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Witi Ihimaera and Hemi Kelly

Witi Ihimaera’s Sleeps Standing Moetū, is the first bilingual novel published in New Zealand. Having a parallel text in te reo by Hemi Kelly, it is an account of the 1863 Battle of Ōrākau through the novella’s 16-year-old protagonist, Moetū. Hemi is a licensed translator and a lecturer in te reo at AUT. Witi Ihimaera, one of New Zealand’s most eminent writers, is the former Distinguished Creative Fellow in Māori Literature at the University of Auckland.