From Shifting Grounds: Deep Histories of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland Wyman, c.1905, Auckland Libraries Heritage Collections, Footprints 01085. The creek and foreshore were reconnected to the harbour in 2005, after the ponds were removed and the sewage plant was upgraded. Local Māori lost their ancestral fishing grounds, and the ponds generated foul odours and midges.
In the 1960s, the Ōruarangi Creek was disconnected from the harbour when the Auckland wastewater oxidation ponds were built on the Māngere coastline, extending along the Ōtuataua Stonefields foreshore. They are waiting for the arrival of the ketch Elsie, which was built to carry cattle and other freight around the Manukau Harbour. It's a seduction: an invitation to see the city afresh, and enjoy." Māori on the banks of the Ōruarangi Creek in the vicinity of Makaurau Marae, Ihumātao, c.1905. It began life as a PhD thesis and has been thoughtfully reconceived into a book for all of us, developed with care and with the support of a wide range of Māori advisers, beautifully designed and illustrated and written with great storytelling flair.
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All three are volcanic sites, giving them good soil and prominence in the landscape, both of which have helped generate a rich history in each place…There aren't many written histories of Tāmaki Makaurau. Each gets two chapters, for stories told about different times.
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Simon Wilson at the Herald wrote rather less but his enthusiasm for the book is just as evident: "She focusses on just three sites: Maungakiekie, Pukekawa (the Domain) and the Ōtuataua Stonefields at Ihumātao. My personal favourite was her chapter on the olive groves that John Logan Campbell planted in Cornwall Park like the grove itself, the research is so finely detailed: "The quincunx pattern used for planting the orchard was the same pattern used by Māori for planting kumara and taro gardens on volcanic soils." Anna Rankin has written a dazzling 4000-word review in the latest Metro. This is just stupendous, a radical reimagining of the city, told through three sites that "challenge the way these particular places as well as the city and nation are understood," as the author writes in her Introduction. Shifting Grounds: Deep Histories of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland by Lucy Mackintosh (Bridget Williams Books, $60)
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The rest of my top 10 ranges from works by great artists (Peter Black, Anne Noble, Colin McCahon) to nostalgia feasts (my book Cover Story, and a book about TV sets, toasters, heaters and other very groovy appliances back when they were manufactured in New Zealand), and other documentary evidence of good old, good-looking New Zealand. There are other, less cripplingly expensive options. You might like to get Hei Taonga mā ngā Uri Whakatipu | Treasures for the Rising Generation: The Dominion Museum Ethnological Expeditions 1919–1923 but only if you can afford it, at $75. You ought to get Shifting Grounds: Deep Histories of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland at once, especially if you live in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland - you won't recognise the city you live in, and you'll see it differently, more deeply. The two very best of the year were on the same theme - histories of New Zealand, told by or of the tangata whenua. The country just looks so damned good, the bright light of the Pacific is just so luscious, and our lives here have always been just so picturesquely happy, troubled, lucky, wretched, comfortable, poor, exciting, boring.We may no longer enjoy the great age of photography (where is the contemporary Ans Westra, the contemporary Marti Friedlander, the contemporary Peter Peryer?) but the land and its people continue to be documented in a range of really beautiful books. One thing New Zealand publishing always, always excels in is picture books. We begin our week-long celebration of the best books of the year as Steve Braunias selects the 10 best illustrated books of 2021 ReadingRoom Christmas: the year’s best illustrated books