see Lynne [and Derek] we should all go”

 

Ngā Pātaka Kōrero - Auckland Libraries · The Late Arrival

 

Penny has documented the Sweetman sibling’s visit to Te Henga. Derek had just had his ninetieth birthday and died soon after their visit in 2021. He gave the family an inscribed copy of The book of Iris, his biography of his mother. Derek inscribed on the flyleaf,

“For the Sweetman Family in memory of Iris and Harry. What things might have happened”

Ngā Pātaka Kōrero - Auckland Libraries · Te Henga Visit

          

At the visit Lynne also presented them with Robin’s copy of 'Marpessa.' This slim volume in the series ‘Flowers of Parnassus’ by Stephen Phillips was first published in 1907.  Robin had kept this book with her all her life. Some months later Lynne asked for the book back and Penny returned it. Penny was able to locate another copy of the slim green volume in similar condition which had been deaccessioned from a university library in California.

Image: Marpessa – cover. On the flyleaf Harry had inscribed: ‘To Iris. A little green book can contain more than all the philosophy in the world: this is such a book. HFS 27.4.22’ . From 'The Book of Iris: a biography of Robin Hyde p.40.

Robin’s copy of Marpessa became her association with Harry. It is a true association copy with this dedication from Harry Sweetman, a rare book in every sense. Derek had collected his mother’s extensive archive over his lifetime and most of it can now be found in the Alexander Turnbull Library and the University of Auckland Library – as noted in the UNESCO Memory of the World inscription #42 (2020). 

Letters, and photographs, evidence of Robin’s short life and productive career as a journalist, poet and writer can be found through the Digital NZ platform. 

Auckland Libraries holds the autobiography written at the suggestion of her doctor (Dr Gilbert Tothill) - NZMS412

This was the period when she wrote The Godwit’s Fly. Robin began writing this novel in 1933 when living at The Grey Lodge, part of the Auckland Mental Hospital in Gladstone Road, Mt Albert. She wrote 300 pages in 4 weeks. The finished book is less than 400 pages. The manuscript was reworked and completed in 1936-37, then typed up in early 1937 for publication by Hurst and Blackett in England in 1938.

New letters continue to surface and through digitisation and transcription they add to the distributed archives. The McNab Collection at Dunedin Public Library has recently digitised letters Iris wrote in 1935 and 1936, with transcriptions.

These letters from ‘The Grey Lodge’ give an insight into Robin’s skill as a writer as well as an insight into her emotional vulnerability. These are evocative letters of substance; letters to keep.

Thank you to Penny Vernon and the Sweetman Family for adding to the extraordinary record of Robin Hyde and reducing the degrees of separation to Robin.

Author: Jane Wild, Rare Books Curator

References:

The Godwits Fly by Robin Hyde, Persephone Books, London, 2016 (373p.)

For further details about Te Uku refer to R T Vernon’s Te Uku (Rice Printers, Hamilton, 1975)

 All letters quoted here are in the collection of Penny Vernon

Marpessa 

Refer to OH_1562 for the full interview:  Penny Vernon in conversation with Jane Wild (July 2025)