Collection: Nafanua Purcell Kersel

Author photo: Ebony Lamb

Nafanua Purcell Kersel (Satupa‘itea, Faleālupo, Aleipata, Tuaefu) is a writer, poet and performer who was born in Sāmoa and raised in Te-Whanganui-a-Tara, Aotearoa. Her poetry has been widely published. She has an MA from the IIML at Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington and won the 2022 Biggs Family Prize in Poetry for Black Sugarcane, her debut collection, which went on to win the Mary and Peter Biggs Award for Poetry at the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards 2026. She lives in Te Matau-a-Māui Hawke’s Bay. She is the 2025 Emerging Pasifika Writer in Residence at the IIML, Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington.