Dunedin poet and barrister Richard Reeve said the readings on November 22 would bring together six poets with a passion for Central Otago and its landscape.
Reeve will be joined by Jillian Sullivan, Michael Harlow, David Eggleton, Bridget Auchmuty and New Zealand poet laureate Robert Sullivan at Central Stories Museum and Art Gallery for the event.
Sullivan is the surviving partner of the late Brian Turner and lives in the Ida Valley.
She will be reading work from the past decade of poems addressing the natural world along with some new work.
Protecting Central Otago’s landscape from specifically large open-cast mines and the resultant toxic waste left behind was her motivation for becoming involved, she said.
"I fear for the health of the air and for the aquifers from toxic dust and leaching from the tailing dam, and the risk to the land, waterways and Clutha/Mata-au from any failure of the dam up in the hills.
"Central Otago is heralded by our council as a ‘World of Difference’ ... the council’s website [asks] ‘what can you do to celebrate and look after the distinctive character and sense of history that is part of our identity?’.
"Not putting an industrial site into our natural environment is a good start."
David Eggleton said he had written about the landscape from an environmental and aesthetic perspective for more than 30 years
"I am personally opposed to the current government’s ideological turn towards enabling a mining company to exploit and profoundly alter this particular area of Central Otago with a large-scale open-cast gold mine.
"I note the Central Otago Environmental Society awarded the former New Zealand poet laureate Brian Turner the title of Poet Laureate of Nature in 2024 for his lifetime’s work in poetry and activism, fighting for and celebrating the natural world.
"Brian is no longer here but I feel that as I too have held the poet laureate position and also live in the Otago region, it is important to carry on his work and to follow and affirm his example as a poetry activist for the local environment."
Reeve, the author of seven collections of poetry, will read work he has written over the past three decades, that addresses not only present-day environmental issues but also his personal connection with the lands and waters of Otago and the South Island.
"My concern with mining in the South Island is with open-cast mining in inappropriate locations," he said.
"If there can be some accommodation between the economic benefits of gold-mining and sustaining the authentic landscape, heritage and environmental values of sites, well and good.
"However, there is no place for a giant open-cast mine at Thomson Gorge Rd or, for that matter, at the northern end of the Rock and Pillar Range or on the Lammerlaw Range, where serious exploration is now also taking place by other Australian companies in the wake of Santana’s efforts.
"Otago’s world-renowned natural landscapes are far too valuable to be sacrificed to open-cast gold mining.
"Overseas tourists, crossing oceans to experience the fabled beauty of our land, do not come here to gaze out on to industrial sites."
