An Analysis of Witi Ihimaera’s Whale Rider Essay

In Witi Ihimaeras novel Whale Rider we pursue Rawiri as he goes through his life watching the growth, incidents and magic of his niece Kahu. Kahu is indentured to be the next chief of the Maori in Whangara, New Zealand, a race that has desc revokeed from the legendary whale rider. However, Kahu is, as Nanny Flowers says, Hungry for her grandfathers love, (Ihimaera 34) and struggles to contract it because she is a girl. The author presents this story through Kahus Uncle Rawiris item of view, and this outside view of Kahu is brilliant because it creates tension between what the proofreader, author, Rawiri and Kahu are thought process and allows the reader to fill in the gaps themselves. The story would lack suspense and penury if we knew Kahus thoughts and would lose all aspects of mystery.Whale Rider creates a distort medium between reality and the characters minds, which is what keeps the reader guessing, second-guessing and wondering(a) all the way up until the moment of truth in the end. Ihimaera makes it the readers job to presume Kahus thoughts as opposed to in reality providing them. Rawiri comes into play in that that he has had a special connection with Kahu since her birth, and being in a first-person perspective with Rawiri makes Rawiri like the reader in that they reciprocally want all of the answers.If the novel were from the point of view of Kahu, the main focus, the dapple would lose all curiosity. It was thought provoking and interesting to see Kahu get to for her grandfathers acceptance from before she could even walk. If Kahu narrated then we wouldnt be able to experience her development from birth, and would lose all of her toddler years. Those years keep Kahu a question and make us, like Rawiri, unavailing to wait for her to come of age and either become the whale rider or not.Whale Rider carries itself primarily on pauperism towards the end. For the readers it is for the books climax. For Rawiri, Nanny Flowers, and even Kahu herself, it is for the end of Kahus puerility and for the answers to be revealed. Ihimaera does a great job of manipulating the motivation of the reader and intertwining it with the motivation of the characters while also leaving a prism in the nerve of reality and literature where some of the gaps and missing pieces are left to be filled with the readers empathy, curiosity and imagination.