Writing short stories in te reo Māori: Dr Darryn Joseph and Dr Atakohu Middleton

Dr Darryn Joseph is a writer and researcher. Over more than 20 years, he has been writing stories for children and adults, some of which have been award-winners. Here’s Darryn talking about his adult short stories with Dr Atakohu Middleton, Kete guest editor for Te Wiki o te reo Māori.

Read the original te reo Māori version of this article here.

Atakohu: In October last year, two of your stories were winners in the Pikihuia creative writing competition. Your story ‘The Caravan Community’ won the short story section; it’s about a kid who moves with his family into a caravan park. Where did this story idea come from?

Darryn: Well, ideas for my short stories in the past 20 years have come simply from my imagination and my enjoyment of writing, and these ideas end up as short stories.

But last year, I did things differently. The basis of the plot, the characters and their observations were instead drawn from my own memories when I was a teenager in the 1980s.  

I really wanted to write a story showing the different things I saw when the year we were living in a caravan, the year my mum left my dad.

At the Pikihuia Awards, the short-story judge, Maiki Sherman, asked the same question you asked, about where the story came from, as she admired the stories that wove the caravan community together. My response was that it was a true story and that I was the teenage character.

Maybe it’s easier to put yourself in the character’s shoes and then recall the complexities, the worries, the stress that affected you at that time to embed within your story. I’m not the first writer to do that. However, I’ll never ever forget the sorts of people we lived with at that really hard-up time. It was also a compassionate and caring community. 

Atakohu: When did you start your creative writing?

Darryn: Around the year 2000 I thought I’d have a look at creative writing, like these short stories. At that time, my goal was just to explore, to try out writing in te reo Māori. When I was a kid, science fiction stories were my favourite, so I really wanted to write stories containing aliens from other planets, robots, a spaceship and a dangerous journey. Between 2004 and 2006, Huia Publishers put out my trilogy about Rangi Tautoru and his journey into space, under the title RT-3.

Atakohu: Tell us about one of your creative writing strategies.

Darryn: Ages ago, I interviewed the writer Peti Nohotima and she told me she started with a conversation between people and then slowly grew it into a story. I did the same for my short story ‘Taku Ao, Tō Mate Kanehe’ in Huia Short Stories 11. It won the reo-Māori short-story award in Pikihuia 2015. I simply wrote a story following Peti’s strategy; I started with a just a conversation.

Atakohu: So what’s the plot of ‘Taku Ao, Tō Mate Kanehe’ …?

Darryn: Well, picture this. Some soldiers, Māori men, are drinking in a pub and then a strip club, trading banter all the while. The subject? Lust, women and the hope they’ll score a one-night stand. All I did was use various figures of speech for sex that I’d heard at kura reo, at parties and wherever else, to start the narrative. They’re talking all sorts of blokey bullshit about sex. Later on, they happen upon a young relation of theirs working in the strip joint …

That was possibly the first time, as I was writing a story, that the narrative was carried largely by what the characters were saying – and I didn’t like the ugly stuff that was coming out of their mouths.

Honestly, I was thinking, no, no, don’t go there, as I continued to write these phrases coming out of their mouths. That’s perhaps the challenge for a writer, to create the nature and the world of your character, even if you don't really like that character and their personal values.

Professor Poia Rewi was the reo-Māori judge that year. He said my short story was a mix of the film Good Morning Vietnam and the book Fifty Shades of Grey …!

Atakohu: Hardcase! My friend, you’re now writing a book for adults. What’s it about?

Darryn: When you get older, your gaze turns to what made you the person you are. My upbringing was unusual; I lived in more than 16 places, from the west coast to the east coast, from Stratford to Inglewood to Mōhaka near Te Wairoa right back to New Plymouth. One of those homes was the caravan park I wrote about in Huia Short Stories 16. So I thought I’d write up some of my childhood experiences.

It’s about writing short stories that capture the ups and downs of family stories, work stories, relationship stories, whatever takes my interest for me and my pen. I have no idea when or if they might be published, but writing the stories is the goal.

Atakohu: I can’t wait to read them, my friend! All power to your pen!