Modern Pakeha Fiction about the Maori

Abstract

Perhaps naturally, in view of the colonial wars and complex legal wrangling, the Maori has always had an especial focus in New Zealand fiction, more so than the Red Indian in the literature penned in North America, or the Australian Aborigine in the fiction of this continent. Thus soon after the appearance of the first novels, which are really pioneer memoirs thinly disguised, the Maori appeared in so many books about New Zealand if only to capture the interest of readers in England. As the pioneering historian of fiction, E.M. Smith, observed in 1939 of the 19th century works, "There was little attempt to describe anything beyond the warfare, the hakas, a Maori meeting, their dress and methods of cooking. The only personal characteristic attributed to a Maori was fierceness or courtesy. The Maori Wars ... were dealt with only sketchily." Thus the anonymous 'Emily Bathurst', or At Home and Abroad (1847) refers obliquely to Hone Heki (p. 162), Kawiti's pah (p. 163) while it really concentrates on the good work of the missions in New Zealand: without, however, discussing adequately those to be ministered to George H. Wilson's 'Ena', or the Ancient Maori does have Maori characters, but they could have been natives from anywhere, were it not for their names.