Jessie Mackay


Jessie Mackay was a New Zealand poet and animal rights activist.

Biography

Her Scottish parents were the shepherd Robert Mackay and his wife, Elizabeth Mackay. She went to Christchurch to train as a teacher, and taught at small rural schools until 1898. She moved to Dunedin, and worked as a journalist for the Otago Witness.
In 1902, she moved to Christchurch where she lived with her sister Georgina. In 1906, she was lady editor of the Canterbury Times. Her work at this time was published in the short-lived New Zealand literary magazine New Zealand Illustrated Magazine.
Her papers are held by the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Wellington, New Zealand.
The Jessie Mackay Memorial Award for Verse is given by the PEN New Zealand.

Animal rights

Mackay was a vegetarian who actively campaigned for women's rights, animal rights, and national liberation movements. Mackay stopped eating meat in the early 20th century because of her compassion for animals. In 1911, Mackay and her sister kept a vegetarian house in New Brighton. Mackay refused to wear feathers and fur. She condemned the fur trade and hunting. In the early 1920s Mackay condemned animal experiments and vivisection as unethical in newspaper articles.

Works