Ngā Pukapuka/Books

WORDS: Anna Knox

The Edwin Fox: How an ordinary Sailing Ship Connected the World in the Age of Globalization 1850-1914

Boyd Cothran and Adrian Shubert

$42.25 HB, $31.16 eBook(University of South Carolina Press)

The Edwin Fox is the oldest surviving merchant sailing vessel in the world. After decades travelling the globe transporting cargo, indentured labourers, immigrants and convicts, then being used to store coal and frozen meat, it is now drydocked in Picton, just past the playground.

Maritime heritage enthusiasts and particularly the Edwin Fox Society which bought the ship for one shilling in 1965, have memorialised the vessel through preservation and in the quirky museum built around it, but it took a pair of US academics (and their funds) to compile a thorough account not only of the ship but also of the era of globalisation it chartered.

From its novelistic opening pages, the book is a compelling read. Full of interesting biographies and dense with facts and figures, it nonetheless retains a conversational style; the authors are invested emotionally, as well as academically, with a deep respect and enthusiasm for their subject matter and the human stories that bear it through time. They marvel at the capacity of humans to build, trade, travel and expand, while also weighing the devastating cost of this insatiable drive to all the forms of life that make it possible.

At times, however, this cultural critique can feel like box-ticking. The handful of references to women might reflect the official record but it doesn’t reflect the historical reality, and the accounts of indigenous peoples often read like an afterthought. Te Tiriti is not mentioned, even in comprehensive passages covering 1840, and the terms ‘pakehas’ and ‘the Māori iwi’ are telling. A casual dismissal of local histories and the suggestion that analysis of US colonial history “applies equally well to Aotearoa New Zealand” represents a new type of globalisation. https://uncpress.org/book/9781469676555/ the-edwin-fox

Architectural Conservation in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands: National Experiences and Practice

John Stubbs, William Chapman, Julia Gatley, Ross King

$141.60 HB, $120.80 eBook (Routledge)

An academic text that doesn’t pretend to be otherwise, Routledge’s Architectural Conservation is required reading for anyone involved in heritage conservation. But it’s also a highly readable and

comprehensive overview of the field; foundational reading for anyone interested in why and how we try to preserve heritage in the Pacific (including globally groundbreaking approaches), and how this might be done better.

The book is part of a global series that documents architectural heritage preservation throughout the world. Covering Australia, New Zealand, Hawai’i, Micronesia, Melanesia, South Pacific Polynesia and the polar regions, the research and analysis take in both the big picture and its localised details. Experts share experiences, knowledge, laws and practices specific to their locales, revealing, in particular, how “the architectural conservation ethos that has developed in Australia and Aotearoa has been a significant development in global heritage management”.

Several Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga staff are contributors, and the history and values of the organisation are well relayed. A highlight is the section by Ellen Anderson, Kaiwhakahaere Tautiaki Taonga me Kāupapa Māori, on the conservation of Māori architecture, in which she gives elegant context to the trend examined throughout the book “toward increasing validation of the intangible origins or cultural value” that is being “led from the Pacific”.

“It is impossible to consider Māori architecture without considering the way that whare are an encapsulation of the entire history of the world, and of all the ancestors before us,” she explains.

Te Ata o Tū, The Shadow of Tūmatauenga: The New Zealand Wars Collections of Te Papa

Matiu Baker, Katie Cooper, Michael Fitzgerald and Rebecca Rice

$70 HB (Te Papa Press)

Reading this multi-authored volume, which spotlights items from Te Papa’s collection relating to the New Zealand Wars, is not unlike a slow and considered walk through a museum, only with more time to learn the stories and connect to the whakapapa of the taonga on display.

The introduction explains the collaborative nature of the project – welcoming “alternative perspectives offered by iwi, hapū and whānau” – that is visible at every level, including a range of essays by contributing scholars and writers. (A highlight is Monty Soutar’s examination via Māori newspapers from the 1840s to the 1930s of the changing meaning of the word ‘kūpapa’.)

Artworks, maps, photographs, books, flags, weapons, medals and many other taonga are the starting points from which the stories of leading figures and rangatira, including Te Kooti, Te Rauparaha, Gustavus von Tempsky and Colonel James Alexander, as well as the histories of the wars themselves, unfold.

The brass-inlaid rosewood writing slope belonging to Te Āti Awa leader, peacemaker and politician Wī Tako becomes a touchpoint for the tale of his political prowess. Surveyors’ instruments from the early 1900s prompt a reflection on concepts of land ownership and property rights.

A watercolour portrait of Te Whāiti recalls his residing in France before living with the Wakefield family in London, while the taking of Rangiriri Pā is brought to life through sketches, engravings, paintings and photographs. In one, the gaze of Tioriori – the Waikato rangatira taken prisoner after having rescued his mortal enemy, Captain Henry Mercer – stares out hauntingly.

“Spoils of war” from that assault, including a hei tiki and waka huia, while now “dislocated from their people and from their kōrero” nonetheless continue to bear witness to the events.

Every one of these many taonga and their stories is a reminder of how, in their relationships with people, objects accumulate meaning and stories garner mana and tapu, and thereby value, over time.

Other titles of interest

Unsettled: Small Stories of Colonisation

Richard Shaw$39.95 (Massey University Press)

This book wrestles with Pākehā settler stories and what they mean now.

Hard by the Cloud House

Peter Walker$39.95 (Massey University Press)

A heady mix of history, memoir, science and mythology in which the author uncovers the story of Te Hōkioi, the extinct giant eagle of New Zealand.

Kiss of Death

Stephen Tester$34.99 (Heritage Press)

Wellington’s only female lawyer weathers the influenza pandemic, misogyny, homophobia and a murder trial in 1918.

The Plough, the Chalice and the Sword

Hugh McBain$95 (Langton@xtra.co.nz)

An illustrated account of the Williams family in New Zealand since 1823.

Traditional Lifeways of the Southern Māori

James Herries Beattie. Edited by Atholl Anderson.$60 (Otago University Press)

A new edition of the 1994 classic based on a major field project Beattie conducted in 1920.

Why Memory Matters: ‘Remembered Histories’ and the Politics of the Shared Past

Rowan Light$17.99 / $4.99 eBook (BWB)

Why are certain aspects of the past remembered over others, and why does this matter? A case-based examination.

The University of Canterbury 1873–2023

John Wilson$69.99 HB (Canterbury University Press)

A comprehensive account of the university’s development by a UC alumnus.

Aiming High: The Story of Byron Brown and his Granddaughter Mary-Annette

Di Buchan$45 (Mary Egan Publishing)

A biography of Byron Brown and his granddaughter Mary-Annette – Queen of Wool for the New Zealand Wool Board – and the beach community of Ōtaki.

Turbulent Threads

Karen McMillan$37.99 (Quentin Wilson Publishing)

An historical saga set in Larnach Castle in the 1890s, a decade that proved transformative for women’s progress.