Molten Clefts of Magma

Poets Serie Barford and Michael Steven deliver their powerful verses at a live Going West event – Shifted Ground – in Titirangi, April 2022.

Performance, Season 4Going West Festival12 June 2022Poetry, New Zealand, Pasifika, New Zealand Literature, Going West, Lopdell House, west Auckland poetry

Forward Into the World of Light

Daren Kamali and Karlo Mila live at the Going West gala, 2021.

Performance, Season 4Going West Festival29 May 2022Poetry, Tonga, FIji, New Zealand, Aotearoa, NZ Literature, The Goddess Muscle, Vunimaqo and Me, Going West, Playhouse Theatre, Glen Eden, Daren Kamali, Karlo Mila, Pita Turei, Fijian musical instruments

Words and Melody

Poet Paula Green in conversation with creative collaborators Bill Manhire, poet, and Norman Meehan, musician and jazz composer.

Discourse, Season 3Going West Festival28 March 2021Poetry, Music, Bill Manhire, Norman Meehan, Paula Green, Small Holes in the Silence

Writing in the Night Kitchen

What does it mean to be a writer, a creative person, while also parenting small children? Poet Karlo Mila and writer and cartoonist/illustrator Sarah Laing share their experiences.

Discourse, Season 2Going West Festival3 December 2020Writing, Poetry, Parenting, Children, Murray Gray, Nicola Strawridge, Sarah Laing, Karlo Mila, David Larsen

Post Prandial Poetry

Allen Curnow reads at Going West in 2001, introduced by Glenn Colquhoun. This was Allen Curnow’s last public performance.

Performance, Season 1Going West Festival24 September 2020Poetry, Wild Iron, The Bells of St Babels, Murray Gray, Glenn Colquhoun, Allen Curnow

Working Class Heroes

Poets Serie Barford and Glenn Colquhoun celebrate their working class roots as part of a train journey west called the Oblivion Express.

Performance, Season 1Going West Festival20 August 2020The Going West Oblivion Express Steam Train, Poetry, Working Class, West Auckland, South Auckland, Te Reo, Glenn Colquhoun, Serie Barford, Cherie Barford

Here Comes That Childhood Pond Again

This session brings together poet, writer, actor and playwright Peter Bland and poet, blogger, and anthologist Paula Green to traverse the world of childhood, children’s poetry and writing with warmth, wit and word-play.

Discourse, Season 1Going West Festival11 August 2020Poetry, Children's Poetry, Writing for Children, Childhood, The Night Kite, When Gulls Fly High, Flamingo Bendalingo, Peter Bland, Paula Green

Small Holes in the Silence

Bill Manhire reads a selection of classic New Zealand poems, with accompaniment by jazz ensemble Norman Meehan, Hannah Griffin and Blair Latham

Performance, Season 1Going West Festival9 July 2020Poetry, Music, Bill Manhire, Norman Meehan, Hannah Griffin, Blair Latham, New Zealand Poetry, Jazz, Piano, Saxophone

The poetry of Anne Kennedy

In 2014 Anne Kennedy was selected as the Going West Books and Writers Festival Curnow Reader, a gala night honour bestowed each year on a poet of prominence. Kennedy reads from her book The Darling North, which won the 2013 New Zealand Post Book Award for poetry.

Performance, Season 1Going West Festival2 July 2020Poetry, Anne Kennedy, Allen Curnow, A Loop in Lone Kauri Road, The Darling North

Breathing Words

Robert Sullivan, Bernard Makoare and Ngāhuia Te Awekotuku discuss and perform taonga pūoro, oral and written Maori literature at the very first session of the Going West in 1996.

Performance, Season 1Going West Festival18 June 2020Te Ao Māori, Te Reo Māori, taonga pūoro, Māori music, Māori written literature, Poetry, Ngahuia Te Awekotuku, Robert Sullivan, Bernard Makoare