A reo Māori translation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth: a gripping tale of ambition and betrayal, prophetic visions and dripping blood.

The dark and captivating William Shakespeare play Macbeth is brought to life in te reo Māori by the doyenne of reo Māori translators – Te Haumihiata Mason – in Matapēhi (Macbeth) William Shakespeare, published yesterday by Auckland University Press.

The force behind the translations of The Diary of Anne Frank and Romeo and Juliet, a daughter of Rūātoki and a master of her craft, Mason breathes new life into Shakespeare’s language and carries Macbeth to a new realm of rhythm, power and poetry.

This book is a treasure for lovers of Shakespeare and te reo Māori alike, and of the alchemy that sparks where they meet.

This dual-language edition places Māori and English side by side, moving through the play like twin currents: distinct, entwined and alive with meaning. Each language casts its own light, revealing fresh depths in the other.

Shakespeare’s Scottish play is a tale of prophecy, ambition and murder; of lairds and ladies and kings; of witches, cauldrons and of “double, double, toil and trouble” – all in a world where “fair is foul and foul is fair”.

Born by the sea in Tauranga Moana and raised in Rūātoki in the nation of Tūhoe, Mason (Tūhoe, Ngāti Pango, Te Arawa) has spent a lifetime devoted to te reo Māori.

Her formative years were spent in a monolingual Māori language community at a time when most of the food on the table was sourced from the land, bush and river.

Growing up in this environment instilled in Mason a passion for te reo Māori, a love of native flora and fauna and a compulsion for growing things.

Persuaded by Tīmoti Kāretu to attend university in her 30s, Mason went on to become a lecturer at Waikato University and then worked for many years at Te Taura Whiri, eventually becoming Kaitiaki Reo and a national authority on the language.

Her book Te Rātaka a Tētahi Kōhine, a translation of Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl, was distributed to schools across Aotearoa in 2019.

Mason’s translation of Romeo and Juliet, Rōmeo rāua ko Hurieta, was published by Auckland University Press in 2023.