Muriel Dorothy Butler, born on April 24, 1925 and died September 20, 2015, she was a New Zealand children’s book author, bookseller, memoirist and reading advocate.
Dorothy was awarded a Diploma in Education from the University of Auckland for her study of her severely handicapped granddaughter Cushla; this research was later adapted for publication as Cushla and Her Books.
She founded the famed Dorothy Butler Children’s Bookshop in Auckland which remains a going concern, albeit under new ownership.
A brief history of the bookshop’s early years was reported in the April 1977 issue of the Horn Book magazine.
Dorothy won the Children’s Book Circle Eleanor Farjeon Award in 1980.
In 1992, Dorothy became the second recipient of the Margaret Mahy Award, whose winners present and publish a lecture concerning children’s literature or literacy.
Dorothy’s lecture was titled Telling Tales.
In the 1993 New Year Honours, Dorothy was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire, for services to children’s literature.
Dorothy Butler died on 20 September 2015 in Te Atatu Peninsula, Auckland.