The actual Queen (Elizabeth 2), made Marsh a Dame Commander of the British Empire in 1966, and in 1978 (along with Dame Daphne du Maurier), Dame Ngaio Marsh became a recipient of the Mystery Writers of America's highest honour: the Grand Master Award. Sayers, has been described as one of the original four Queens of Crime. She is considered to be one the leading writers of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction, and along with her stable mates Agatha Christie, Margery Allingham, and Dorothy L. From the 1930s through to the 1980s, Ngaio Marsh wrote 32 novels (most still in print). If you want to talk about New Zealand and crime/mystery fiction, you start (and can pretty much end) with Ngaio Marsh. In both instances, in Christchurch, New Zealand.

Ngaio Marsh sold four stories to the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, and I mention this upfront, because it's the only other connection (albeit tenuous) that I can claim to her I too have had stories appear in the same magazine.Ĭhapter and Verse: The Little Copplestone Mystery (August 1973)Ī couple of Dames at the Savoy (Christie and Marsh)Įdith Ngaio Marsh was born in 1895 (April 23 same birthday as Shakespeare) and died in 1982. I mention this brush with movie stardom simply because I can state that I have met and spoken to someone who not only knew, but was a good friend of, writer Ngaio Marsh. His brother was a lecturer at the university (his brother, Michael, would later be one of my English professors). For a short time, in a galaxy far, far away (the 1980s), I worked as a bank clerk on campus at the University of Auckland, and Mr Neill came in one quiet afternoon to make enquiries about foreign exchanges.

Artists in Crime by Ngaio Marsh