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He whakamāoritanga o te whakaari hinapōuri a Hakipia mō te aroha pūhou i waenga i ētahi whānau toheriri e rua.

Whakaorangia ana i te pukapuka nei e tōna kaiwhakamāori e Te Haumihiata Mason te ao o Rōmeo rāua ko Hurieta ki te reo whakaatu i te wairua Māori.

Mauroa ana te kaingākautia o ngā whakaari a Wiremu Hakipia i te ao Māori – mai i ngā whakamāoritanga a Tākuta Pei Te Hurinui o Te Tangata Whai Rawa o Wēneti, o Othello me Julius Caesar ki ngā whakamāoritanga a Tākuta Merimeri Penfold i ngā oriori aroha a Hakipia. Whāia ana e Te Haumihiata tēnei tikanga i tana whakamāoritanga o Toroihi rāua ko Kāhira i whakaaritia ki te Whare Whakaari o te Globe i Rānana i te 2012, tahuri ana ki te whakaari a Hakipia mō te aroha whaiāipo hinapōuri e tino kaingākautia ana.

Te aroha, te tuku mātātahi, te tōwhare, te pākūhā – katoa atu kei a Rōmeo rāua ko Hurieta. Ka kawea ake te whakaari nei e tōna whakamāoritanga ki te manawa o Aotearoa.

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A te reo Māori translation of Shakespeare’s tragic drama of young love between two feuding families.

In this book, acclaimed translator Te Haumihiata Mason brings the world of Romeo and Juliet alive in a language filled with wairua Māori.

The plays of William Shakespeare have had an enduring appeal in te ao Māori – from Dr Pei Te Hurinui Jones’s translation of The Merchant of Venice, Othello and Julius Caesar to Dr Merimeri Penfold’s translation of Shakespeare’s love sonnets. Te Haumihiata Mason has been central to that tradition, translating Troilus and Cressida for a performance at London’s Globe Theatre in 2012 and now taking on Shakespeare’s most beloved romantic tragedy.

Love, duels, murders, marriages – Romeo and Juliet has it all. This te reo Maōri translation will bring the play into the heart of Aotearoa.

Te Kaitito / Playwright

He kaitito whakaari, he kaitito toikupu, he kaiwhakaari a William Shakespeare (1564–1616). Ko ia te kaituhi kawenga nui katoa ki te reo Ingarihi, tata ana te whakawhitihia o ana whakaari ki ngā reo katoa me te kaha ake i ētahi atu kaitito whakaari te whakaaritia ki te kura, ki te atamira. Nō ngā tau 1590 i tuhia ai e Hakipia a Rōmeo rāua ko Hurieta, mai i taua wā taka mai ki nāianei, kua tino kaha te whakaaritia.

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William Shakespeare (1564–1616) was a playwright, poet and actor. He is considered the most influential writer in the English language: his plays have been translated into almost every language and are performed in schools and theatres more often than any other playwright. Shakespeare wrote Romeo and Juliet in the 1590s and, from that time to today, it has been one of his most frequently performed plays.

Te Kaiwhakamāori / Translator

I whānau mai a Te Haumihiata Mason (Tūhoe, Ngāti Pango, Te Arawa) ki ngā pāpāringa o Tauranga Moana, ka whakatipuhia ki te whārua o Ruatoki i roto o Tūhoe. Ko te reo Māori te reo o te hapori katoa i tōna tamarikitanga, i pono ai tōna ngākau ki te reo Māori. He wā hoki tērā i ora ai te whārua i ōna whenua, i ōna ngahere me ōna awa, me te aha, whakatōkia ana ki roto ki a Te Haumihiata te aroha ki te reo, ki ngā tini a Tāne, a Tangaroa, me te hiahia tonu ki te whakatipu i ngā momo mea katoa.

Ka whakahaungia e Tīmoti Kāretu kia haere ia ki te whare wānanga i ōna tau 30, nāwai ā, ka noho ia hei kaiako i te Tari Māori o Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato. Nō muri ka haere ia ki Te Taura Whiri, ka noho hei Kaitiaki Reo mō te motu. Ko tana pukapuka o nā tata nei, Te Rātaka a Tētahi Kōhine, tana whakamāoritanga o te Diary of a Young Girl a Anne Frank, i tohaina ki ngā kura o Aotearoa i te 2019.

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Born by the sea in Tauranga Moana and raised in Ruatoki in the nation of Tūhoe, Te Haumihiata Mason (Tūhoe, Ngāti Pango, Te Arawa) has spent a lifetime devoted to te reo Māori. Her formative years were spent in a monolingual Māori language community at a time when most of the food on the table was sourced from the land, bush and river. Growing up in this environment instilled in Te Haumihiata a passion for te reo Māori, a love of native flora and fauna and a compulsion for growing things.

Persuaded by Tīmoti Kāretu to attend university in her 30s, Te Haumihiata went on to become a lecturer at Waikato University and then worked for many years at Te Taura Whiri, eventually becoming Kaitiaki Reo and a national authority on the language. Her recent book Te Rātaka a Tētahi Kōhine, a translation of Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl, was distributed to schools across Aotearoa in 2019.

Endorsement

‘Tokoiti nei te hunga o te ao whakamāori kōrero e rite ana ki a Te Haumihiata nei te matatau ki te reo me te mōhio ki tō te ao Māori titiro, tō te ao Māori whakaaro kia noho Māori tonu mai ai te wairua o te kōrero ahakoa nā tangata kē ngā kupu e whakamāoritia mai rā.

Noho ana ko te ao Māori tonu te atamira o te whakaari nei, ā, rere ana ōna kīwaha, ōna whakataukī, ōna kupu whakarite, ōna huahuatau, hei whakaahua i te ao o Rōmeo rāua ko tana tōrere ko Hurieta.

Ā tēnā, tēnā koa kī mai, kei hea kē he kōrero i tua atu i tēnei e puta ai te aroha o te tangata ki te tangata?’

— Mai i te kupu takamua nā Tā Tīmoti Kāretu

‘There are few people in the world of Māori translation who have the same proficiency in the language as Te Haumihiata or the same knowledge of how the Māori world looks and thinks – so that the spirit of the language remains Māori even though the words translated are written by people from other cultures.

The Māori world is the stage of this play. The world of Romeo and his lover Juliet is brought to life through distinctive kīwaha, whakataukī, kupu whakarite, and huahuatau straight from te ao Māori.’

— From the foreword by Sir Tīmoti Kāretu