New Zealand Listener

I’m sure I’m not the only person who has lamented in recent weeks how hard it is to find an outstanding local obituary these days. I know what you’re going to say: perhaps the Listener should do something about that. And perhaps you’re right. But in

Mike Hamblyn, Dunedin Vladimir Putin : “A big ego beats a big hat.” – Rex McGregor, Auckland Putin: “But if you don’t, I will look for you, I will find you and I will kill you.” – Christopher Bray, Martinborough. Putin: “Take your cap off. It makes y

Australia’s prime minister has hit a milestone, unremarkable to modern New Zealanders, but one that slows, if not halts, Canberra’s churning door that flings out prime ministers like a giddying roundabout. At August’s end, Scott Morrison, 53, notched

With nearly threequarters of us awaiting a second jab of the Pfizer vaccine sometime before Christmas and currently twiddling our thumbs in lockdown, it might be worthwhile considering what the hell has happened to the economy over the past year? Aft

We treat soil like dirt. We poison it with heavy metals, strip it of life with herbicides and over-fertilise it with artificial nitrogen. We harm it by growing only single crops, hurt it through overgrazing and seem happy to watch it disappear before

Man-made erosion results in continuing large-scale losses of topsoil in New Zealand, according to the Environment Aotearoa 2019 report produced by the Ministry for the Environment and Stats NZ. It says an estimated 192 million tonnes of soil is lost

Hawke’s Bay produces half of the country’s total fruit and vegetables, as well as being recognised as a major wine region. That’s because the Heretaunga Plains is classified as having class 1 soils, the type found in only 3% of the entire country. Ye

It was the cruellest of ironies. On April 18, just a day short of the first anniversary of Fiji managing to subdue its first Covid-19 outbreak, Prime Minister Voreqe (Frank) Bainimarama announced the start of the harshest period in living memory for

About 15% of the global population is deficient in selenium, primarily as a result of low levels of this vital mineral in soils. Low selenium levels inhibit the ability of selenium-containing proteins, with significant anti-inflammatory and antioxida

Just seven minutes from Nadi International Airport is a pristine paradise known to both Fijians and tourists as “the new Denarau”. Before Covid came along, Naisoso Island was set to boom. But according to its owner, property development group Relcorp

David Seymour, the Act leader, may or may not be an alien. Neither of us is able to provide a definitive answer to this intriguing dilemma. He had a go: “Well, you never know. And if you were an alien, would you know that you were?” If you did know,

It’s hard to find a pundit or pollster who would stake their reputation on a future David Seymour-led government, but the Act leader shares some useful commonalities with two prime ministerial standouts, Sir John Key and Jacinda Ardern. Seymour’s ris

Most of us are reluctant to pay more than $20 for a bottle of wine, and we can find highly enjoyable stuff at that price. But on special occasions, why not indulge yourself in a special bottle? The New Zealand wines featured here are all in the $75-$

Telehealth comes into its own during periods of lockdown, but even in normal times, it can improve life for patients, as one tech-based nursing service being piloted at Waikato Hospital is showing. Joy Wright, 55, is living with advanced breast cance

According to the wags who have colonised the entertainment information database IMDb, the “1pm Daily [Covid] Update takes place in the imaginary island nation of New Zealand, a utopian society where science, facts, strong leadership and a genuine car

When the pandemic forced a suspension of international cricket in March 2020, Indian men’s coach Ravi Shastri declared the enforced break was a godsend for his team, who were running on empty after 10 months on the road. This was their schedule: from

Auckland’s Eileen Merriman is so productive – not “prolific”, a word that suggests ease and glibness – it sometimes feels as if she has sprung fully formed on to the New Zealand fiction scene, like Athena from the head of Zeus. Except that, since Mer

It was a veteran journalist, and not a police detective, who finally brought down Jeffrey Epstein. A dogged two-year investigation by Julie K Brown, headlined “Perversion of justice”, first broke in the Miami Herald in November 2018. It described how

Puzzle No 1614 1. Which musical instrument did Laurens Hammond revolutionise in 1934? (5) 4. Which city’s airport is named after Frédéric Chopin? (6) 9. What is a wide ornamental strip of gathered material sewn onto a skirt? (7) 10. Which US city is

Erik Thomson has got his old job back. He played ever-personable patriarch Dave Rafter in hit Australian family drama Packed to the Rafters for six seasons from 2008. Now, he and television-wife Rebecca Gibney and much of the rest of the cast are ret

Charlie Watts, the Rolling Stones’ drummer from their inception in 1962, was always a man apart. A jazz aficionado in the most enduring rock band of the past 60 years; poised and humble in a culture that often favours the dissolute and self-aggrandis

Taika Waititi’s name is on Reservation Dogs as co-creator and executive producer, and he co-wrote the first episode. So, it’s unsurprising that, despite the comedy series being about four Native American teens living on a reservation in contemporary

DOCUMENTARY: 9/11: LIFE UNDER ATTACK (TVNZ 1, 8.35pm). Made for Britain’s ITV, this 90-minute documentary revisits the harrowing events of 9/11 by using recordings made at the time to tell the story of that day. The programme eschews any retrospectiv

With a new stage production opening in London and this movie musical arriving on Amazon, it appears young Cinders is having a moment. This one has Cuban-American pop star Camila Cabello as a Cinderella who doesn’t conform to the princess-in-waiting o

ABOMINABLE (TVNZ 2, 7.00pm). Sweet-natured and colourful animated adventure about three kids trying to get a lost yeti back to the Himalayas after he’s found in downtown Shanghai. One of the trio, Jin, is voiced by Tenzing Norgay Trainor, grandson of

The day Marisa goes to view the house she will move into with Jake, with whom she will soon, she plans, have a baby, a magpie flies into a room. Marisa hates birds. She hates their flappiness, their nasty sharp beaks, “the smallness of their dead peb

Ayear ago, the NZSO gathered a socially distanced orchestra on the stage of the Michael Fowler Centre and livestreamed a concert called “Passion”. New Zealand was under Level 2 Covid restrictions. The musicians played under the baton of young New Zea

The welcome swallows, those elegant, darting harbingers of spring, are back. We always welcome them, even if they do nest in the tractor bay. We don’t mind the nesting. We do mind the copious amounts of swallow poop that decorate the interior of the

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Eating the right types of foods, especially those high in dietary fibre and resistant starch, can support a healthy population of gut microbes and benefit our overall health. In The CSIRO Gut Care Guide, leading researchers from Australia’s national

People who are infected with Covid-19 immediately before or after surgery are 50% more likely to have venous thromboembolism, a condition in which dangerous blood clots form in veins, according to research from the UK’s University of Birmingham. The