More Margaret Mahy Magic
The multi-award-winning author, who was first published and praised in the United States over 30 years ago, has had her books translated into 15 languages. She has won literary prizes in the UK, Italy…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
X – Woman
Anna Paquin is playing another complex and haunted character – but this time on the New York stage. “I don’t think it’s anything in my own life,” she says. “Maybe it’s a fascination of…
A Wired Army
The NZ Army is the first in the world to recruit online, and expects to cut the process from 4 to 6 weeks to just 14 days. “If we can offer a way that is faster,…
“For You to See Our World the Right Way Round”
Allen Curnow, one of New Zealand’s great 20th-century writers and poets, has died in Auckland. Daily Telegraph: “regarded by many as New Zealand’s greatest poet” Curnow helped define a separate NZ identity in verse,…
The Person is Political
Voters across the political spectrum have convinced Georgina Beyers not to quit politics after she said she was stepping down. “The fact that a transsexual, a former sex worker and a Labour candidate could win the historically…
Virtual Spectator is Simply Red
Fans can watch the latest Simply Red concert from all angles live via the internet thanks to rapidly growing Kiwi software company Virtual Spectator. “Watching live footage from the concert they can create their own unique…
Praise for Jewish Museum
Praise keeps coming for the new Jewish Museum in Berlin, and the exhibition curated by Kiwis Ken Gorbey and Nigel Cox. Gorbey and Cox realise that sympathy-inducing gimmicks are pathetically unequal to the gravity…
More to Crowe About
Russell Crowe excels on the screen, and now with his band 30-odd Foot of Grunts he is tackling the music scene as well. The bands first album, Bastard Life of Clarity, was released this month.
Johnson and the Whale
Mark Johnson is literally leading the way with research into whale behaviour – part of his work involves attaching digital recorders to 60-foot sperm whales out in the Gulf of Mexico. Scientists like Johnson are trying…
Hoop Dream
The Tall Blacks NZ Basketball Team has shocked Australia, winning their 3-game series to earn a place among the world’s top basketball nations at the World Titles next year. Says NZ coach Tab Baldwin: “Today, it’s a…
The Fox Boy
The 19th-century studio portrait of a young Maori boy aged five or six, dignified but standing taut and uncommunicative, captured the imagination of New Zealand writer Peter Walker, The result was The Fox Boy…
Granted Respect
“About a third of the 96 professional sailors competing in the Volvo Ocean Race are New Zealanders. But only one, Grant Dalton, commands instant recognition and awed respect from his international peer group as well as his…
Six Months in a Leaky Boat
Has the round the world race – now the Volvo Ocean Challenge – lost its edge? Sir Peter Blake thinks so. “In the 1970s, adventurers in leaky oilskins set out to sea in yachts that by…
Whale of a tale
A combination of German and New Zealand investors will finance Whale Rider, the film adaptation of…
Kiwi Bashing is No Joke
Air New Zealand’s role in the financial difficulties of Ansett Australia has created heated comment in the Australian media. “In recent days it has not been difficult to come by jokes and derisive comments about New Zealanders….
Famous NZ Plants
The Times explores the unlikely problem of growing tea trees like they do down in New Zealand.
September 11
New Zealanders and Australians unite in New York City to share their grief at the loss of antipodean lives on September 11th. Kiwi Alan Beaven, a leading environmental lawyer based in California, was on the hijacked plane that…
Film Success at Montreal
Still Life, a short film that tells the story of an elderly couple who discover that love defies even death, took out top honours in its category at the Montreal Film Festival. It is…
ANZUS Shmanzus
“The Chinese are not coming, the Russians are not coming, the Indonesians are not even coming. Time has moved on.” Helen Clark doesn’t miss ANZUS – and doesn’t think she will any time soon.
Native Art Expert
Noted Maori and Polynesian art expert Terence Tui A Tane Barrow, 78, died Aug. 31 at his Honolulu home. “He was very famous — anyone who wanted to authenticate Polynesian art would call… from…
The Odder Rock Tour
Neil Finn has just completed one of rock’s great experimental tours. He started off playing with friends from Radiohead and the Smiths in New Zealand, and ended up on stage with complete strangers in…
Virtual Magic
US-based Kiwi Mark Billinghurst has won the entertainment section of the Discover Magazine Innovation Awards with his ‘magicBook’ virtual reality invention. ‘magicBook’ looks like a normal book, but when seen through a hand-held viewer, 3D images pop…
Galaxy Star
NZ professional soccer player Simon Elliot kicked his first goal of the season – and ensured his Los Angeles Galaxy team victory in front of 17, fans.
Lord of the Spin-Offs
“The adventures of Frodo Baggins and Gandalf the wizard are proving so lucrative to HarperCollins that, without spending a penny on promotion or marketing, they have seen sales of the books soar by 400…
Archived Story
Drilling and hammering continued right up to opening, but the Jewish Museum in Germany is at last open. It is the culmination of an intense period of work for Ken Gorbey and Nigel Cox,…
Corporate Drain
“Forget the brain drain – the Kiwis who leave usually come back; the real problem we face is the corporation drain, the breaking up or moving offshore of our top corporations,” says Mike Pratt, dean of…
Positive Reinforcement
Researchers from the University of Otago have been published in the totem of scientific veracity, Nature magazine. The paper builds on the notion that positive reinforcement helps the acquisition of learned behaviours.
Amazing Race amazing TV
“More than a thrill a minute” is packed into The Amazing Race, a “dazzling and fascinating show that brings new energy and respectability …
Publishing Gem
Author Fay Weldon, who spent her childhood in New Zealand, has divided the literary world with her latest novel, The Bulgari Connection. It’s sponsored by the Italian jewellery company in what Weldon describes as…
More Kiwi on Aussie screens
Selling 26 episodes of Street Legal to the Aussies has quadrupled the amount of programming NZ has over the ditch. More importantly, it …
Blyth Spirit
“Blyth Tait headed a clean sweep for New Zealand when he rode his Olympic and world champion, Ready Teddy, to win the Burghley Pedigree Horse Trials.”
Gandalf writes…
“A year’s work abroad isn’t unusual or daunting for an actor – but a year in New Zealand? I’m indifferent to rugby and don’t eat lamb but at least it seemed a good opportunity…
NZ Red
“That New Zealand can make decent reds is news of the “man bites dog” variety. If this article had been written a mere five or six years ago, it would have been pretty short. Not any…
Book Now
Providores, the keenly awaited new restaurant from Peter Gordon, has opened to acclaim. Says the Times: “Expect to queue once the reviews start rolling in.”
Nature Film Fest Sucess
Natural History New Zealand walked away with two awards at at the Japan Wildlife Film Festival, one of the industry’s highest-regarded wildlife television festivals. The Crystal Ocean won the Underwater Award, while the…
Exporting Ex-All Blacks
Josh Kronfeld and Craig Dowd are expected to make a big impact in British rugby.
Remote Control
Wellington design student Rodney Mackrell has won the top prize in a $46,000 competition, run by Korean giant LG Electronics. His “cellular remote” is a pocket-sized device that operates as a cellphone with the fold-out screen allowing…
Wgtn Saatchis in world top-10
In a volume compiled by editors of graphic design bible Graphis Saatchi & Saatchi’s Wellington office, originator of the award winning Toyota bugger and Adidas All Black haka campaigns (left), makes the world top-10…
DMXAA Discovery Fights Cancer
Yahoo News recognises Professors Bruce Baguley and William Denny of the Cancer Society Research Centre , University of Auckland, for their discovery of DMXAA, a significant new development in to cancer research.
All the Money in the World
New Zealander Graeme Wheeler has been appointed Treasurer of the World Bank and in the process takes responsibility for a portfolio worth hundreds of millions.
Rip Roaring History
Surfer Maz Quinn has made history: he’s the first New Zealand surfer to qualify for the Surfing Professionals’ World Championship Tour. “This is a huge result for Maz and for New Zealand sport in general,” says NZ…
NZ ‘No Subsidies’ Model for Europe?
“New Zealand is one of a handful of countries which have embarked on free trade for agriculture and some say it should be used as a model for changes in Europe.”
Wading In
Robert Wade, Professor at the London School of Economics, gave NZ a “developing” status at the Knowledge Wave Conference. “The comparative position of New Zealand today is more serious than many think,” Dr Wade said, adding that…
Kiwi Koala
New Zealand film company Daybreak Pacific imported actors and animatronic Koala’s to Auckland for the shooting of Ozzie, a New Zealand made film featuring an Australian icon.
Time-out: critics Knox-ed over
Elizabeth Knox’s career and upcoming bovine noir tale gets talked up and produces another fine vintage according to the passing feet of Time: “Measured by the beat of an angel’s wing, his [Vintner’s Luck…
Booker long-list Graced
Kiwi author Patrica Grace’s Dogside Story about an East Coast Maori township makes the long-list for the much-vaunted Booker Prize, shunting aside Salman to join such luminaries as Beryl Bainbridge, Peter Carey, Ian McEwan,…
The Genetics of Antipodean Cattle
The Times of India reports that “an Australian-New Zealand company aims to run off copies of top breeding bulls for export to the world.”
This Glorious Tradition
Respect: The Sydney Morning Herald offers solace to the demanding expectations of AB fans and puts a recently balanced ledger in the context of the history and aura of the All Black tradition: “Now you know…
The Pacific Petri Dish
The Australian takes an editorial swipe at the Triple Bottom Line approach advocated at New Zealand’s Knowledge Wave Conference. Paul Kelly believes “New Zealand today raises loud alarm bells for an Australian.”
Stopping the Rot
The Hamilton-based HortResearch has developed a spray-on organic control agent that can help prevent botrytis – grapes rotting on the vine. “It sounds like Mecca,” says Phil Ryan, chief winemaker of McWilliam’s Wines, Mount Pleasant. “Anything that…
Strike an Edge Pose
In a 30 page feature Vogue Australia’s August edtion focuses on edge culture. Fashion designers Karen Walker and Zambesi feature alongside artist Michael Parekowhai and muscian King Kapisi. Editor Kristie Clements muses on the…
“Erotic, hyper-imaginative fiction”
Elizabeth Knox’s Black Oxen is “lush, dark and puzzling,” as well as “startling and strangely satisfying”.
CNN on PM
With a focus on Clark’s style of governance and personal history, CNN attempt to get behind the professional life of the New Zealand Prime Minister.
Tamahori, Lee Tamahori
New Zealand director picked as front-runner to direct next Bond movie, with Pierce Brosnan still in the hot seat as 007.
