Witi Tame Ihimaera-Smiler (1944-02-07) 7 February 1944 (age 80) Gisborne, New Zealand
Occupation
Writer
academic
Language
English
Māori
Education
Victoria University of Wellington (BA)
Children
2
Witi Tame Ihimaera-SmilerDCNZM QSM (/ˈwɪtiɪhiˈmaɪrə/; born 7 February 1944) is a New Zealand author. Raised in the small town of Waituhi, he decided to become a writer as a teenager after being convinced that Māori people were ignored or mischaracterised in literature. He was the first Māori writer to publish a collection of short stories, with Pounamu, Pounamu (1972), and the first to publish a novel, with Tangi (1973). After his early works, he took a ten-year break from writing, during which he focused on editing an anthology of Māori writing in English.
From the late 1980s onwards Ihimaera wrote prolifically. In his novels, plays, short stories and opera librettos, he examines contemporary Māori culture, legends and history, and the impacts of colonisation in New Zealand. He has said that "Māori culture is the taonga, the treasure vault from which I source my inspiration".[1] His 1987 novel The Whale Rider is his best-known work, read widely by children and adults both in New Zealand and overseas. It was adapted into the critically acclaimed 2002 film Whale Rider directed by Niki Caro. His semi-autobiographical novel Nights in the Gardens of Spain (1996) was about a married man coming to terms with his homosexuality. In later works he has dealt with historical events such as the campaign of non-violent resistance at Parihaka in the late nineteenth century.
Ihimaera is an influential figure in New Zealand literature, and over his long career has won numerous awards and fellowships, including multiple awards for both fiction and non-fiction at the New Zealand Book Awards spanning the period 1973 to 2016, the Robert Burns Fellowship (1975), the Katherine Mansfield Menton Fellowship (1993), and a Prime Minister's Award for Literary Achievement (2017). Until 2010 he was the Professor of English and Distinguished Creative Fellow in Māori Literature at the University of Auckland. He has since published two volumes of his memoirs: Māori Boy: A Memoir of Childhood (2014) and Native Son: The Writer's Memoir (2019).
^Gnanalingam, Brannavan (4 November 2019). "By Way of Circularities: an interview with Witi Ihimaera". Sydney Review of Books. Archived from the original on 18 April 2021. Retrieved 18 April 2021.
Witi Tame Ihimaera-Smiler DCNZM QSM (/ˈwɪti ɪhiˈmaɪrə/; born 7 February 1944) is a New Zealand author. Raised in the small town of Waituhi, he decided...
The Whale Rider is a 1987 novel by New Zealand author WitiIhimaera. In 2002 it was adapted into a film, Whale Rider, directed by Niki Caro. Set in the...
Popoia pā, and as the setting for several novels and short stories of WitiIhimaera. Members of the Te Whanau-a-Kai Te Aitanga-a-Māhaki iwi (tribe) are...
Witi Ihimaera (born 1944), New Zealand author Witi language, alternative spelling for Wiri, an Aboriginal Australian language of Queensland WITI (TV)...
and directed by Niki Caro. Based on the 1987 novel The Whale Rider by WitiIhimaera, the film stars Keisha Castle-Hughes as Kahu Paikea Apirana, a twelve-year-old...
sheep-shearing competition in 1982. His uncle is the prominent Māori author WitiIhimaera who wrote The Whale Rider which became a film of the same name. Lewis...
include two of the most influential living authors from this region: WitiIhimaera, New Zealand's first published Māori novelist, and Samoan poet Albert...
Were Warriors. The rural-set drama was based on the novel Bulibasha by WitiIhimaera, and starred Temuera Morrison, whom he had earlier directed in Once...
various conflicting versions of Merle's origin. New Zealand author WitiIhimaera used Oberon's hidden South Asian and alleged Māori heritage as the inspiration...
reproduction of the book "Whale Rider", while according to the author WitiIhimaera, this book is the one "that the Māori community accepts best, and a...
Dickson George Henare Lloyd Jones Teddy Tahu Rhodes 2009 Lyonel Grant WitiIhimaera Chris Knox Richard Nunns Anne Noble 2010 Stuart Devenie Michael Parmenter...
Dickson George Henare Lloyd Jones Teddy Tahu Rhodes 2009 Lyonel Grant WitiIhimaera Chris Knox Richard Nunns Anne Noble 2010 Stuart Devenie Michael Parmenter...
Dickson George Henare Lloyd Jones Teddy Tahu Rhodes 2009 Lyonel Grant WitiIhimaera Chris Knox Richard Nunns Anne Noble 2010 Stuart Devenie Michael Parmenter...
Dickson George Henare Lloyd Jones Teddy Tahu Rhodes 2009 Lyonel Grant WitiIhimaera Chris Knox Richard Nunns Anne Noble 2010 Stuart Devenie Michael Parmenter...
taniwha rau (Waikato of a hundred chiefs) (Mead & Groves 2001:421). WitiIhimaera, author of The Whale Rider, says that he has a female kaitiaki (guardian)...
modernist literature written by Anglophone authors such as the Māori writer WitiIhimaera, whose characters express a desire to engage with and absorb the best...
significant New Zealand authors such as Barry Crump, Janet Frame and WitiIhimaera. The Reed firm was founded in Dunedin, New Zealand, in 1907 by Alfred...
portal New Zealand portal Oceania portal Jonah Whale Rider, a book (by WitiIhimaera) and film inspired in part by the story of Paikea and Ruatapu. "The...
released the song Parihaka about the incident. In 2011, New Zealand author WitiIhimaera published a novel called The Parihaka Woman which provides a fictional...
"Literature as resistance in the Maori Renaissance: Patricia Grace, WitiIhimaera, Alan Duff". Anglistik: Journal of International English Studies. 20...
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