+ Books and Other Major Works
2017 - Confessions of a Cockroach/Headstone. Lasavia Publishing
2015 - Taniwha (With Jennifer Rackham). Lasavia Publishing
2014 - Hold my Teeth While I Teach you to Dance. Lasavia Publishing Ltd: Auckland. A novel.
2014 - The Angel of Compassion. Lasavia Publishing Ltd: Auckland. Non-fiction.
2004 – Stench, Hazard Press: Christchurch. A novel.
2001 – Counterpart. Harper Collins: Sydney. A novel.
1996 – Dumb Show. Longacre Press: Dunedin. A novel.
1996 – Treasure Hunt. Auckland University Press: Auckland. Poetry.
1991 – Lethal Dose. Hard Echo Press: Auckland. A novel.
1991 – Foreigners. Penguin Books: Auckland. Three novellas.
1991 – Mary Mouse, Manuscript of Children’s Poetry, broadcast on NZ National Radio.
1987 – Antibody Positive. Hard Echo Press, Auckland. A novel.
1986 – Lear: The Shakespeare Company Plays Lear at Babylon. Hard Echo Press, Auckland. A novel.
1985 – Standing Wave. Hard Echo Press, Auckland. Poetry.
1984 – From a Woman in Mt Eden Prison & Drawing Lessons. Hard Echo Press, Auckland. Poetry.
1983 – The Palanquin Ropes. Voice Press, Wellington. Poetry.
1973 – Dialogue. Whitcomb and Tombs, Christchurch. A text for senior English. Co-author with A.T. Johnson.
Pending:
To Beatrice Where We Crossed The Line. Second Avenue Press: Auckland. Poetry. Due March, 2014.
+ Anthologized Short Stories
Only those stories anthologized are listed. The list does not include stories, or novel ex
cerpts, published in magazines or literary periodicals. Read these stories here >>
2009 – ‘A visit to Te Wharau Bay: A Conversation at the End of the World’ (Random House). The Best New Zealand Fiction # 6. Edited by Owen Marshall
2006 – ‘The Wedding of Psyche’ (Reed Books). The myth of the 21st Century. Ed by Tina Shaw and Jack Ross.
1998 – ‘Towards the bottom of the garden, the plum blossom shows pink.’ (Tandem) One hundred Short Short Stories Ed by Graham Lay.
1996 – ‘The Fohn Effect’ (IPL) Antipodean Tales Ed. by Geoff Churchman.
1995 – ‘Teledildonics’ Lust (Vintage) Ed. by Michael Giftkins.
1995 – ‘When That Shark Bites’ Men Love Sex (Vintage, Australia) Ed. by Alan Close.
1995 – ‘Rutherford’s Dream’ Rutherford’s Dreams (IPL) Ed. by Warwick Bennett and Patrick Hudson.
1994 – ‘The Harmony of the Swine’ Tart and Juicy (Vintage) Ed. by Michael Giftkins.
1992 – ‘The Woman of Tuscany House’ Erotic Writing (Penguin) Ed. by Sue McCauley and Richard Mc Lachlan.
Anthologized Short Stories
2008 & 2009 – Stench film option renewed by POP films.
2007 – Stench film option renewed by POP films.
2006 – Stench film option renewed by POP films.
2005 – Stench option sold to Vicky Pope of POP films ltd. Film in development.
2001 – Short film script ‘Hatto’ wins NZ Film Commission Funding for production in 2002. Value $69 000 dollars
2000 – Expression of formal interest from South Pacific Pictures to convert Stench into a film script.
1998 – Employed by director Ellory Elkayem to write a screen play for Signs of Life based on an original story by Ellory, funded by the NZ Film Commission..
1998 – Independent film maker Karen Rook, purchases an option on Lear (1986) (Project not completed.)
1997 – South Pacific Pictures purchases an option on novel Dumb Show (1996). Mike Johnson given role of script advisor. Project not completed.
1997 – Employed by Reston Griffiths (Park Avenue Advertising) to write a feature film based on an original idea by Reston.
+ Awards and Fellowships
2006 – Wellington composer Carol Shortis wins the Philip Neil Memorial Prize with a song entitled ‘The riddle of her flight’ with the lyrics of a poem from Mike Johnson’s book Treasure Hunt.
2002 – Nominated for the Sir Julius Vogel Award for the novel Counterpart.
2002 – Auckland University Literary Fellowship. Value: $50.000.
2001 – Creative NZ project grant for work on a novel. Value $9,000.
1999 – Francis Keane Award for best short story, ‘Magic Strings.’
1997 – Buckland Memorial Literary Award for the novel, Dumb Show.
1996 – Creative NZ Project Grant for work on a novel (Counterpart). Value $18,000.
1992 – Playwrights Grant for working on dramatizing of Lear: Value: $3000.
1990 – Literary Fund Project Grant for work on fiction. Value $9000.
1988 – Literary Fund Project Grant for work on a novel. Value: $6000.
1987 – Literary Fellowship for twelve months at the University of Canterbury. (Writer in Residence.) Value $40,000.
1986 – Lear. A novel. Shortlisted for New Zealand Book Awards.
1985 – Literary Fund Project Grant for prose writing. Value: $3000.
1982 – Poetry Prize: Te Awamutu Festival of the Arts.
1981 – Co winner of the John Cowie Reed Memorial Competition for a long poem or sequence of poems, with The Palanquin Ropes.
+ Mike Johnson the Teacher
I began teaching creative writing in 1987, during a year as Literary Fellow at the University Canterbury, and have been teaching it ever since. Throughout the 1990’s I taught night classes for what was then The Centre for Continuing Education at the University of Auckland. These classes had wonderful names, like ‘Develop your Creative Writing Potential!’ In 2003 I began working for the English Department at the University of Auckland, teaching across a range of undergraduate creative and academic writing classes, including The Short Story and Contemporary Poetry both at stage 3 level.
In 2005 I worked in the first year of The University of Auckland’s Master’s in Creative Writing program (MCW), which continued until 2008, when I shifted to AUT University, teaching both undergrad and postgrad creative writing, and where, in 2014, at the time of writing this, I am still working.
