'E Manu, Tena koe!’ – O Bird, Greetings to you 1

Turnbull Library Record, Volume 34, 1 January 2001, Page 45

Jane Mcßae

'E Manu, Tena koe!’ - O Bird, Greetings to you 1

the oral tradition in Maori-language newspapers

In a letter published in the newspaper Te Wananga in 1876, headed ‘To Henare Tomoana’ (the proprietor), Tiopira Hukiki began: ‘E hoa, tena koe, ara koutou katoa i roto i te aroha o to tatou Ariki o Ihu. Ka huri’ (Friend, greetings to you, that is to all of you, in the love of our Lord, Jesus. I conclude). 2 That short statement encapsulates a history of the transition of Maori oral tradition to print. The greeting is very brief but evidently after the fashion of ceremonial speeches. It was adapted, in handwriting, to the letter form for printing in a newspaper published by Maori. It took novel licence with the form of traditional greetings and named a god delivered by Christian missionaries. As an artefact, it was the consequence of the arrival of Pakeha (Europeans) in New Zealand, their introduction of writing and print and interaction with Maori.

Newspapers in Maori were published in New Zealand from the 1840 sto the 1930 sby the government, the church, and individuals. They were a means to advance political and religious convictions but they also reported local, national and international news, and invited opinion. During that unusual time —there have been no like papers because of colonisation’s diminution of Maori language and culture —Maori contributed to them all, and published their own. Accustomed to an oral tradition of Polynesian origin but recreated in their own language during some thousand years in Aotearoa, they acquired the art of writing from Pakeha in the early 1800 s. My article concerns the printed legacy of that oral tradition, in particular the ancient, poetic

modes of expression which Maori used in writing for the newspapers, the ways in which they combined oral and written usage, and the effects of literacy on their writing and thinking.

Writing by Maori for the newspapers reveals the oral style in which they were versed and a capacity and inventiveness in composition which the pen, the times and printed publication required. In particular, the poetic mannerisms of the oral tradition, in which rhetoric and metaphor prevailed, are remarkable —and often puzzling. We may not think to go to newspapers in search of poetry but these otherwise prosaic, informative pages are indeed rich testimony to the high talk of Maori oral tradition. They contain some examples of what we can suppose are near facsimile texts of ancient times but their historical interest also lies in capturing modifications wrought by literacy. There are versions of old texts in strikingly new settings, literary genres embellished with oral conventions, and incorporation of knowledge revealed by Pakeha. The papers therefore exemplify how Maori used literacy and became acquainted with publishing; they represent their first writing for the public domain and their first experience as publishers. A long record of Maori intellectual engagement in print, they offer insight for scholarship on the shift from an oral to literate mentality. 4 How Maori thought about the extraordinary, often contentious, matters of the day, was in part a consequence of their literacy, because they were informed by what they read and, as they wrote, they learnt to arrange and describe observations and arguments in different ways.

Interest in Maori language, oral tradition and literacy is thus well served by the newspapers. But they are also witness to an aspect of New Zealand history that I will refer to tangentially, and that is informal exchanges between Maori and Pakeha. These play a smaller part in published histories of those years because grand fights attract more attention (and the newspapers are not without reports of those), but while they went on so did ordinary conversations. The papers document some of that dialogue, in letters between contributors, reports of speeches in meetings and, indirectly, in the use of Maori and European traditions. The interchange of two means, styles and cultures of composition offers a perhaps idealised, yet hopeful trope of successful human communication —or at least the endeavour to achieve it. The ease with which Maori amalgamated the oral and the written, and with which Pakeha employed Maori erudition and figures of speech, attests a regard for each other’s discourse. No doubt at times that borrowing was tactical or contrived. The papers were after all highly engaged politically and writers opinionated. But on occasion when Maori and Pakeha use each other’s poetry and thinking, we read something courteous, appreciative of difference, suggestive of a possible rapport.

Maori wrote for all the newspapers and used all genres—editorials, letters, articles, obituaries, reports of meetings and events, advertisements, notices. Occasionally they offered complete texts of the primary genres of their oral repertoire—genealogies, sayings, songs, incantations, and narratives —although it

was more common for these to appear as fragments, modified to suit the subject matter or norms of the newspaper. 5 Contest with British colonial government and missionaries prompted words but so did approval of them. Maori wrote about personal, tribal, national, and philosophical matters.

From what we know of Maori society in the time of the oral tradition, that is, as we understand it from manuscripts Maori wrote in the 19th century, early eyewitness accounts by Pakeha, and contemporary practice, 6 it is evident that having a say publicly on topics of all kinds was of great importance, and that rhetoric and poetry were normal in that talk. The chiefly orator, the participant in a debate about going to war or choosing a leader, the singer of songs of grief or love or accusation or prediction, the narrator of travels or tribal history or singular events, all took part in an active, verbal reporting which might be considered similar to that of a newspaper. This is perhaps why Maori readily and ably participated in the modem and much larger paper fomm. As editors, correspondents and journalists, they were purposeful and expected practical consequences from their impassioned, metaphorical talk in print. 7 When they took up the forms and protocols of writing for newspapers, however, Maori brought to them the precedents and observances of performance and their oral arts, and, implicitly, sometimes explicitly, the philosophy that underpinned them. Their poetic language therefore found a place in the papers and Pakeha were attracted to use of it. One illustration of this conjunction of the oral and the written, the poetic and philosophical, and literary exchanges between Maori and Pakeha, is the bird of my title.

Several newspapers took bird names. Two picturesque and related titles manifest the rhetorical shaft of some naming. The independent Maori King movement’s paper was a mythical bird with a piercing cry, an omen of war— Te hokioi e rere atu na (1862-63) or ‘The warbird in flight to you’. The paper opposing the movement, edited by the Pakeha John Gorst and supported by the government, was as provocative with its biblical allusion and seeming innocence of a solitary bird’s chirping— Te pihoihoi mokemoke i runga i te tuanui (1863) or ‘The sparrow alone on the roof. 8

Other titles were, superficially, benign. Te Korimako (1882-88) and Te Kopara (1913-21) chose the bellbird as title. Maori admired its song. Its chorus at dawn announced the light of day that, in their thinking and poetry, represented life and success. It was therefore a fitting image for early reports and news, and put the papers in a good light. In the first issue of Te Korimako, the editor, Charles Davis, and proprietor, an American philanthropist, W. P. Snow, embarked on their printed tuition of Maori in Christian and European beliefs and behaviour. In the editorial, addressed ‘To the Maori people of Aotearoa’, they chose their words wisely, asking readers to teach and feed the bird so that it could speak out and help them succeed in \.. the advancement of this island; the dethronement of evil, and the ascendancy of good’ (to use their English translation as illustration of the intent). 9 There was a mihi or formal greeting to the bird. It was encouraged on its flight throughout the land

bearing the message of God’s mercy; it was reminded of the demise of the other birds, Te hokioi and Te pihoihoi, and urged not to let troublesome dissenters ruffle its feathers but to continue with its message, for its more important task was to show the way to righteousness. 10 It was the bellbird which high chiefs were said to have imitated when they gave orders to their slaves at dawn, 11 and in hindsight there is an ironic parallel in the commanding, homiletic writing of the evangelical proprietors and editors of the papers named for it.

The Maori minister-editors of the Church of England papers also had traditional imagery in mind and at heart —such words being invested with great emotion —when they sought a new name for their paper He kupu whakamarama (1898) (‘Words of enlightenment’). Bird names were offered in the published discussion of the choice; 12 one man, influenced by the book, posed that such a name would be fitting because birds had important roles in the Bible. 1 3 It became, however, TePipiwharauroa (1899-1913;seeF igure 1) or ‘ The shining cuckoo ’, a bird that in the oral poetry could signify summer, planting and prosperity, and another winged messenger awakening readers to the advantages of Christianity and European custom. When its successor, Te Kopara, was launched, the editor, Wi Paraire Rangihau, acknowledged the long flight of the Pipiwharauroa, attributed its demise to ‘hunger’ (or insufficient subscriptions, a reason for the failure of several papers), and let the new bird speak for itself: ‘. .. ko ahau tenei, ko Te Kopara .. . mete hiahia ano kite kawe korero ki nga wahi katoa’ (I am the one, Te Kopara ,... who now wishes to carry news to all places). 14 Impressed by the sweet song of the bellbird and shining cuckoo, Maori used them to symbolise the skills of orators, composers and singers, who were also referred to proverbially as manu korero (talking birds). The newspapers’ ‘song’ or printed word, the writers’ ‘chorus’ or texts, could be compared similarly.

The bird names, which were chosen by Maori and Pakeha, prompted Maori to habitual responses, to the phraseology and sentiments of the oral world and mentality. As many were to do (even in papers with different titles), Tutua Te Ngakau of Kawhia, writing to the editor of Te Korimako preferred the address, ‘E manu, tena koe!’ (O bird, greetings to you!) to ‘Dear Sir’. 15 Captivated by the range of a newspaper’s circulation and information, Maori writers often described it as the bird’s far-distant flight for gathering and delivery of news. Perhaps this helped to envisage the community of readers which was far greater than a tribal audience. Davis, in Te Korimako , had anticipated this metaphor, perhaps enjoyed it himself, when in the first issue he extended the title to Ko te korimako rere haere (‘The bellbird which travels about’) although he did not use it in the English translation. 16 Maori replied to it. Rewiri Paru of Te Wairoa, opened his letter with this tribute to the paper: ‘Tena koe! Te manu kaha kite hari mai i nga korero ote ao nei, e Kori, mau e kawe atu taku korero ki nga pito e wha o te motu nei’ (Greetings to you! The bird who is able to bring to me news of the world, O Kori, take my message to the four comers of this land). 17 T. Erueti Manihera, from Gisborne, wishing to receive

the paper, wrote: ‘Te manu tuatahi nana nei i rere haere te motu nei, rauna noa ona kokonga me ona kurae, e manu, tenei ano au te manukanuka nei ki ou taunga mai ki toku marae’ (The first bird to fly across this land, around all its comers and headlands, O bird, I am anxious that you land at my home ground). He offered sweet-scented seeds ‘nga puakakara hei taki mai mou kia rere mai ki toku marae’ (to entice you to fly to my home ground) and signed off as its ‘whaiaipo’ or sweetheart. 18

In later issues the editor and writers put the bird to work in various ways; for example, to encourage subscriptions or proper behaviour. 14 It stimulated some fine compositions in the oral style, with its characteristically concise, formulaic, highly allusive, often cryptic language. Such was the acknowledgement of Te Korimako by Te Rutene Ahunuku of Gisborne. He began by declaring his people’s delight at the bird’s appearance with news of the world, noting also that they would call it a kopara. By use of whakatauki (traditional sayings) he alluded to the kopara as herald of dawn, to the likening of fine speakers to this bird, to its very ancient role in ritual and its origin in the storied Polynesian homeland of Hawaiki. He concluded, to great effect, with timehonoured, rhythmical expressions which are still heard today, and which revealed his opinion of the value of the paper, of the light it would bring: \ .. takiri te ata,

korihi te manu, tino awatea, tino awatea’ (... morning dawns, birds chorus, it is the very light of day, the very light of day). 20 In Te Pipiwharauroa the Maori editor solicited and acknowledged donations and subscriptions diplomatically by use of the oblique subtitle: ‘Supplejack berries for our bird’; he sent greetings from the bird’s new nest or location and advised the benefits of it being invited to marae or tribal centres.' 1 He cited the shining cuckoo’s call —rendered as ‘Kui, kui. Whiti, whiti, ora’ (No food, no food. It changes, it changes, there’s life), signal of summer’s plenty after the scarcity of winter—to conclude editorials and articles.' 2 Te Kakatarau of Hine-ki-Waiapu, began his letter, which reported on events in his East Coast locality, by greeting the bird and asking it to broadcast his few words to other marae , and finished off with: ‘Kati nei, e Te Pipi, nga korero mo tenei tuhinga atu. Kia ora koe, me o matua. Kia kaha to tangi, kiau, kiamarama, hei whakaoho, hei arahi, hei tohutohu i te iwi Maori. Heoi, kahuri’ (Enough now, Te Pipi, of words in this letter to you. Bless you and your elders. Let your cry be strong, resolute, and clear, to rouse, guide and advise the Maori people. And so, I conclude). 23

The bird could be found indirectly too. Huia tangata kotahi (1893-95; see Figure 2), a paper of the Kotahitanga or Maori Parliament movement, promoted its cause in the title, ‘Unify the people’. But there was play on the word huia (meaning ‘unite’), for it also refers to a bird (. Heteralocha acutirostris ) prized for its precious feathers, which were drawn on the masthead. In the first issue, not missing the chance for metaphors, the editor, Ihaia Flutana, asked readers to call the manuhiri or guest to stop off at their marae and to load the bird with knowledge for it to ‘carry to the four winds, from one end of the world right around to the other’.' 4 Replies echoed him: Hutu Te Hiaro of Ngawapurua, expressed his gratitude for the guest who came to their marae; instructions were given to the bird, such as ‘lt is for you, O bird, to carry these words to the two islands’, and promises made to send it berries. 27

It was also a bird to show the way. One article, referring to wisdom received from the ancestors concerning signals which birds on land and at sea give humans, compared this with other knowledge of birds by reference to the biblical dove which brought the olive branch to Noah in the ark to signal the abating of the floodwaters. 26 But the bird’s primary metaphoric resonance was political, in the chorus of protest about government and call for unity. An editorial reporting on Bills presented to the Maori parliament concluded by reminding readers that their bird called attention to the decision they themselves had to make as to whether or not to give allegiance to Maori unified under the Treaty of Waitangi. 27 Writers supported that unity by reiterating the instruction to the bird to ‘E tangi i to tangi, “Huia! Huia! Huia kia kotahi!’” (Sing your song, ‘Gather, gather, gather together as one’).' 8

The image of the bird appears on numerous occasions in the newspapers. It is engaging because it is charming, because it shows the generative possibilities of the oral tradition in answer to another medium and other knowledge, and because it is

a small exemplar of how Maori and Pakeha brought their traditions together in print. In addition it preserves, often opaquely, the thinking in which these references were grounded, that is, Maori metaphysics and cosmology. When Maori introduced such personification and figurative reference into the newspapers, they put on record in print words memorised from their oral practice. But the graphic image could not capture ideas and understanding hidden at the root of the traditional learning. Printed words also depend for meaning on unmarked signification; the oral record as it appears in 19th and early 20th century Maorilanguage journalism depends for its meaning on the shared experience of the culture, on what Walter Ong describes as ‘the cultural institutions in which utterance was deeply embedded’. 29 If we follow the bird back into the oral tradition, we will discover that Maori were thinking differently about this motif from the Pakeha editors, or our sense now of its efficacy as a symbol. A comparison between a bird’s flight and song and a newspaper’s circulation and printed chorus would have been widely understood. But there were also other associations for Maori. What the newspapers made of the bird is, partially at least, mirrored and explained in what we know of Maori thinking about the world.

For 19th century Maori a newspaper must have recalled the messenger bird in the oral compositions. As the many extant letters of the time testify, Maori greatly enjoyed the ability to communicate with those at a distance. But in a sense they had had that experience in the past —imagined or actual depending on your point of view—as the oral texts record. 30 In songs and narratives birds relayed messages, warned, predicted, spoke to characters. Leaving aside that some were trained to

speak, it was sensible to Maori that birds could convey messages on behalf of and to humans because they are distant kin, having a common ancestor in the god named Tane. Birds were therefore also believed to be in contact with the other world (hence the Christian newspaper birds were fitting). Their manifestation or song could foreshadow an event, rather as newspapers anticipate; spirits of the dead went as birds to visit descendants; birds were used in rituals to communicate with spirits. Indeed birds were very valuable to Maori, not only for the religious but also practically, because the feathers of some became cloaks and some were eaten. 31 The newspapers were possibly viewed similarly, as both exotic and mundane.

The bird shared place in the newspapers with many such symbols. One not unlike it, in signifying a paper’s long-distance carriage of a freight of knowledge, was the waka or canoe. There was a long, multi vocal association in the word, the ‘traditional referentiality’ 2 of the oral arts. It was evocative of the ancestral vessels that came from Hawaiki, of each tribe’s genealogical line from their famed canoe, of varied imagery in poetry, and of function in everyday life. Papers were given titles (by Maori and Pakeha) such as Te waka o te iwi (‘The tribes’ canoe’) (1857), and Te waka Maori o Niu Tirani(\B7 1 -79) (‘The Maori canoe of New Zealand’). In Te Wananga (1874-78) the canoe symbolised cultural and political aims. The leading article in the first issue, inviting all to participate in this wananga or learned forum, greeted tribes by canoe: ‘Greetings to you, Tainui, greetings to you, Te Arawa, greetings, Kurahaupo...’ and so on. 33 This enlisted replies in the same vein, some with topical comment. Pehimana Horua of Waipapa, spoke of loading his message on board to convey to others, but saw water (chiefs and government) investing the canoe, and asked if the editor had a bailer to use so it would not overturn —the appeal of the metaphor did not deter the editor from replying that he should do the bailing himself. 34

The bird and canoe motifs and other conventional, poetic usage, may have helped Maori feel part of the newspaper community, especially in view of the didacticism of clerical, government or philanthropic editors. As Raymond Tallis has noted, metaphor is ‘a way of poetically discovering in or imposing upon the variety of the world a greater oneness’, like recurrent features such as motifs in literature that assert ‘that things have not changed, despite the changes that have taken place’. 3 " Maori voices are strong and vibrant in the papers, confirming, in the unusual variety of the times, their wish to participate in the emerging government and also to maintain their way of life. 36 Their identity was given one voice in the repetitive, often highly predictable, poetic language—couched in customary vocabulary, formulae, and genres—that they passed over to print. Such language represents the mental world of an oral society that, in relation to time and the past, as Tzvetan Todorov puts it, ‘favors the cyclical over linear, repetition over difference, ritual over improvisation’ and that transposes new events into the ‘familiar mental schema’ to make them intelligible. 37 The newspapers, however, epitomise Maori development beyond the

oral mindset. Intensive reading 3 * of their oral texts and subtle rewording of the predominantly set expressions and patterns of the highly structured compositional style, were not only at work there.

Oral and literate usage and thinking combine in the newspapers, and chart how Maori actively and selectively brought two traditions together. Songs, sayings, genealogical discourse, historical and fabulous narratives, and incantations were the stock genres for Maori but journalism, with its European literate conventions, enjoined them to rework those and use others. Their writing, and that by Pakeha which incorporated what they had heard and read in Maori, therefore exhibits an exchange between rather than a replacement of traditions; a mix of conservatism, experimentation, curiosity and idiosyncrasy. This is demonstrable in the creative employment of the genres of oral and written discourse, which was original, resourceful, and a potent combination of the religious and secular.

Maori had no letter form in the oral tradition. In the newspapers correspondents emulated English letters—as quickly no doubt as we have the casual, abbreviated email letter —some exactly, others by skillful adaptation. A writer who began with the protocol of address of the pen, such as ‘Dear Sir’ or ‘To the Editor’, might follow with the voice and mihi which preface speeches, pick up the pen’s style for a plainlyworded message, and conclude by return to the ceremonial order of the voice, quoting part or all of a waiata or poetic song such as is sung to round off a speech. 39 Issues of Te Wananga offer many examples. Writers were as conservative as they were inventive. In paying homage to the new paper, one writer, not wishing to forego the oral etiquette, would reply to the host (tangata whenua) editor as a guest (manuhiri ) reader, quoting a dramatic tauparapara (chant to draw attention to the speaker) and choosing only traditional phrasing to acknowledge the invitation to take part in printed reporting, but another would try something surprising, such as this acclamation of the paper’s arrival, ‘E hoa, tena koe. Kua tae mai to whakatu ki a matou, kua whanau koe, he tane’ (Friend, greetings. Your notice has reached us that you have given birth and it’s a boy). 40 While the rituals of some letters emulated speeches on the marae, so did the content as writers engaged in vigorous debates by pen. 41 And newspaper reporting was not without interest in sensation through appeal to personal letters. In the government’s Maori messenger/Ko te karereMaori (184954), surely published advisedly, an article about a man executed for murder includes letters he addressed to his sister and friends at home, expressing heartfelt grief and contrition and citing waiata tangi or laments. 42

Other striking examples of the merging and juxtaposition of oral and written manners are to be seen in obituaries and death notices. Maori had no equivalent to a biography though, when notifying deaths of prominent people or family, they compiled relevant details to fit that format but for their own consolation provided seemly embellishments. 43 Genealogy and tribal affiliations might be added or classical forms of oratory, such as farewells (poroporoaki ) or the deceased’s last

statement ( ohaki ) to the family, and (as in letters) it was common to sign off with the ornament of a song. Karepa Karei’s long tribute to his wife repeated her last words of farewell, instruction to the family and profession of faith, and quoted a waiata tangi. That it was a public avowal of grief is conveyed in his remark, ‘Katahi nei ka tukua kia taia kite perehi, hei titiro ma tera ma tera’ (And so I have sent this for printing on the press for each person to see). 44 Repeated references in this obituary to the Christian faith make it unsurprising that it was published in the Wesleyan Church’s Te Haeata\ the newspapers bore the persuasions of their publishers. Hoani Nahe of Hauraki, writing in the Maori-run Te Wananga of the death of a promising chief, Mohi Mangakahia, emphasised his tribal and genealogical connections and potential as a politician but also reported his farewells (which, too, stressed his commitment to Christianity) and songs to the people. 4 '

Waiata, so prolific in the oral tradition, were printed for events at which they would have or had been sung. A report on the celebrations for Queen Victoria’s 30th birthday, published in the Maori messenger/Ko te karere Maori , gave the texts of the traditional karanga (ceremonial call) which welcomed Sir George and Lady Grey and the kdtaratara (celebratory song to accompany a dance) composed for the event. 46 Songs of protest about land were printed from meetings between tribes and government, and from individuals. 47 Pakeha also appealed to waiata to endorse or embellish their writing. Te Haeata (‘Light of dawn’) referred to the light of God but the editor in the inaugural issue (which was rich with quotation from Maori tradition) admitted its origin, when he quoted formulaic song lines in which ‘te haeata’ appears. 48

In common with other church newspapers and, to a lesser extent, those of government, Te Haeata made good use of the oral tradition to lend weight to argument, exemplify, and persuade by the consensus of Maori tradition. Waiata and whakatauki served to explain the decline in the Maori population, lament engagement in war and, astutely, remind that subscriptions were due. 44 This is not surprising given the similarities in their two traditions: the Bible was as poetic, mystic, allusive, easily memorised. Allegories and mythological narratives starred in giving advice to Maori: Ko te karere o Nui Tireni created a conversation between ‘Star’ and ‘Cloud’ to explain natural phenomena and question the aetiological Maori account of Rona and the moon, and the better value of European education was advocated by contrast with the curious tales about the culture heroes Maui and Tawhaki. 50 Primly and harshly didactic as that kind of reference appears to us now, the newspapers are nonetheless witness to Pakeha editors’ and contributors’ close acquaintance with Maori language and oral tradition, of which we might be envious now. The borrowing was of course mutual. Maori quoted frequently from the Bible, referred to Christian teachings in waiata and, as I noted at the start, in ritual greetings, alluded to European knowledge, quoted from Shakespeare. 51

These diverse examples of oral and literate custom in the newspapers are a very small sample from a very large corpus. However (taking into account that some

writing was entirely prosaic and some solely in the oral style), the papers illustrate that the writing by Maori was very often—in content, style and language—at once ancient in its evident oral heritage, modem in its adoption of the domain of print, and creative in self-conscious modification of both media. Custom, pride, respect for the past, pleasure in the cadence of familiar poetic phrasing, and recognition of its salient wisdom ensured that Maori writers kept their tradition alive, but it was also changed by the new circumstances of its use, by the transaction between the two media. In respect of the history of print, changes to Maori thinking and use of the oral tradition might be tentatively proposed (recognising that many other factors contributed to such changes) on the basis of these examples and an overview of the newspapers.

It is clear that Maori quickly adopted the journalist’s style. To borrow Egbert Bakker’s contention, they became interested in the literate preoccupation with manipulation of new information rather than (as he puts it) of writers in archaic Greece, ‘anticipation of the reactivation/re-enactment of what is “known”... [which is] the quintessence of verbal experience in an oral society’. 52 In this view, the repetitions of Maori oral tradition (which were never simply verbatim, and seldom simple) would gradually give place, in the face of print, to investigative, critical, cumulative reporting. As readers in the 21 st century we notice the special nature of Maori oral tradition in the newspapers because it is poetic and romantic, but it is already in modified form and very often substantially truncated. Across the years of the newspapers, and especially after the turn of the century, Bakker’s distinction seems to me apparent in writing by Maori —they incorporated less of the manners and matter of traditional speech and were less rhetorical. Or rather, perhaps, they combined the oral and written in a more sophisticated, selective way, for they did not abandon the oral. 55 New information and plain reporting predominated for good reason, however. Newspapers were about the usual and unusual, but they sought to appeal by the new. Editors turned down writing which was unclear; 54 cryptic referents to a tribal tradition limited the chance of making a point widely understood (and thereby gaining sympathy); writing had to be explicit for a paper’s many readers.

The shift to interest in information is also apparent because the newspapers witness the integration of European knowledge into the oral testimony. Before the newspaper literature, Maori had experienced reading print, principally in the Bible. When they came to be authors and publishers they drew on their reading, and the papers record how they manipulated it in their writing. The ancestral tribal inheritance had been the sole foundation on which oratory, compositions and talk were based. The new literature and ideas—including the newspaper content in which Maori and Pakeha sometimes deliberately put the traditional knowledge up to questioning and comparison—provided counterpoint and enrichment.

Finally, as letters in particular suggest, it seems that further analysis of the newspapers would support the thesis that literacy develops a new sense of the self

in relation to the world: a stronger individual identity, which also alters how one thinks about, describes and lives life. 5 " The papers had a national circulation, though some had a regional base and primarily local readers. Maori contributed to the papers as individuals and sometimes as a tribal group, but they did not limit their comment to tribal matters even if their life emphasised them. Print (among other European innovations) also increased the possibility of earning a status that went beyond what was traditionally due by virtue of lineage or (less frequently) extraordinary achievement. In addition, the newspapers opened up and served new and larger communities: Maori with Pakeha as one people nationally or, at least philosophically, in international association with other peoples. Some Maori used the papers to argue a political and cultural autonomy against colonisation, others to support it. However, I suspect the press had a wider impact as a tool of communication, not one that replaced the marae and kin group, but one that irretrievably expanded the horizons of individual thought and self-awareness.

A reading of the mix of oral and literate conventions in Maori writing for newspapers is rich with suggestion for a history of Maori literacy and mentality. It supports some of the current views about the development of literacy 6 and it reveals new material and insights. But it also serves us more personally. Energetic, considered and pragmatic in this use of print, Maori ensured retention of some of their oral poetry and cultural philosophy in the silent, paper bird, leaving us a fascinating record, covering almost 100 years, of how they responded to and developed their use of literacy and, equally significantly, of the complexity and beauty of their poetic depiction of life.

Turnbull Library Record 34 (2001), 45-58

References 1 My article is a revised and expanded version of a paper presented at the SHARP (Society for the History of Authorship, Reading and Publishing) international conference in Mainz in 2000. It is one publication from a 3-year research project at the Department of Maori Studies of the University of Auckland, funded by the Marsden Fund (Royal Society of New Zealand), in association with the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, and the History of Print Culture in New Zealand (Humanities Society of New Zealand). I would like to acknowledge researchers on our project: Jenifer Curnow, Tane Mokena, Dinah Paul, Hazel Petrie, Yvonne Sutherland and Lyn Waymouth who, in creating English abstracts of the newspapers and through discussion, have contributed towards my article. All translations are mine, unless otherwise stated.

2 Te Wananga, 4 March 1876, p. 125, the letter advises a death in his family. 3 The newspapers can be read in the microfiche collection Niupepa 1842-1933: Maori newspapers (Wellington: Alexander Turnbull Library, 1996) and (with the abstracts) on the University of Waikato’s Computer Science Department’s Internet site <http://www.nzdl.org>. 4 As discussed by, e.g., Walter Ong, Orality and literacy (London: Methuen, 1982) and Norman Simms, Points of contact: A study of the interplay and intersection of traditional and nontraditional literatures, cultures and mentalities (Pace University Press, New York, 1991).

5 Some saw the potential for the papers to preserve the oral tradition but this did not happen to any extent. I am grateful to Steven Chrisp for this information with regard to the Wairarapa papers, Te puke ki Hikurangi and Te Mareikura.

6 As contemporary practice on marae : the right to speak is respected, poetic oral genres are heard at everyday and ceremonial events; rhetoric and oblique talk are admired. 7 Also D. F. McKenzie’s point, that Maori used literacy to serve their ‘supreme social interest’, in Oral culture, literacy & print in early New Zealand: The Treaty ofWaitangi (Wellington: Victoria University Press, 1985), p. 20. And consider Adrian Johns re the earliest newspapers as genres that ‘first developed rhetorical procedures to project authenticity in the domains of print to the highest degree’, The nature of the book: Print and knowledge in the making (London: Chicago University Press, 1998), p. 174. 8 ‘I watch, and am as a sparrow alone upon the house top’ (Psalms 102. 7). Dr T. M. Hocken, recalling the rivalry between the papers, could not resist the imagery: ‘Gentle though the chirping of this little bird was, it immediately proved itself a formidable rival to the fierce scream of the Hokioi as the natives found’ ( Otago witness, 7 September 1910).

9 Te Korimako, 1 March 1882, pp.l-2. 10 Te Korimako, 1 March 1882, p.2. 11 Margaret Orbell, The natural world of the Maori (Auckland: William Collins, 1985), p.l 93. 12 See Lachlan Paterson, ‘Nga tangi a Te Pip!’ (unpublished dissertation, Otago University, Dunedin, 1999), pp. 10-13. Many names suggested were traditional, with inherent meaning. 13 He kupu whakamarama, November 1898, pp. 4-5. 14 Te Kopara, October 1913, p.l. 15 Te Korimako, 15 October 1885, p.B. 16 Te Korimako, 1 March 1882, pp.l-2. 17 Te Korimako, 15 January 1883, p. 6. 18 Te Korimako, 15 August 1885, p. 4.

19 E.g., Hauraki Paora’s letter reminded of the bird’s need for food (Te Korimako, 15 December 1883, p. 4); the editor suggested that if Maori and Pakeha stopped drinking alcohol, Te Korimako and other birds could stop grumbling about it (15 September 1883, p.B). 20 Te Korimako, 13 December 1882, p. 3. 21 E.g, Te Pipiwharauroa, 1 September 1899, p.B; 1 August 1899, p. 7; 1 November 1899, [p.2]. 22 E.g., Te Pipiwharauroa, 1 September 1899, p.l; 1 June 1899, pp.l-2. 23 Te Pipiwharauroa, 1 September 1899, pp. 6-7. The final phrase ‘I conclude’ (Ka huri) (see also p. 1 above), is common in speeches on marae. H. W. Williams, A dictionary of the Maori language, 7th ed. (Wellington: GP Publications, 1992), p. 71, notes it as modem, to mark ‘the end of a subject, letter etc.’. It possibly arose in writing letters to separate the greeting from the topic. 24 Huia tangata kotahi, 8 February 1893, p.l. 25 See letters and reports on correspondence, Huia tangata kotahi, 11 March 1893, p. 6; 6 May 1893, p. 4; 11 March 1893, p. 3.

26 Huia tangata kotahi, 1 August 1893, p.l. 27 Huia tangata kotahi, 19 August 1893, p.2. 28 See, e.g., Huia tangata kotahi, Rawiri Karaha (19 August 1893, p. 6), unsigned (19 August 1893, p. 5, and Hoani Nahe (29 April 1893, p. 4). 29 Walter J. Ong, ‘Hermeneutic forever: voice, text, digitization, and the I’, Oral tradition, 10 (1) (1995), 10. 30 About birds and the oral texts, see Orbell, Natural world of the Maori, pp. 181-213, which informs the following section.

31 Did the editors of Te Korimako recall this in publishing a translation to Maori of ‘Sing a song of sixpence’ (13 December 1882, p. 3)? 32 John Miles Foley’s term to refer to the complexity of the oral context and the layers of meaning that accrue around and are invoked in use of words, phrases and compositional structure, in Immanent art: From structure to meaning in traditional oral epic (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991). 33 Te Wananga, 5 August 1874, p. 1. 34 Te Wananga, 26 January 1875, p. 9. 35 Raymond Tallis, Newton’s sleep: The two cultures and the two kingdoms (London: St Martin’s

Press, 1995), p. 154. 36 Compare affirmation of Negro social groups by African-American papers in the 1900 s, see Michael Fultz, “‘The morning cometh”: African-American periodicals, education, and the Black middle class, 1900-1930’, in Print culture in a diverse America, ed. by James P. Danky and Wayne A. Wiegand (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1998), p.l 54. 37 In relation to the Aztec account of their conquest, The morals of history (translated by Alyson Waters) (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995), p. 20. 38 That is, reading (or being informed by) only texts of their own tradition, in contrast to extensive reading of many and diverse texts, referred to in Wiegand, ‘lntroduction’, Print culture in a diverse America, p. 5. 39 See Simms, Points of contact, p. 147, re 20th century Maori authors combining the ritual oral with the written conventions similarly. 40 Te Wananga, 4 September 1874, p. 1; 10 October 1874, p. 21; and other examples in vol. 1 (AugustDecember 1874).

41 The importance of voiced words in debate is suggested by the popularity of verbatim reports of speeches at government and tribal meetings in the newspapers, these also containing fine exemplars of the oral heritage. 42 Maori messenger/Ko te karere Maori, 24 May 1849, p.[2], 43 As occurs in Maori death notices in today’s newspapers. 44 Te Haeata, 2 April 1860, pp. 3-4. 45 Te Wananga, 12 May 1875, pp.B2-83. 46 Maori messenger/Ko te karere Maori, 24 May 1849, pp.[l-2], 47 See, e.g., Tewaka Maori o A huriri, 9 November 1864, pp. 1-3, and a son’s submission of his late father’s lament about the milling by Pakeha of forest on his land, Te waka o te iwi, November 1857, [p.2], 48 Te Haeata, 1 April 1859, p. 1. With different but related symbolic intent, see Michael Fultz “‘The morning cometh’”, p. 129.

49 Te Haeata, 1 July 1859, pp.l-2; 1 December 1860, pp.l-2; 2 April 1860, p.l. 50 Ko te karere o Nui Tireni, 1 August 1845, pp.3l-2; 1 July 1844, pp. 33-34. 51 Interesting examples: a writer in Te Pipiwharauroa, October 1899, p. 7, who quoted from scripture, an English song and Henry IV, and Aperahama Taonui’s dissertation on the meaning of wananga in Te Wananga (21 August 1875, p.2) in which he refers to Pakeha learning as established in books and the English dictionary with its 80,000 words. 52 Egbert J. Bakker, ‘Activation and preservation: the interdependence of text and performance in an oral tradition’, Oral tradition, 8 (1) (1993), 12-16. Writers in archaic Greece, he argues, were not concerned with information, readers or communication of ideas, but with fixing what was known, with performance rather than relaying of messages for information. 53 Particularly in the church papers with Maori minister-editors, e.g. Te Pipiwharauroa and in writing by Maori politicians, i.e. those most versed in literacy. Compare the trend to less rhetoric in 1930 s Black American journals, Michael Fultz, “‘The morning cometh’”, p. 143.

54 It is not possible to know the extent of editorial intervention but comments about clarity, brevity, appropriate topics etc. were made, e.g., in Ko te karere o Niu Tireni on incorrect language and that some original compositions were inappropriate (possibly indelicate) (1 October 1843, pp.4o-2; 1 November 1843, p. 46), and instruction on how to write, e.g., Te Pipiwharauroa, October 1899, pp. 2-3. 55 As described by, e.g., Norman Simms, Points of contact, p,losff. 56 Such as Havelock’s craft literacy and Stock’s textual communities but not the literary culture and mentality of modern world, see Norman Simms, Points of contact, p. 129, also the local character of print culture, see Adrian Johns, The nature of the book, p. 30.