We went ashore one morning: Lessons of Sunday Island

This article reflects on the author's time on New Zealand's northernmost landmass, Raoul Island, and questions both what an artist/writer might bring to such an encounter and what they might take from it. The article explores and celebrates the paradoxical nature of outlying islands, how their bracing, confronting reality might bring us closer to the heart of our evolving notion of Aotearoa/New Zealand. In such far‐flung places, we realise our identity not only as inhabitants of an island‐nation but also as ‘Oceanians’, as people of the broader Pacific.