For a book written by an oral historian, Oracles & Miracles (1) is a strange work. When it appeared as a novel it attracted favourable reviews and was highly rated by judging panels, and it has since been adapted for radio and made into a successful play. The original work obviously has a good deal of merit. I read it after several women of my acquaintance spoke enthusiastically about it because of the insights it offered them into the roles of girls and young women growing up in Christchurch a few decades ago. I do not wish to dispute the merits of Oracles &Miracles as literature, as a dramatic production, or as a feminist tract. What does concern me are the number of historical inaccuracies that I found in the novel. After I had recorded them I found out about Elizabeth Gordon's critique of its social ideology. (2) She commented on some geographical and historical oddities as well, but in all except one instance my list differed from hers. Her account also challenged Stevan Eldred-Grigg's oral history for omitting references to major events- happenings that no one living in Christchurch in those times would ever forget. Why, she asked, was there no reference to the record snowfall of 1945 or to Ballantyne's fire of 1947?
