Poets for Princess Ashika: Love, Loss and the Sea

Paekakariki fundraiser for the victims of the Princess Ashika Ferry Disaster in Tonga

Featuring: Glenn Colquhoun, Karlo Mila, Apirana Taylor, David Geary and the Paekakariki School Kapa Haka group.

2pm Saturday, 5 September

Paekakariki Memorial Hall, The Parade (next to Campbell Park)

Koha entry

Karlo Mila
Born in Rotorua, Karlo is of Tongan, Palagi and Samoan descent. Mila was educated at Massey University and has worked as a trade union organiser, teacher and health research manager.Her first collection of poetry, Dream Fish Floating (Huia, 2005), won the NZSA Jessie Mackay Award for Best First Book of Poetry at the 2006 Montana New Zealand Book Awards. Mila says that her poetry is both personal and political, reflecting ‘issues of the Pacific diaspora and navigating the tensions between traditional cultures and urban Aotearoa-Pacific realities.’

Apirana Taylor
Apirana of Te Whanau-a-Apanui, Ngati Porou and Taranaki descent, has published several collections of poetry, short stories and novels. He has also published prolifically in other mediums including sound and video recordings. He writes for children and theatre, and is involved in acting, and teaching drama. Taylor’s first collection of poetry, Eyes of the Ruru, established his powerful voice among Maori writers and his prose, written predominantly in realist modes, firmly established his literary presence. He was Massey University’s writer-in-residence in 1996 and writer-in-residence at Canterbury University in 2003.

Glenn Colquhoun
Glenn is a doctor, poet and children’s writer. His first collection of poetry, The Art of Walking Upright (1999), is about the Northland community of Te Tii in the Bay of Islands, a village the author has long had a close association with. His first poetry collection, The Art of Walking Upright, won Best First Book of Poetry at the 2000 Montana New Zealand Book Awards. In 2003 he won the Poetry Category and also became the first poet to be awarded the coveted Montana Readers’ Choice Award. He has written several children’s books and has been the convener of the New Zealand Post Book Awards. In 2004, Colquhoun was the recipient of the Prize in Modern Letters.

David Geary
David is a playwright and fiction writer. David’s plays have been widely performed and he has received several awards for his work. He has had poems published, and a full collection of his short stories appeared in 2003. His plays are described as being ‘characterised by their physicality, their mordant humour and their critique of entrenched Kiwi mythologies’. David Geary was the Victoria University Creative New Zealand writer-in-residence in 2008.