Sam Neill reveals the truth about Palmerston North via Tim Upperton

Tim Upperton's poem about Palmerston North has caught the attention of actor Sam Neill.

Twittersphere was abuzz – had Sam Neill moved to Palmerston North?

The Peaky Blinkers and Jurassic Park actor tweeted a video of himself reading a poem about Palmerston North, which he introduced by saying it was about "a town in the North Island of New Zealand where I live".

Neill certainly does live in Aotearoa, but in Central Otago.

However, Tim Upperton lives in Palmerston North and it was his poem, The Truth About Palmerston North, that Neill was reading.

Neill's selection of his poem was a complete surprise. Upperton had had a rotten day as he temporarily lost his dog. He arrived home to hundreds of notifications on his phone as Neill had tagged him in the tweet.

"So that was a nice ending to what had been a stressful day."

The Truth About Palmerston North was published in a 2018 issue of Poetry magazine that was dedicated to New Zealand poets and he suspects Neill was reading from that issue.

Neill introduces his reading by referencing the United States inauguration and saying it had been a big week for poetry. He is probably referring to Amanda Gorman, the poet who garnered international attention with her reading at Joe Biden's presidential inauguration.

Neill tells viewers his friend John Clarke, "New Zealand's greatest ever comedian", came from Palmerston North. "Any town that can produce a John Clarke you can forgive anything."

Upperton hasn't spoken to Neill about the video "so how he came across it is conjecture on my part".

Upperton says he owes a big debt to James Brown's poem I Come from Palmerston North, which refers to the city as the spiritual home of stockcars.

Brown grew up in Palmerston North and now lives in Wellington.

Upperton says Brown's poem is aggressive modesty - modest but a bit prickly and defensive, and it prompted him to write his own.

He had a similar tone to Brown's in mind when he wrote The Truth About Palmerston North, the way you run yourself down yet at same time you are defensive and hate it when people run you down.

"We do that, we don't let other people do that."

Upperton says his poem is a little bit of push back against negative things he hears about places like Hamilton, Eketahuna and Palmerston North.

"They are almost bywords in provincially or boringness."

Upperton enjoys living here and particularly likes Palmerston North for its ordinariness. We are living in extraordinary times and it's quite nice to live in Palmerston North, he says.

He hopes his affection for the city comes through in the poem; he does bristle when people sneer at Palmerston North.

"We are a provincial backwater, there's no way around that but so what, backwaters have things going for them as well."

The poem will be in his third book of poems to be published by Victoria University Press this year.

"It had more reach than any other poem that I've ever written, just because a film star happened to read it."

Upperton has been writing and publishing poetry for 20 years. His second poetry collection, The Night We Ate The Baby, was an Ockham New Zealand Book Awards finalist in 2016, and he won the Caselberg International Poetry Prize in 2012, 2013 and 2020.

As part of the poetry prize, he has been awarded a week-long writer's residency at Caselberg House in Dunedin this year.

Upperton completed a poetry PhD in 2019 from Massey University. In part he wrote a research essay about American poet Frederick Seidel. Upperton says Seidel's poems push the reader away but at the same time draw one in and he is fascinated by Seidel's tone that can be unpleasant and unafraid.

Upperton is a freelance writer who has taught creative writing. He also does some gardening jobs. "I must be the most highly qualified gardener in the country, I imagine."

Upperton's son, Oscar, and daughter, Katrina, are also published poets.