Coming to terms with his loss is, for Tama, a voyage of self-discovery and a recognition of his responsibility to uphold the tradition that is his father's legacy. Past, present, and future interconnect as Tama's individual response to his father's death is framed by the history of his whanau, and the mythic history of Maori legend: the separation of Rangitane, the sky father, from Papatuanuku, the earth mother, so that their children could dwell in the light. It is at once a mourning of the dead and an affirmation of the living, for Tama's personal grief and memories are tempered by the spirit of love and kinship that draws the community together on such occasions. Structured by the ceremonial patterns of the funeral itself, Tangi is a work that mines the emotional intensity of loss and the communal rituals surrounding death. Ihimaera's first novel, Tangi, is an extended meditation on the subject of Pounamu, Pounamu 's concluding story: Tama Mahana's return from Wellington (the emerald city) to attend the burial of his father. It is his granddaughter who articulates the dilemma that the young people face: "The world isn't Maori any more. Pounamu, or greenstone-semi-precious jade traditionally used to make weaponry and jewelry, is Ihimaera's symbol of Maoritanga, and he contrasts it with the cold, glittering attractions of Pakeha culture in "the emerald city." One story in particular, "The Whale," dramatizes the conflicting claims of tradition and change, as an old man sits in the meeting house mourning the decay of the world that he knew and the loss of the young to the city's siren call. Both celebration and lamentation, they are lyrical evocations of a rural, communal way of life that is rapidly becoming a thing of the past. Many of the stories in Ihimaera's first collection, Pounamu, Pounamu, are set in the village of Waituhi, the geographical and cultural hearth-and heart-of the Whanau A Kai to which much of his subsequent fiction returns. His work proclaims the vitality and significance of New Zealand's "other culture," one that Ihimaera suggests enriches the lives of Maori and Pakeha alike. Drawing upon the rich resources of Maori myth and legend, he blends the past with the present, evoking the ancestral framework of historical continuity that is an essential part of Maoritanga. Although his early works can be seen as pastoral and elegiac, Ihimaera does not idealize his subjects rather, he renders their trials and conflicts, joys and sorrows, shortcomings and strengths, with remarkable honesty and clarity. Writing with "both love and anger," Ihimaera documents the traditional Maori way of life and the changes it has undergone since the coming of the Pakeha. A central feature of his imaginative landscape is the whanau, or extended family community, an emotional and cultural bastion eroded by urbanization and social fragmentation.
Witi Ihimaera writes with a keen awareness of his cultural heritage, and a profound commitment to the values and traditions of his people. Like to offer: a personal vision of Maori life as I see it, the Maori side of New Zealand's dual heritage of culture. Cultural difference is not a bad thing, it can be very exciting, and it can offer a different view of the world, value system, and interpretation of events. So far I have written about exclusively Maori people within an exclusively Maori framework, using our own oral tradition of Maori literature, our own mythology, as my inspiration. I like to think that I write with both love-aroha-and anger in the hope that the values of Maori life will never be lost. Not to become the first Maori novelist but to render my people into words as honestly and as candidly as I could to present a picture of Maoritanga which is our word for the way we feel and are, in the hope that our values will be maintained. It is important to both Maori and Pakeha that they realize their dual cultural heritage, and that is why I began to write. There are two cultural landscapes in my country, the Maori and the Pakeha (European), and although all people, including Maori, inhabit the Pakeha landscape, very few know the Maori one.