BOOKS on the South Pacific

Te Ao Hou, July 1956, Page 56

BOOKS on the South Pacific by J. C STURM Most people form their own private pictures of the places they have never seen. These are usually inaccurate, frequently romantic, and always incomplete. After reading some recent books on the South Pacific area I have had to give my ideas about island life a complete overhaul. And books that can correct a false impression are always worth reading. During coronation year, Queen Salote and her Kingdom of Tonga became headline news in Britain. This six foot three Polynesian Queen charmed English crowds with her gracious dignity and warm spontaneous smile. She will always be remembered as the Queen who drove to Westminster Abbey in an open carriage in spite of pouring rain. Queen Salote and Her Kingdom, by Sir Harry Luke, published 1954, and Ten Years in Tonga, by J. S. N 1, published 1955, both give full-length portraits of Tonga's Queen, and in different ways attempt to cover Tonga's historical background, her independent relationship with Great Britain, and her socio-economic conditions today. That is a big order for any author, no matter how small the country he is studying, and neither of these writers really probes far below the descriptive level. After a first quick reading several historical landmarks and figures stand out. There is Will Mariner, a fifteen year old boy who was captured by Tongans in 1806 and lived with them for four years. King George Tubou I, Queen Salote's great-great-grandfather, became the “Grand Old Man of the Pacific and the Maker of modern Tonga … and preserved his throne when other Pacific monarchies fell.” Shirley Baker was a missionary who “clearly meddled in politics, became Prime Minister of Tonga, but overplayed his hand and paid the penalty.” There are some mouth-watering descriptions of Tongan cooking and feasting, a startling account of Falcon Island which is sometimes above the sea and sometimes below it, and Mr Neill ends his book with an extremely interesting and thoughtful study of Pitcairn Island. Of the two books, Sir Harry Luke's is the more readable and entertaining. At his best, Sir Harry writes with mischievous humour, as in his account of a young Tongan noble whose sweetheart was in danger. “One night he spirited the girl away in his canoe and concealed her in a cave, where he visited her every night with bananas and yams and other food.” Mr Neill's book gives a more detailed picture but his painstaking thoroughness of an ex-administrator makes for slower and more sober reading. Doctor to the Islands, first published in 1952, is written and illustrated by Tom Davis, a half-caste Raratongan educated in this country, and his wife, Lydia Davis, born and bred in New Zealand. This is only one reason why the book should appeal to a New Zealand public. I have seldom read such an absorbing account of how two people decided to do something and set about doing it. Their story begins: “I was married in Dunedin in the South Island of New Zealand on the 4th of September, 1940, and for my wedding I wore a black fur coat.” That sentence is typical of the whole book—lively, accurate and personal. From the Registrar's office we follow them through Tom's last years as a medical student in Dunedin, his interneship in Auckland, seven years in the Cook Islands as a doctor, and an incredible trip in a small ketch from Wellington to Boston in mid-winter with two small children. Tom Davis's job in Raratonga was a hard one, and he makes no bones about the struggle he had with a conservative administration. Through persistence and sheer hard work Tom Davis won the confidence of the Raratongans, gained the co-operation of the witch-doctors, and persuaded the authorities to approve of at least some of his reforms. Lydia had her own problems as housewife, mother and unofficial district nurse, and some of her chapters are uproariously funny. But when it comes to supporting Tom's work and sharing in his hopes, Lydia speaks up as plainly as her husband. “The lessons we learned in the islands have made the obligation of helping the people of the Pacific the most steadfast thing in our lives.” Arthur Grimble, author of A Pattern of Islands, published 1952, went to the Gilbert Islands in 1913 as a cadet in the Colonial Administrative Service. In a sharp, witty and very entertaining style, Mr Grimble crams into one

book the story of his work among the Gilbertese—which included, apart from administrative duties, a study of their social etiquette, mythology, fishing, mid-wifery, burial rites, and cooking among other things. He has some hard things to say about the Colonial Service and the shortsightedness of some of the first missionaries, but his loudest jokes are always cracked at his own expense. There was the time of his first speech in Gilbertese before a large and not very sympathetic audience, when his lack of grammar led him to say, “I am glad to meet you today, but I shall always be very, very glad to say goodbye to you.” It brought the house down. Some of his other experiences must have been truly terrifying, as when he went after an octopus with himself as live bait, and tiger shark fishing in a frail canoe scarcely big enough to hold him. He describes how the Gilbertese “call” the porpoise to their islands, inviting them to a feast, and after guiding them through the shallows to the beach with loving care, butcher them wholesale with shouts of derision. This was a feat he could not admire. But on the whole, he has only good to say of the island people he came to love, and if they taught him one tenth of the wisdom and humility that has gone into his book, they must be very fine people indeed.