Essay

The Monday excerpt: Why are New Zealanders so fucking intolerant of anyone with a brain, ie intellectuals?

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In an excerpt from his new book of essays, Roger Horrocks examines the anti-intellectual climate in New Zealand. Warning: includes fatuous statements by Gordon McLauchlan. Every culture has areas of repression that make it distinctive or notorious, such as various forms of puritanism, racism, or sexism. New Zealand has outgrown much of the puritanism that dominated its way … Read more

How to spend $1000 at Unity Books: the final episode

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As winner of the 2015 Nigel Cox Award, Steve Braunias was awarded $1000 worth of books at Unity. He’s finally spent the last dollar, and reports on his shopping spree. The thing about winning the Nigel Cox Prize is that it comes as a total surprise to the chosen authors, and I hate surprises. The … Read more

The Monday excerpt: Andrew O’Hagan on the strange story of “Satoshi Nakamoto”

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An excerpt from the latest London Review of Books. Spinoff Review of Books literary editor Steve Braunias writes: Andrew O’Hagan! Novelist, essayist, very smart person who wears a suit and tie even when he’s writing at home – every inch an aesthete, all that, but he’s also an awesome reporter and his latest get in the … Read more

Danyl McLauchlan: Five things I was thinking about while writing Mysterious Mysteries of the Aro Valley

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In which Wellington writer Danyl McLauchlan approaches his latest novel Mysterious Mysteries of the Aro Valley from five directions. He took the photos, too. Thing one: Tone I was about halfway through writing this book when a friend asked me what it was about. I thought for a while, then answered, “Sorry, but I can’t really put it into words.” He … Read more

Before he was an Auckland Council candidate Bill Ralston was the wildest man in news

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Yesterday afternoon three legends of news had lunch at (where else?) Prego. The Herald‘s former editor-in-chief Tim Murphy and ex-Mediaworks’ head of news Mark Jennings interrogated ’90s news icon Bill Ralston about his run for Council. Ahead of our publication of Murphy’s account of the lunch, Jennings remembers the glory days of his former colleague. Bill and … Read more

What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this: Katherine Mansfield on the Napier-Taupo road

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Peter Wells reviews Katherine Mansfield’s The Urewera Notebook, edited by Anna Plumridge. The Napier-Taupo road has the high status of being one of those roads on which you lose cellphone coverage. This means you leave behind the 21st Century. You plunge into the uncertainties of real time, presented naked of technology to the landscape. And the landscape itself … Read more

Last fan standing: The tragic tale of a lonely Grey’s Anatomy lover

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It’s hard being a loner fan. Madeleine Chapman speaks of her struggle to find a single friend who still cares about Grey’s Anatomy. Contains spoilers, if anyone still cares.  “Have you watched the latest Grey’s yet?” “Mad, I’m sorry to say that I’m not sure if I ever will.” That was it. On the 18th of December … Read more

Flying Nun: In love with the sound of their own voice, more like

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An essay by Gary Steel on the hits and myths of Flying Nun, as chronicled by the record company’s founder Roger Shepherd in his new best-selling memoir. Flying Nun. Was there ever a record label that was more famous than any of its acts? It’s the home of the “Dunedin sound”, The Clean, The Chills, … Read more

Life in tin boxes: 24 powerful photographs from Azraq refugee camp

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Just over two years ago, the Azraq refugee camp was opened in Jordan to house Syrians fleeing their war-ravaged home. Today around 35,000 refugees live there. World Vision’s Simon Day recently returned from Azraq. Here he shares some of what he saw 1 Shimmering on the horizon are the white boxes of the Azraq refugee … Read more

You Shouldn’t Dream Here: On the tragic Auckland most of us never see

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In a deeply personal essay, youth worker Iain Stevens* tells of the small joys and savage pains of his work with some of our community’s most damaged families. I wondered what it was going to take to break my heart. I’ve been a youth advocate for just on four years. Moving all around West Auckland, … Read more

All aboard! A beginner’s guide to jumping on the Warriors bandwagon

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Everybody loves a good bandwagon, and the Warriors one is once again pulling into the station. Experienced bandwagonner James Dann has some sage advice for those thinking of jumping aboard. So the Warriors pulled out their best performance of the season on Saturday, demolishing last year’s beaten finalists the Brisbane Broncos at Mt Smart Stadium. … Read more

I arrived in Australia to a warm welcome. Others are met by the ugly face of sanctioned inhumanity

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On the second anniversary of her migration to the Lucky Country, Di White is moved to tears by Chasing Asylum, an acclaimed new film about Australian refugee policy. It’s been two years since I moved to Australia. I arrived on a plane on 4 June 2014. I remember the day well. I was moving between … Read more

A cease-and-desist letter to Max Key: please stop stealing my look

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After Max Key flagrantly and repeatedly copied her style, The Spinoff’s editorial assistant Madeleine Chapman was left no option but to hire legal representation in a bid to uphold the integrity of her personal brand. Mr Max Key St Stephens Avenue Parnell Dear Mr Key: The Spinoff Legal Counsel represents MISS MADELEINE CHAPMAN. If you are represented … Read more

Book of the Week: The murder of Osama bin Laden

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Finlay Macdonald reviews The Killing of Osama bin Laden by Seymour Hersh  About the worst thing anyone will say of Seymour Hersh’s journalism is that he’s only “one of America’s greatest investigative reporters”. But that’s the New York Times for you, always hedging. Others don’t hold back so much: “The most feared investigative reporter in … Read more

The Monday excerpt: Buster Stiggs and the birth of punk rock in New Zealand

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Fair to describe Buster Stiggs as a legend. He was in New Zealand’s first punk band, Suburban Reptiles, and then joined his old schoolmate Phil Judd in The Swingers, who created maybe the greatest song in NZ rock history – ‘Counting The Beat’. He recently penned the first part of a memoir in the autumn … Read more

Ockham national book awards: the poet who wore a swan

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Poet Chris Tse won two awards at last night’s Ockham NZ Book Awards – best first book of poetry, and best dressed male. He tells the truth about those swans on his shoulders. Something I wasn’t prepared for heading into the Ockhams ceremony was the number of people who would want to touch me. I … Read more

Ockham national book awards: and the winner is…who the hell is Stephen Daisley?

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Forget Craig Marriner! We have a new strangest-ever winner of a New Zealand book award. Woah! The award for best dressed female went to Stella Chrysostomou, manager of Page and Blackmore bookstore in Nelson, and the best dressed male prize went to poet Chris Tse, who wore like these feathery swan things on his shoulders, sort of like … Read more

Ockham national book awards: Does my narrative look big in this?

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A horse walks into a bar, and the bartender says, “No, the book awards are next door.” Mein gott! The book awards are on tonight, in a matter of hours, any minute! There will be so many intellectuals as well as publishers. And the thing that will be occupying the thoughts and anxieties of just … Read more

Ockham national book awards: The curious case of the strangest ever winner of a book award in New Zealand

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As the tension builds towards tomorrow night’s Ockham national book awards, Graeme Lay shudders to recall the time the award for best novel went to a bogan – and Steve Braunias barges his way in at the end of the story, and adds a highly unusual postscript. Book awards are wonderful. They’re also fraught. Glittering … Read more

Ockham national book awards: Steve Braunias interviews Patrick Evans

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All week this week we focus on books and authors nominated for next Tuesday’s Ockham national book awards. Today: a goddamned epic interview (6000 words!) with fiction finalist Patrick Evans, conducted by Spinoff Review of Books literary editor Steve Braunias. The live email interview is seldom practised but will revolutionise journalism as we know it, … Read more

Ockham national book awards: The life and bohemian times of Maurice Gee

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An excerpt (lightly edited – the least it needed! So many semi-colons!) from the masterful biography Maurice Gee: Life and Work, by Rachel Barrowman (Victoria University Press). In this early chapter, she writes of Gee as a young, unhappy misfit in Wellington, putting up with James K Baxter and enjoying his time as a hospital … Read more

For the love of pod: how podcasts saved my life, then nearly destroyed it

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Intimate, informative and idiosyncratic, podcasts are the media format that everyone seems to love. But beware, says Holly Walker: podcast puppy love can quickly spiral into aural obsession. I was having a rough time. My partner was sick and we had a small child. I was working full time, and doing most of the domestic … Read more

Poetry Idol’s organiser is shocked and saddened to learn that slam poetry is “dumb-ass and not good”

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Yesterday we published a furious denunciation of slam poetry which felt like it demanded a counterweight. Comedian and performance poet Penny Ashton – the founder of Poetry Idol – offered her services, and we gladly accepted. Today I happily pulled on my bohemian attire – including a T-Shirt that says “Feminist Buzz Killing It” – and sat down … Read more

Essay: Slam poetry is despicable and dumb-ass and not good

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Opinion: Andrew Paul Wood wishes a pox upon slam poetry, that “horrid practice” which is currently in vogue and features in the upcoming Auckland Writers Festival. (Read performance poet Penny Ashton disagreeing with him here.) “I can’t bear these accounts I read in The Times and elsewhere of these poetry slams, in which various young men and … Read more

Stevie TV: David Carradine predicts his own grisly death in hallucinatory ‘Eastern Western’ Kung Fu

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Steve Braunias watches a deeply morbid episode of meandering ’70s action-adventure Kung Fu. Warning: content may be disturbing. Every second Wednesday my daughter and three of her pals come over to the house after school before their dance lesson, and they always ask for macaroni and Kung Fu. I tape it from the Jones Channel and one … Read more

Why the end of the Pop-up Globe isn’t the end of the world

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There’s been a major push to keep the Pop-up Globe in Auckland. Sam Brooks says it’s deeply misguided. If you’ve been lucky enough to walk around Central Auckland over the past three months, then you’ll have seen a large white silo building sitting in the carpark that you might’ve tried to park in when the Civic … Read more