Award-winning Māori writer Tina Makereti named 2026 Katherine Mansfield Menton Fellow

Award-winning writer Tina Makereti has been named the 2026 Katherine Mansfield Menton Fellow, a prestigious literary honour that will see her travel to southern France for a three-month writing residency. Makereti, who is of Te Ātiawa, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, and Ngāti Rangatahi-Matakore descent, was selected by the fellowship’s advisory committee for her distinctive voice and her ability to move seamlessly between fiction and nonfiction work. The fellowship includes a $43,000 grant to cover travel, insurance, accommodation, and living costs. As reported by Waatea News on 13 September 2026, the residency provides Makereti access to the writing room at Villa Isola Bella, the historic site where Katherine Mansfield lived and worked between 1919 and 1920. For Makereti, the opportunity offers a rare chance to step away from her teaching responsibilities at Te Herenga Waka – Victoria University of Wellington to focus entirely on her craft. This recognition follows a period of significant success for the author. Her essay collection, This Compulsion in Us, won the General Nonfiction Award at the 2026 Ockham New Zealand Book Awards, and her 2025 novel, The Mires, was a finalist for the Jann Medlicott Acorn Prize for Fiction. Makereti has a long history of literary contribution, including co-editing the anthology Black Marks on the White Page with Witi Ihimaera, a fellow recipient of the Menton residency in 1999. Established in 1970, the Katherine Mansfield Menton Fellowship is the only privately funded international literary fellowship in Aotearoa. Makereti joins a distinguished list of former fellows including Selina Tusitala Marsh and Dame Fiona Kidman. The Arts Foundation notes that the fellowship remains a vital pathway for New Zealand writers to immerse themselves in new work thousands of kilometres from home while carrying the stories and whakapapa of Aotearoa with them.