Celebrated Māori writer Renée (Ngāti Kahungunu), who "described herself as a lesbian feminist with socialist working-class ideals, and was considered a pioneer in writing about working-class women, takatāpui and Māori," died December 11, the Post reported. She was 94. Renée was a playwright, novelist, poet, short story writer, essayist and blogger, "and an esteemed writing teacher and mentor. Her plays were among the first to put women center stage, and her fiction work did the same thing."
Renée, whose full name was Renée Gertrude Taylor, left school at 12 to work in woolen mills, and later a printing factory where she learned how to bind books. She had thought she would pursue higher education, but her mother said she had to work so her younger brother and sister could go to school, too.
Renée began writing seriously at 50, publishing 10 books of fiction and a memoir, more than 20 plays, numerous short stories and essays and, for 10 years, a weekly blog, Renée's Wednesday Busk. Her best known work was Wednesday to Come, a play about the women in a working-class family coping in the Depression, which was famously set around a coffin and included scones being baked on stage.
In 2006, Renée was appointed an Officer of the NZ Order of Merit for services to literature and drama. In 2013, she was awarded the Ngā Tohu ā Tā Kingi Ihaka for a lifetime contribution to ngā toi Māori, and the Playmarket Award in 2017, for a significant artistic contribution to theatre in Aotearoa. She received the Prime Minister's Award for Literary Achievement in Fiction in 2018.
A lifelong fan of crime fiction, Renée published her first crime novel, The Wild Card, with the Cuba Press when she turned 90, and a sequel, Blood Matters, three years later. Both were shortlisted for the Ngaio Marsh Awards.
Mary McCallum, Renée's publisher at Mākaro and the Cuba presses, said her work over nearly half a century helped bring those on the perimeters of society to a place of safety and power. McCallum described their connection as "one of the great relationships of my life--publisher to author to start with and then, with two roadies, three plane trips, four books, multiple festivals and other events, and thousands of phone calls and emails and edits under our belts, we became the greatest of friends.... Wherever we went, I saw how people were drawn to and uplifted by this gracious, generous, straight-talking, unapologetically political, indomitable woman, who had weathered so much and yet was fighting for their corner, even into her 90s."
In a tribute, Unity Books, Wellington, wrote in the Spinoff: "Renée was our much-loved author, customer and long-time friend and supporter of us all here at Unity Books. Renée always brought together a genial, efficient and incisive approach to her work and writing. She was so inclusive and energetic in her great friendship with us all over the decades, her involvement with us and the literary community was always unburdened by a "me me me" sentimentality. Renée was an 'us us us' person. We will miss her very much but of course her writing remains forever."
From the poem "Tiger Country," featured in Renée's final blog post:
Some nights after the sun has flamed
and seabirds search the pastures of the sea
tigers come out and lean gentle over your chair--
wrap you in a striped shawl of sturdy warmth
fold their paws and purr soft in the silent room.
This is the danger time. Stand up. Walk slow.
Their eyes are on the game and you're it.