Tom Brooking

The Fate of the Land Ko ngā Ākinga a ngā Rangatira: Māori political struggle in the Liberal era 1891–1912 by Danny Keenan (Massey University Press, 2023), 328pp, $65

This is a timely book because it adds much to the distressing story of the concerted Māori effort to slow the alienation of their land and reveals more about this key tussle than has formally been available. Keenan builds on, critiques and extends the work of several Pākehā historians including Keith Sorrenson, Alan Ward, W.H. Oliver, Judith Binney, Graham Butterworth, Paul Moon, Richard Hill, the legal historians David Williams and Richard Boast, and the geographer J.S. Duncan, all of whom criticised Keith Sinclair for claiming that the Liberals paid a ‘fair’ price for Māori land. Ranginui Walker’s major biography of Āpirana Ngata and Joe Pere’s work on farming on the East Coast also added much useful information on the continued battle waged by Ngata on behalf of Ngāti Porou. [Read more…]

Paerau Warbrick

The English Text of the Treaty of Waitangi by Ned Fletcher (Bridget Williams Books, 2022), 736pp, $69.99

Ned Fletcher’s The English Text of the Treaty of Waitangi had its genesis in his colossal law PhD thesis. By and large I did not find the resultant book, given gravitas by sheer bulk, the easiest prose to read. It is a lengthy work organised into four parts, seemingly intended as a general reference for academics. [Read more…]

Andrew Paul Wood

Te Motunui Epa by Rachel Buchanan (Bridget William Books, 2022), 256pp, $49.99

Wind the clock back to the early 1800s, when Pākehā have just started establishing a significant presence in Aotearoa. Te Ātiawa hapū has occupied Taranaki for generations, but a new menace has arrived to disturb the peaceful equilibrium: European muskets, and with them, nearly a century of intertribal warfare in North Taranaki.

Te Ātiawa rushed to dismantle the most precious taonga from their carved buildings and hide them in Peropero swamp, intending to retrieve them later. Alas, that did not happen. Those who knew where they were hidden were captured or killed. [Read more…]