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You Can’t Say That!

Or Can You?

It’s time for a grown-up conversation about tough issues

By Yvonne van Dongen

View October issue

Features

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In Conversation with Ali Mau

Mau, No Words for This. In Conversation with Ali Mau 31st July 2025 Ali Mau has never been one to stay silent. In her searing new memoir No Words For This, the award-winning journalist, broadcaster and advocate lays bare a childhood marked by trauma — and the strength that emerged…

Steve Braunias – The end is nigh

Alyse Hedley Steve Braunias - The end is nigh In Prepare (& Survive!), a new guide to getting through natural disasters and other apocalyptic events, well-meaning advice meets full-blown existential dread. Steve Braunias, deeply cynical and mildly horrified, reviews the handbook that wants to save your life — and your…

Weekend recipes all swoon, no stress

My Weekend Table Weekend recipes all swoon, no stress 31st July 2025Setting aside the objectively beautiful photographs, My Weekend Table is a seriously solid collection of recipes and a celebration of the kind of food that draws people in and slows time — simple, generous, and deeply satisfying. From sun-drenched…

The Whistleblowers

The Whistleblowers 24th July 2025 In North & South last month doctors and other health professionals said they were being gagged which was, in turn, threatening patient safety. Three case studies are significant precedents of medical whistleblowing and are also reminders of the power of speaking out. Medical whistleblowing is…

Watching the detectives

Photo Shutterstock Watching the detectives 24th July 2025 The Sport Integrity Commission promises to dance like no one’s watching. Except they’re out of step. How can an organisation pledging integrity not be transparent? By Greg BruceThe Sport Integrity Commission (SIC) was set up last year to ensure (according to itself)…

The Culture Compass

The Culture Compass 24th July 2025If 2025 is teaching us anything, it’s that while chaos and turmoil run rampant, art in all its forms will remain.  But still, like air, I’ll rise.  Over the coming weeks, there are some spectacular examples of art and culture rising, including three unique festivals…

Small town socks it to the world

Norsewear full team Small town socks it to the world 24th July 2025 Norsewood, in southern Hawke's Bay, has a population of 150. Like many small regional towns, it's been struggling. Two thirds of local families have someone who has been employed at Norsewear, the factory that was put on…

Sex workers: in their own words

Untold Intimacies: A History of Sex Work in Aotearoa Sex workers: in their own words 24th July 2025 Trailblazers, activists and educators shine bright in an enlightened history of sex work in Aotearoa. By Sky IdriannaThe history of sex work in Aotearoa is so often left in the dark -…

Culture Etc.

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The family album

Interdisciplinary artist Stella Brennan remixes archival objects into anti-nostalgic meditations on progress and history. Thread Between Darkness & Light is Brennan’s most personal artwork, and one of her most beautiful. By Theo Macdonald.

Olafur Eliasson: Beyond the limits of perception

Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki welcomes a retrospective exhibition from one of contemporary art's great ambassadors for climate consciousness and the capacity of art to affect change.

Christine Jeffs: Making A Mistake

Christine Jeffs latest film, A Mistake, is based on author Carl Shuker’s novel in which a surgeon’s split-second decision leads to dire consequences. Shuker talks to Jeffs about directing Hollywood stars and the love of horses that keeps her home. By Carl Shuke

The first XI

Once a thorn in the side of New Zealand sports media, the Alternative Commentary Collective have become Kiwi sports royalty over the last decade (and a year).

Man of Letters

A conversation with painter Julian Hooper. By Theo Macdonald.

Late bloomers and buttocks

Guy Somerset kicks off his new North & South column on reading the backlist with the genius of Barbara Anderson

Perfect pictures

Perfect Pictures By Theo Macdonald Let’s cut to The Chase (Arthur Penn, 1966). For the past five years, the New Zealand International Film Festival has been lost in The Fog (John Carpenter, 1980). Long-term leader Bill Gosden passed away in 2020, 2021’s Auckland leg was rudely cancelled by COVID-19 (We…

Surf’s up

Surf’s up. By Nadia Shaw-Owens

Partner Content

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Appetite for investment

Growing up in the eighties, “a little girl with buck teeth and red pigtails”, Megan Dunn didn’t dream of becoming a Project Manager. She wanted to be Madison, the mermaid played by Daryl Hannah in Splash. By Theo Macdonald.

Smith’s Dream

The late Maurice K Smith spent most of his career practising and teaching architecture in the United States, but also left a vivid impression in the country of his birth. By Lucy Streep.

Virtual Revolution

NORTH & SOUTH + AUT Virtual Revolution AUT puts the latest technology in the hands of today's students AUT has opened its virtual production studio, putting top-end Hollywood production technology in the hands of today’s students. Associate Professor Dafydd Sills-Jones, Head of AUT’s Virtual Creative Precinct, says the virtual production…

Trading concrete for cows: A leap from city life to country bliss

NORTH & SOUTH + FMG Trading concrete for cows: A leap from city life to country bliss When Julia Jones decided to swap city living for the rural idyll of a lifestyle block, she was signing up for more than just fresh air and open space. It was a dream…

Four Corners

Utopia Lab

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Too Many People Are Dying On Our Roads

We need better roads, not better people.

Intensive Dairy Farming Is Killing The Environment

New Zealand should halve its number of cows.

The Criminal Justice System Is Broken

How we could reduce crime by locking up less people.

New Zealand Has A Dental Care Crisis

How do we fix it?

Why We Should Borrow More Money

A case for changing the way we think about national debt.

Bring Back the Glory Days of Rail

Why it's a smart idea to re-invest heavily in our national rail system.

Backstory

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Heaven or a Place on Earth?

What awaits us after death?

The Lost Islands

Historic artefacts washed up by the tides hint at lost lands whose full stories we can only guess at.

Beyond the Badlands

Strange monsters and ominous ghosts can be traced to repressed memories of violent histories, argues one Australian researcher looking at the past through a novel lens.

The Northern Bear

Our relationship with Russia has been characterised by instability — cycling between friend and foe, the nation and its citizens have often become symbols of our own fear and anxieties.

Echoes of History

Most New Zealanders remain unaware of the Surafend massacre by Anzac soldiers in 1918.

Gone Bush

To evade New Zealand’s draft in both world wars, scores of conscientious objectors fled deep into the bush.

Closed Encounters

Covid-19 checkpoints are not the first time some parts of the country have been sealed off from the rest.

As a Matter of Fact

Dismissal by Western scientists of mātauranga Māori and indigenous knowledge as unscientific “myth” often succumbs to its own criticism.

Archive Highlights

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Bert’s Labyrinth

Survivors are finally speaking out — but years earlier, a journalist tried to publish the inside story of the notorious Auckland commune. Then she came too close. By Anke Richter

Issues

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