May 19, 2023
Auckland Writers Festival demystifies writing for Māori
The Auckland Writers Festival is in full swing, with Māori authors, poets and scholars well-represented in this weekend’s line-up.
Screenwriter and author Michael Bennett, who curated the Maori content along with his poet daughter Matariki, says that reflects a thriving publishing scene where almost half of this year’s New Zealand Ockham Book Award finalists were Māori.
He drew on his own experience of being in a creative whanau to build a programme that says writing is not just for an elite few.
“Anyone can do it if they have the will and they get surrounded by the right people and our sessions were really to try and make, especially for young Maori, for rangatahi, to demystify the writing process and put a whole lot of young, extraordinary brown people on stage saying ‘we can do this and you can too,'” Bennett says.
Most of the Maori sessions in the festival at the Aotea Centre are free.