Gigi Fenster: 2019
Easter Writers Residency

Gigi Fenster: 2019
Easter Writers Residency

Gigi Fenster: 2019
Easter Writers Residency
1335 1335 Michael King Writers Centre

Gigi’s first book, The Intentions Book was shortlisted for the 2013 New Zealand Post Book Awards and long-listed for the IMPAC Dublin Award. Her second book, Feverish was published in 2018, and she has published work in various literary journals. She has a PhD in Creative Writing and two Masters degrees in Law. Gigi teaches law and creative writing and is a member of the Write Where You Are Trust, which provides creative writing classes to, amongst others, prison inmates.

Since the middle of the 19th century, the law has relied on the concept of the ‘reasonable man’ as a standard against which to measure human activity. The reasonable man is a fictional everyman, the ordinary man in the street, Mr Joe Shmoe. This reasonable man has been employed by courts across the globe in determining a wide range of matters – Gigi says, ‘I hope to write a creative non-fiction book that covers chapters in the life of the reasonable man test. My book will not purport to be a comprehensive review of every aspect of the history of this test. Rather, I hope to pull out some key cases from different parts of the world and, through these different cases, to produce a cohesive (if incomplete) biography of the fictional reasonable man. I will spend my residency time in researching case law and selecting the cases to be included in the book.’

Gigi lives in Ōtaki and is our tenth resident for the year.