Rupert Alister Halls Taylor (21 September 1943 – 9 September 2019) was an innovative and controversial New Zealand

publisher Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...

. He published ''

The Little Red Schoolbook ''The Little Red Schoolbook'' ( da, Den Lille Røde Bog For Skoleelever; en, The Little Red Book For School Pupils) is a book written by two Danish schoolteachers, Søren Hansen and Jesper Jensen, first published in 1969. It was subject to mu ...

'' in the 1970s (widely criticised by morals campaigners for its subversive content),

Tim Shadbolt Sir Timothy Richard Shadbolt (born 19 February 1947) is a New Zealand politician. He was the Mayor of Invercargill and previously Mayor of Waitemata City. Early life Shadbolt was born in the Auckland suburb of Remuera in 1947. His father died ...

's autobiographical ''Bullshit and Jellybeans'', and significant works on artists C. F. Goldie and

Gustavus von Tempsky Gustavus Ferdinand von Tempsky (15 February 1828 – 7 September 1868) was a Prussian adventurer, artist, newspaper correspondent and soldier in New Zealand, Australia, California, Mexico and the Mosquito Coast of Central America. He was also a ...

Tussles with the publishing industry

Untrusted in the New Zealand publishing industry for slow payment of debts, he was bankrupted in the early 1980s at the instigation of the Publishers' Association. Discharged ten years later, he began a new publishing venture, reissuing some of his earlier publications in edited and updated form. He established ''New Zealand Who's Who Aotearoa'', with the first volume published in 1992, in competition to the standard biographical work ''

Who's Who in New Zealand The ''Who's Who in New Zealand'', originally called the ''Who's Who in New Zealand and the Western Pacific'', is a collection of biographies that was first published in 1908, and the latest version is from 1991. History The first edition was edi ...

'' (last published in 1991). In 2001 he was accused by the London ''

Daily Mirror The ''Daily Mirror'' is a British national daily tabloid. Founded in 1903, it is owned by parent company Reach plc. From 1985 to 1987, and from 1997 to 2002, the title on its masthead was simply ''The Mirror''. It had an average daily print ...

'' Sorted column by

Penman & Greenwood The ''Daily Mirror'' investigators who exposed rogues in the Thursday edition of the paper between 1999 and 2006. Journalists Andrew Penman and Michael Greenwood found the cheats and confronted them. The investigations column, launched in 1997, wa ...

, in a report headlined "Full medal racket", of targeting national heroes in a publishing con. In 2005 he was again in financial difficulty when the New South Wales Department of Fair Trading was granted an injunction banning him from marketing a range of non-existent publications about prominent Australians. The Supreme Court found that he had solicited fees from Australians to be included in a publication entitled the Australian Roll of Honour series, which did not exist.

Personal life

His partner from 1978 to 2004 was the journalist and politician

Deborah Coddington Deborah Coddington is a New Zealand journalist and former ACT New Zealand politician. Pre-political career Coddington, born in Waipukurau, worked from 1973 to 1984 as a magazine journalist, but in 1985 moved to Russell, a town in the Bay of I ...

, with whom he had three children. Taylor was a "loved brother, uncle, father and grandfather". Upon his death his daughter Imogen described him to journalists Kendall Hutt and Mandy Te as a "sensitive, artistic, kind of guy".

Publications

*Down Under The Plum Trees, explicit sex instruction manual, 1972. *Tim Shadbolt, autobiography, 'Bullshit and Jellybeans'. *Sue Kedgley, Sexist Society, 1973. *Sam Hunt, From Bottle Creek.See 'Culture Clash' inset at https://teara.govt.nz/en/publishing/page-6

References

Where's Who's WhoAlister Taylor and Deborah Coddington 1978
{{DEFAULTSORT:Taylor, Alister 1943 births 2019 deaths New Zealand publishers (people) Place of birth missing