Ruahine Mythic Women

Ruahine is a collection of traditional Maori stories retold from a contemporary feminist perspective. Ngahuia Te Awekotuku uses her extensive and expert knowledge of Maori culture to add quiet authority to her radical re-interpretations. A straight, authorised version of the story is briefly given, followed by a re-telling: readers unfamiliar with the stories can read the original and then enjoy the re-telling. Often subversive and always redolent with idiomatic detail these re-tellings breathe fleshy life into characters and stories rendered static by repetition. Irreverent, daring and heart-warming, Ruahine asks readers to swim with Hinemoa to Mokoia Island to meet her lover Tutanekai, limbs aching with cold and exhaustion; and to feel the despair and keenly tempered fury of the bird-woman, Kurungaituku, her family horribly murdered by a trusted servant a