Wars Without End

Wars Without End by Danny Keegan is a captivating and incisive account of New Zealand’s Land Wars – from a Māori perspective.

From the earliest days of European settlement in New Zealand, Māori have struggled to hold on to their land.

Tensions began early, arising from disputed land sales. When open conflict between Māori and Imperial forces broke out in the 1840s and 1860s, the struggles only intensified. For both sides, land was at the heart of the conflict, one that casts a long shadow over race relations in modern-day New Zealand.

Wars Without End is the first book to approach this contentious subject from a Māori point of view, focusing on the Māori resolve to maintain possession of customary lands and explaining the subtleties of an ongoing and complex conflict.

Written by senior Māori historian Danny Keenan, Wars Without End eloquently and powerfully describes the Māori reasons for fighting the Land Wars, placing them in the wider context of the Māori struggle to retain their sovereign estates.

The Land Wars might have been quickly forgotten by Pākehā, but for Māori these longstanding struggles are wars without end.

• Published: 2 February 2021
• ISBN: 9780143774938
• Imprint: Penguin
• Format: Paperback
• Pages: 304

Danny Keenan is of Ngāti Te Whiti ki Te Ātiawa descent. Keenan has a public service background, mainly the Department of Māori Affairs from 1981 to 1989. When the Department was disestablished in 1989, he returned to Massey University, completing a PhD in history in 1994. Appointed lecturer in New Zealand history, he became senior lecturer in 2004. He was a founding member of Te Pouhere Korero, the Māori historians network.

Keenan has published widely on Māori and New Zealand history. His most recent book, Te Whiti O Rongomai and the Resistance of Parihaka, received a Ngā Kupu Ora Māori Book Award in 2016. He is now a full-time writer, living in Whanganui.