Koha - Hone Tuwhare

They had a good library at the railway workshops and so I discovered a new world.

– Hone Tuwhare on early inspiration

Anger? That’s another thing. If they just poke around with it [Mother Earth] without even sort of thinking about it ... raping her. For Christ’s sake [yes] that’s anger you know!

– Tuwhare on the proposed Aramoana smelter

It’s a kind of a soul thing thing with us [Māori] as you know ... Mother Earth: it’s somebody, it’s real, it’s not some inanimate being or thing you know. A lot of my poems are about nature ... landscapes ... it’s that feeling: it’s a living thing. That’s all I can say about that. Mother Earth: it’s the beginning of all of us and we’ll end up back there too you know ... she’ll embrace us again.

– Tuwhare, on his connection with the land