Steve Braunias talks well of the dead
Max Cryer died on August 25 possibly aged 86, and I wrote an appreciation of him in last weekend's Canvas. It was a very discreet story. Perhaps it was discreet to a fault; I wondered about that in the days after the story was published, and whether I had failed the test of journalism in my attempt to respect Max's wish for privacy. These conflicts gave the story a certain kind of tension. It was one of the stranger obituaries I've written – bring out the famous New Zealand dead, and I will usually be on hand to say a few words for the Herald - but consistent with my philosophy that while you cannot defame the dead you maybe ought to think of everyone deserving a bon voyage. You'd want the same for yourself. The fear of what people will say about us when we leave the room is no less an issue when we leave the room and never come back.
Max enjoyed long and loyal friendships. I interviewed five of his oldest friends and no one had a bad word to say about him. Neither had they any hard information, including the year of his birth; he maintained a silence bordering on pathological secrecy. No one had ever seen him with a partner. The author C.K. Stead – they were at university together, and remained friends - told a funny story about a house guest from Kurdistan at Max's home in Onehunga. I withheld it. It was more innuendo than fact, and I approached the story with a certain piety. I knew Max, liked him, and wanted him to rest in peace. But when the story was published, I figured it would lead to fresh information, as readers crept out of the woodwork not so much with dirt – please excuse another fit of piety but in my long career I've never asked anyone for dirt – than with sightings, evidence, facts.
"Max was a character," emailed an author who had known him for nearly 30 years. He relayed the fresh information that he often went to Max's house for lunch, "every one unfailingly accompanied by borscht. I have a childhood loathing of beetroot, but I dared not share that with dear Max." This wasn't quite what I had in mind, but then he wrote, "So many people have a Max story." Aha! Such as? "I have a friend who has a concrete rabbit in his garden, which Max coveted hugely."
"Max was my friend for over 70 years," emailed a former businessman now in a rest home in Ōrewa. "He truly was a wonderful man and friend. Your story mentioned, interestingly enough, whether he was a milliner. In my early days I was the NZ representative of the Queen's milliner, Aage Thaarup to her Majesty the Queen of England." What? He signed off with the honorific of a knighthood and the explanatory note, "Awarded by His Majesty the Emperor of Japan. The Order of the Rising Sun, with Gold Rays." Fascinating; but not very helpful as far as understanding the life and activities of Max.
