By Nicola Daly
Aotearoa (translated as “land of the long white cloud”) is the Māori name for New Zealand, a small country in the South Pacific, to the east of Australia. Just over 5 million of us live here. One way of getting to know us is through our children’s literature!
Our vibrant children’s literature community in Aotearoa is evident in two annual book awards. First is the the annual Storylines Notable Books List. On the Sunday nearest the birthday of Hans Christian Andersen (April 2) every year, the New Zealand Children’s Literature Foundation, Storylines Te Whare Waituhi Tamaraiki, announces the winners in five categories (Picturebooks, Junior fiction, YA fiction, Nonfiction, and books in Te Reo Māori).
This amazing organisation offers awards to support and mentor emerging illustrators and writers and organises Storylines Story Tours of authors and illustrators into schools around the country. In 2024, the Margaret Mahy Award for lifetime achievement was awarded to Paula Green, an author, poet, anthologist and book award judge. Her poetry anthology, A Treasury of NZ Poems for Children, is one of her most celebrated works.
A Treasury of NZ Poems for Children
Edited by Paula Green
Illustrated by Jenny Cooper
Published by Penguin Random House New Zealand Limited, 2017
Buy from Bookshop.org US
The annual New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults recognizes books in eight categories. The overall winner of the New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults is named the Margaret Mahy Book of the Year (after one of New Zealand’s most celebrated authors). This year, the overall winner also won the Elsie Locke Award for Non-fiction. The book that took home both of these prizes was Ross Calman’s The Treaty of Waitangi/ Te Tiriti o Waitangi, a book about the country’s founding document signed in 1840 between Māori chiefs and the British crown. Illustrations, photos and fact boxes examine this document from multiple perspectives and present it as key to understanding the nation’s past, present and future. (Note: ‘Te Tiriti o Waitangi’ is used only on the book cover to acknowledge the bilingual nature of the document; the book’s text is in English only).
The Treaty of Waitangi. Te Tiriti o Waitangi
One of the very distinctive aspects of Aotearoa picture books for children is the role these books play in supporting the revitalisation and reclamation of Te Reo Māori, the Māori language, which is the Indigenous language of Aotearoa. In the 1970s, after years of oppression, activists fought for Te Reo Māori to be taught in New Zealand schools. A petition was presented to parliament on September 14, 1975. This day became an annual Māori language day, which today is celebrated in the middle of Mahuru Māori, a September-long focus on promoting the increased use of Māori language in everyday life.
Research shows that picture books support language learning, and in the case of Aotearoa, picture books can support the revitalisation of Te Reo Māori in the community and the reclamation of this heritage language by the Māori community. Picture books in Aotearoa incorporate Te Reo Māori in a number of ways, including publishing books written exclusively in Te Reo Māori. For example, the book Hineraukatauri me te Ara Pūoro, which recounts the traditional story (pūrākau) of the goddess of musical instruments using a traditional poetical rhythm. The book won two awards in the 2025 New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults: the Wright Family Foundation Te Kura Pounamu Award for a Book Originally Written in Te Reo Maori, and the Russell Clark Award for Illustration.
Hineraukatauri me te Ara Pūoro
Other Aotearoa picture books are written bilingually. For example, Titiro/Look, the winner of the 2025 Bookhub Picture Book Award (one of the categories of the New Zealand Book Awards for Children and Young Adults), a board book that pairs whanau (family) and toys to build vocabulary (in Māori and English) for shapes, colours and objects accompanied by striking illustrations and stunning design.
Titiro/Look
Written and illustrated by Gavin Bishop (Tainui, Ngāti Awa)
Translated by Darryn Joseph (Ngāti Maniapoto, Ngāti Rereahu)
Published by Gecko Press, 2024
Buy from Gecko Press
Lastly, many books in Aotearoa are published simultaneously in Māori and English editions. This ensures children in Māori homes and educational settings enjoy the same stories as those in English speaking homes and educational settings. Examples of these come from award-winning Māori publisher Huia, which regularly publishes in both languages simultaneously, including Huia’s latest picture book publication, He Taonga ngā Toka/A Guide to Rocks. In this story, Charlie and his Dad talk about the importance of discussing feelings, using rocks as a metaphor.
He Taonga Te Toka/ A Guide to Rocks
About Nicola Daly
Nicola Daly is a sociolinguist and Associate Professor in the Division of Education, University of Waikato, where she teaches children’s literature. She is the principal investigator of a three-year Marsden funded project working with Huia Publishers and other colleagues to explore Indigenous voices in picture books. She leads the Postgraduate Certificate in Children’s and Young Adult Literature and co-directs the Waikato Picturebook Research Unit. She was a Fulbright New Zealand Scholar at the University of Arizona, USA in 2019/2020.
Support World Kid Lit!
World Kid Lit is a nonprofit that aims to bring diverse, inclusive, global literature into the hands and onto the bookshelves of young people. We rely on grants and donations to support our work. If you can, please support us at Ko-fi. Thanks!
We earn a small commission every time you buy books via the affiliate links on our site, or via our booklists at UK Bookshop.org. This is a much appreciated donation towards our work. Thank you!
World Kid Lit 