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Witi Ihimaera
Photo Credit: Andi Crown

Witi Ihimaera

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Three-time winner of the Wattie/Montana Book of the Year award, Katherine Mansfield fellow and playwright Witi Ihimaera is one of New Zealand’s most prolific and accomplished writers. Witi’s first novel, Tangi, won the Wattie Book of the Year Award in 1974, a feat he repeated with The Matriarch in 1986. His celebrated novel Bulibasha, King of the Gypsies, now adapted as the film Mahana, won the Montana Book of the Year award in 1995. Witi’s other novels and short story collections include The Whale Rider (also adapted as an internationally successful film); Dream Swimmer (sequel to the award-winning The Matriarch); Pounamu, Pounamu and Nights In The Gardens of Spain. In 2015 he published the first volume of his autobiography, Maori Boy.
 

Quotes

'Part oracle, part memoralist, Ihimaera is an inspired voice...'

Metro (NZ)

'A writer just doesn’t come out fully formed. A writer is the result of experiences...'

Witi Ihimaera

'The voice on the page is very much the voice of the man: eloquent, endearing, cheeky, somehow proud and humble at the same time, willing to put it all out there.'

NZ Books

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Short story club – 26 July 2018

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