Author(s): Albert Wendt

Maori Books

Auckland, one summer weekend. A family fused together by the energies of multicultural Aotearoa New Zealand faces meltdown as tensions build between migrant and New Zealand-born generations, and between Samoan, Maori and Palagi family members. The Songmaker's Chair tells of a Samoan family, the 'Aiga Sa-Peseola, who have been in Auckland since the 1950s. Over three generations the family have intermarried with Maori and Pakeha to develop what they refer to as the Peseola Way. Central to that way is the magnificent Polynesian exploration and settlement of the Pacific, and a songmaking tradition which Peseola Olaga, the family patriarch has inherited from his father. At the heart of the play is the love between Peseola Olaga and Malaga, his wife, and how they've struggled to give their children a good life in Aotearoa. Theirs is the Peseola Way: defiant, honest and unflinching even in the face of death.