Kupu Festival brings out wealth of Māori writers

Adam Gifford Kupu Festival brings out wealth of Māori writers

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The curator of this year’s Ngā Ringa Tuhituhi: Kupu Māori Writers Festival says it was great to see the range of genres writers are tackling, from moteatea to history to protest to writing for young people.

Robyn Bargh says the festival drew large audiences both to the Rotorua venues and online.

She says the level of engagement between writers and audience was higher than she’s seen at other festivals, and the korero was often challenging.

“Professor Linda Tuhiwai Smith gave a fabulous talk on the importance of writing our stories as a part of decolonising ourselves and telling our stories and telling our histories in the way we want to tell them,” Ms Bargh says.

She says when she started Huia Publishers 30 years ago there were few Maori writers – but these days, especially with modern technology, numbers have grown exponentially.

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