Ancestry

by Albert Wendt

Albert Wendt’s new collection of short stories explores the nature of family, tradition and culture through the eyes of those seemingly caught between the realities of modern contemporary life and the ancestral ties of their heritage. With a deft touch, he draws us into his characters’ lives and with equal parts wisdom and wit, he exposes them to us. This is a masterful meditation on the ties that bind people together across time and place.The unpublished manuscript of Ancestry was overall winner of the University of the South Pacific Press Literature Prize in 2011.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

306 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Albert Wendt was born in Apia, Samoa.
Wendt's epic Leaves of the Banyan Tree (1979) won the 1980 New Zealand Book Awards. He was appointed to the first chair in Pacific literature at the University of the South Pacific in Suva. In 1988 he took up a professorship of Pacific studies at the University of Auckland. In 1999 Wendt was visiting Professor of Asian and Pacific Studies at the University of Hawaii. In 2001 he was made Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his services to literature. In the 2013 Queen's Birthday Honours he was appointed a member of the Order of New Zealand.

Reviews

[Serena · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant writing, very easy to read and loads to think about. I really wish I could understand Samoan! My intellectual capabilities are nowhere near as good as Wendt's so can't pull this together into a comprehensive piece of text, but various thoughts were:

-I like the tribute to the grandparent, especially for example in "One Rule", where they triumph. Is there a particularly noticeable generational divide at the moment? A few stories seem to suggest so.
-I also see that non-nuclear families are explored a lot. Think we could do with more stories like this. Prompts an interesting suggestion that not all parents are good parents.
-Very good for understanding a bit more of Pacific literature given references to other authors.
-No translator, so language question to the author (apart from the very obvious "what does all the Samoan mean") is around the use of swearing - there's a lot. Also the use of 'darling', is it just used a lot in normal speech?

[Wanna dance? · Rating 1 out of 5]

I’m finding this read very tiresome, the characters are a bit mundane and I haven’t found a hook yet.