In Their Own Words
Ataria Sharman: Congratulations on the launch of your debut pukapuka, Ruin and Āria! Can you introduce yourselves and provide an overview of your books?
Jessica Hinerangi Thompson Carr: Kia ora, ko Whakatere Te Manawa Kaiaia rāua ko Taranaki ōku maunga, Ko Waima Tuhirangi rāua ko Waingongoro ōku awa, Ko Hokianga Whakapau Karakia rāua ko te Tai-O-Rehua ōku maunga, Ko Māmari rāua ko Aotea ōku waka, Ko Te Mahurehure rāua ko Kānihi Umutahi ōku hapū, ko Ngāpuhi rātou ko Ngāti Ruanui ko Ngāruahine ōku iwi.
Āria is a small collection of poems about reconnecting to your whakapapa Māori, your identity, and your way of belonging and being in that space.
Emma Hislop: Kia ora, ko Hikaroaroa te mauka, ko Waikouaiti te awa, ko Uruao, ko Araiteuru ko Tākitimu ngā waka, ko Kāi Tahu te iwi, ko Kati Huirapa me kāi Te Ruahikihiki kā hapū ko Puketeraki te marae, ko Doug Hislop rāua ko Peta Smith ōku mātua, ko Emma Hislop tōku ikoa.
My book Ruin came out recently, a collection of thirteen short stories. It’s been described as an exploration of power.
What inspired the creation of your pukapuka, and can you share insights into your writing process?
Emma: I’ve always written stories. I had an inspiring secondary school English teacher, Diane Kawana, who sadly passed. She was instrumental in telling me I was a good writer. She gave me specific feedback on my work when I was about 13. Her support stuck with me and kept me going.
In 2013, while completing a writing course, I started taking it more seriously. I’d find myself writing in my spare time. My son was born the following year, in 2014. The writing slowed down, but the stories I wanted to tell shifted dramatically. It’s a bit of an addiction for me; writing is what I like doing the most.
One of my Māori Studies lecturers was the first to say my writing was good at university. We were having a catch-up because I was doing research for her, and I remember her saying, ‘Oh, you’re writing is good.’ It stuck with me. I guess the comments teachers make to us do give us that confidence. I wouldn’t have realised I was good at writing if it hadn’t been for this person. How about you, Jess, with Āria?
Jessica: I have always been like, I’m going to be a writer; I’m determined to write even if I’m rubbish. Maybe I’m a little bit delusional, but I keep going. I’ve always liked writing; I’ve always been passionate about writing poems and stories when I was a kid.
This collection began in 2017-18. It was a slow trickling through of poems to form a manuscript. I don’t think I intended it to become what it became. I pulled them together and attempted to build a concept for the collection.
I wanted to publish them; I like to share my work. Then, it became what it is now: a reflection of healing, reconnection, growth and balance. Āria was inspired by reconnecting to my whakapapa, hope for the future and whānau. My friends and those on the same journey.
That’s beautiful, Jess. I feel like so many creatives, and myself, start writing to heal colonisation and trauma and some of the things that have happened to us. But after you go through that process, it goes beyond healing and into the next phase of creativity.
Jessica: I’m sure many others do that. You start in one place and end up in a completely different space the more you write. The more I wrote, the more I wanted to reach out and forward, to pull myself into a different mindset. Whether I was fully there or not. Writing helped me get there. The poems were feeding and healing me while I wrote them, although they initially started from a place of feeling quite lost. They helped guide me.
The reader can go through those stages of their emotions with you, and that may assist the healing process for them.
Jessica: Yeah, they can feel the support and the tautoko. Many of us, many people I know, feel and have felt that way. It can feel isolating, but you’re not alone. And there’s a place to go from there as well.
Your writing doesn’t have to have the right message for everyone. So long as it speaks to someone, it’s worth sharing. Either way, you’ve done something for yourself as a wāhine Māori for your growth, healing, and creative journey.
Sometimes, if I feel blocked from putting my work out there, I think it’s because I’m worried about other people’s reactions. Was that something you thought about?
Emma: To be honest, I don’t think about that when I’m writing. I don’t think about the reader at all, which is probably a bad thing. But now that the book is out, I do. I need to grow a tougher skin about whether people like the book or don’t like the book.
Writing is one thing; having a book out for readers is different. It’s almost like they don’t marry up.
Jessica: I wish I were like that. When I write, I’ve got all these voices in my head, and I can get self-conscious. When pulling the pukapuka together, I wondered, what would this person think? I can hear the criticism in my head already. That doesn’t always happen with organic poems that pop out, but when I thought, oh, this is going to be a pukapuka, it did.
I get unsure about feedback or eyes on it. This is quite a young pukapuka, and the first part of it is meant to be insecure. But I don’t want to carry that throughout my writing forever. I need to work on that, to get into that confident headspace where I can just write without those voices or thinking about eyes on it. That could be healthier for me.
Do you read your book reviews?
Emma: I do read reviews. The other day, I talked to a friend who doesn’t read the reviews. I was like, wow, I wish I had that self-control. The minute the publisher sends me a review, I’m straight on it. I was at the gym the other day, and one came through, and I stopped running to read it.
Jessica: Yep, I’m the same. I’ll be like, stop everything. I need to read it right now.
I’ve been waiting for a horrific review. I’ve been waiting for someone to say everything I fear is true about this pukapuka. Say all of those things that you think in your head about yourself as a writer. I can see it now, but that would be like, you know, silly because a lot of it is in my head. But there are truths to some of it, and I can be critical about my mahi, and I know that someone could see those things. I’m waiting for it to happen. It hasn’t happened yet. But it’ll probably happen one day; someone’s like, people are going to hate it. People are going to love it.
I have been reading the reviews. I’ve gotten some very generous ones, which I’m shocked about because I was bracing myself for a rough one. Did it do what it intended to do? Did you take something from it that I never even thought about giving and never even intended? Because that happens.
As a creative, you don’t control how people see the work. So you have to put it out there and let it exist by itself.
You published traditionally with Ruin and Āria; did it meet your expectations?
Emma: I was thinking about this because I don’t think I expected it to be accepted for publication. And then, when it was, I was so happy to hand it over that it felt like a huge relief.
Everything took time, from when I handed the manuscript to the publisher. Of course, there was the editing and all of that. That was my learning: to be patient.
Jessica: I wanted the help that traditional publishing can give me that self-publishing can’t. From the editing process to the way they lay it out. They gave me feedback that I never would have thought of. That’s what I was looking for when I went for traditional publishing. Also, the distribution of the book to bookshops across Aotearoa.
I was surprised by how long it took. I edited the book for ages. I got in my head too much with the editing and dragged it out longer than needed. But it was nice to have that support from experienced people who’ve done it before.
I thought once the pukapuka was out, I’d feel on top of the world forever. But life keeps going on, and you keep writing. I think it was because I’ve wanted to be an author for so long. I had this idea that I would feel levelled up. You don’t realise how normal you feel after.
I don’t know why I built it up in my head. It’s this big thing that maybe you’ve dreamed of for ages. It’s not as drastic and sudden, with a big bang. I thought it was going to be glamorous. Maybe it’s not as glamorous as I thought it would be. It was like, oh, I’ve achieved my dream. Nothing’s changed.
Did working with editors improve your writing?
Emma: It made me pay attention to details and things more often and interrogate the work. My editor, Anna Knox, has an incredible eye for detail. She would question me about something in scenes like, there’s a pot bubbling on the stove, what’s in the pot? And I’d be like, it doesn’t matter what’s in the pot, I’m not writing about the meal, you know, but she’d want to know. That would make the scene more real, and there were other details that emerged.
Making decisions takes work for me. There were a lot of decisions to be made, and Anna was very patient and professional. I’m super grateful to her.
Jessica: It helped me similarly improve my writing. Based on what I learned from my editors, I would go about my editing process differently. Now, I can move forward to the next pukapuka and be more efficient. Tayi Tibble read my manuscript very early on, and her advice of being generous to the reader has stuck with me. I want to carry that through.
I can get very stubborn and not want to cut things. I find it hard to kill the darlings. Now that I’ve gone through that process, I feel more confident. That has made me feel like a better writer, and the next book will be sharper and cleaner. Anne Kennedy looked at my manuscript, and she was amazing. She was constructive with her feedback but very gentle because I’m sensitive, and I needed that. I appreciated that.
I’m always grateful for an editor. I know writers who struggle with feedback, but I love it because it gives me more confidence knowing someone else has invested time and knowledge into your work. It’s such a gift.
In one sentence, what is the essence of your book and its central themes?
Emma: Pip Adam said it the best, to be honest. I’ll read what she said because I find it hard to talk about my work. It’s something I can get better at. But she said, ‘Ruin is a machine for the exposure and exploration of power. It turns the intricacy and activity of relationship over in the cogs of its deft craft. It’s an incredible confirmation of what short fiction can do and be: beautiful, confronting, validating.’ Oh, wow, that’s kind of bigging myself up. I didn’t realise it was so complimentary.
I didn’t know I was writing a specific type of book. I was lucky to have Pip as my mentor towards the end, and she pointed out one day that there were many terrible men in the book. And I hadn’t even noticed them. I’m so preoccupied with writing the women.
When she pointed that out, I sat down one night and was like, wow, there are a lot of terrible men in this book. And then that has become what the book is about in a weird way. It seemed to have some predominant themes and preoccupations running through it, which I wasn’t aware of when writing them strangely.
Jessica: I would describe Āria as a panic, a protest or a reflection, and a rongoā. I took the rongoā from Hinemoana Baker, who had a quote in the back of it, giving very generous praise. They said every poem is a rongoā to its readers, which was the best praise I could hope for. I want it to provide space for people who do need that rongoā. It’s for reconnecting and for Maori who feel whakamā or lost.
Many Māori I know didn’t grow up with their māoritanga or feeling strong in their identity and knowing everything we hope to know about whakapapa and our culture. Āria is for people like that.
That’s an important perspective.
Jessica: It can feel very uncomfortable. I’ve felt embarrassed for things I got wrong about whakapapa, names I’ve got wrong, and tūpuna, who I thought I knew the history of and got feedback that I was way off. Stumbling through is okay because your intentions are on learning and growing and getting to that point where you’ve got the knowledge and feel confident and strong in your whakapapa.
Emma: Very relatable stuff to me. Stumble through. I love that; it describes it.
Jessica: It’s better to stumble through than not take the first step. Have those moments of being corrected rather than not learning anything or going anywhere.
It takes bravery.
Emma: At the same time, if you’re not in a place to be able to do that, that’s okay, too. Some people don’t have that point of connection.
Jessica: Some people don’t have access to their hapū name and those things that lead you back. It’s about knowing your tūpuna are still with you, you’re not alone, and you have other people at your side who are going through the same thing. You’re a complete person and living life and existing. And that is enough.