Profiles > Profiles D-H > Brigid Feehan
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Brigid Feehan Brigid was born in Wellington and, except for one year, spent all of her childhood there. When she was about nine the family moved to Ireland with a view to settling. Her parents had emigrated from Ireland to New Zealand in the late 1950s and her father had always yearned to return ‘home’. Living in rural Ireland in the 1970s was dramatically different from life in Wellington. Brigid loved most things about it: the freedom of country children, being able to cycle everywhere, having loads of cousins her age to hang out with, and the large and ghost–story ridden houses that the extended family lived in. The one thing she and her brother didn’t like was the school they attended. This was at a high point of Irish nationalism. The Headmaster taught in the Irish language only - students even studied English through Irish - and he was also very strict and a dab hand at punishment. Coming from a cosy little primary school in Wellington, they didn’t know what had hit them! This was pre-Celtic tiger era and Brigid’s parents found that employment opportunities were, to say the least, not plentiful. They returned to New Zealand after a year. The family settled quickly back into the New Zealand way of life, and the kids were briefly famous at school for their adventure. Before the adventure they had lived in the city. After it, they lived in Johnsonville. Friday night was fish and chips and library night. The family would go to the library first, then to the fish and chip shop and then home. The maximum number of books you were allowed to take out of the Johnsonville library was five, so that’s how many Brigid took out. By Monday she had usually read them all and Friday would seem like a long way away.
Brigid started sending stories to the Evening Post children’s page, and can still remember the feeling of excitement when they were published. She started to think about being a writer. She wondered how she would fit it in with being a prima ballerina and/or a gymnast (this last was the Olga Korbut influence). After school Brigid went to university and studied law. Most of her jobs have been in the public sector and they have mainly involved writing. Working in the law has helped Brigid appreciate both the importance and the difficulty of communicating your message clearly.
While working she took a couple of short creative writing courses. Brigid was still nursing a desire to write fiction (and had a few short stories under her bed) but it wasn’t until she had a baby that she actually sat down at regular intervals and for a sustained length of time and finished a draft of a novel. Stella Star owes of much its existence to the sleeping habits of her son. She is writing regularly now. And loving it.
Brigid lives with her husband, son and cat in Island Bay, Wellington. The beach is not too far away from their house. Wellington’s south coast is a beautiful place for rambles and clear-the-head walks.
Brigid is a trustee with the Refugee Family Reunification Trust, which helps refugees in Wellington with the costs associated with bringing their families to New Zealand. Reading is still one of her main pleasures.
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