I'm making some changes

Kia ora koutou

Today’s newsletter is going to be a slightly less formal update on the state of things (I mean, just look at the state of things).

Firstly, I have recently accepted a job offer. Not only that, but I will be working for people and a kaupapa for which I have deep respect. No more shamefully avoiding eye-contact with my own reflection!

Unfortunately, this means I’m probably not going to be able to hold myself to any sort of consistent output. For this reason, I won’t be offended if anyone switches their membership from paid to unpaid. My financial situation is all good at the moment and there are others who need the money more than me1.

However, I am still hoping to organise my life in a way that allows me to keep up the writing and activism alongside four days a week of work. Right now, there’s so much bouncing around my brain that I am hurting to get onto the page. Even if there’s a disconnect between what people want to read (cutting observations on the current political landscape) and what I want to say (mainly stuff about film, animals and history), I’m always looking for that sweet spot where they intersect.

So please stay subscribed and watch this space! Some things I’ve been thinking about include:

• a continuation on The Activist Canon, my series on films about organising (check out my pieces about Patu!, Two Days One Night and Pom Poko);
• the way people ascribe complex morality to historical events just because the events themselves are complex (e.g. around the colonisation of Palestine or the Spinoff’s recent baby-brained defence of colonial monuments);
• the decline of the United Kingdom as recently depicted in Danny Boyle’s 28 Years Later and Adam Curtis’ Shifty (both of which I loved);
• local body elections, especially with the need to preserve Māori wards; and
• the upcoming NZ International Film Festival.

Finally, as I’ve previously signalled, my debut novella is coming out very soon. My publisher and I are close to locking in a launch date but are looking at times in late-August, early-September. Downstream from Nowhere is a fictional narrative history about ahistoricism and Pākehā subjectivity:

Since the first Pākehā set foot in what would go on to be known as the Messines Valley, it has seen its fair share of history. Music festivals. Failed settlements. Paranormal phenomena. Through a history of everything from sick beasts to sick beats, the stolen land has passed through the hands of church and state and capital and each has left its grubby fingerprints.

Downstream from Nowhere follows this history through the eyes of a selection of history’s most unfortunate scoundrels. These characters were confronted with what they found on the land and in the sky. What they took away from the valley (if anything at all), depended entirely on what they brought in.

A massive thank you to everyone who has subscribed, read and provided feedback on my writing, especially when so much of what is going on in the world is undescribably bleak.

Look after yourselves. Check out the Queer Cinema for Palestine programme this Wednesday. Boycott Doc Edge. Enrol to vote but don’t let your involvement in politics end at the ballot box.

Ngā mihi nui

ur boi jc