Books, Reviews, Writers
pp. 57-58 · Read in the full issue
Insight Into The Lives
Of The Hawaiians
Edward Joesting’s Hawaii: An Uncommon History, is a readable, pleasant account of Hawaiian history since western contact. It does not, however, live up to its title “un common”.
In the introduction the author claims that his work is not con ventional history but an in-depth study of particular events—“a deeper, more human look into Hawaii’s past than is possible with a general history”. A justifiable aim, but, un fortunately, what follows is a string of episodes with little or no interpre tation and neither thematic nor strict chronological structure to give the work coherence. The protagonists are presented without a context.
There is no sense of the changing patterns of life in Hawaii, the de velopment of foreign settlement or the place of the Hawaiians in this new world.
Only in the early chapters of the book is the reader presented with a picture of the Hawaiians. After the death of Kamehameha I, they dis appear completely from the narrative, except for a brief glimpse of the high chief Boki in the late 1820 s. The work becomes increasingly Euro centric, a progression of portraits of white settlers, culminating in a brief history of polo in the islands, played of course by rich successful haoles (whites).
Hawaii: An Uncommon History, is an adequate introduction to Hawaiian history, despite its lapses into anecdotal trivia, but for those who want a greater insight into the lives of non-whites in Hawaii, the reprint ing of Gavan Daws’ Shoal of Time, first published in 1968, will be a most welcome occurrence. Shoal of Time which covers the period from Cook’s arrival to the granting of statehood in 1959, is slightly less extensive than Joesting’s work which includes two pre-contact chapters.
Throughout his book, Daws re veals an acute sensitivity towards the question of race, Hawaiian, haole and Oriental. The problems arising from the inflow of white settlers and
plantation labourers, coinciding as it did with the rapid decrease in the Hawaiian population, led to white domination of both Hawaiian and Oriental combined with much in justice, bitterness and racial pre judice.
The question of race relations and racial justice lies at the heart of Hawaiian history and Daws, unlike Joesting, does not ignore the issue.
While Daws does not indulge in un realistic speculative history neither does he mince words about the cost in human terms of Hawaii’s involve ment in the whaling trade, the suc cessful development of the sugar in
dustry, or the islands’ annexation to the United States and later elevation to statehood.
White consuls, businessmen, naval captains, missionaries, politicians and planters all played a part in under mining the independence of Hawaii, while the sugar men swamped the island demographically with planta tion labour to guarantee their own profits. During the 19th century the Hawaiians understood and feared the haoles’ increasing interference and control of Hawaiian affairs, which led them to use the only powers they had, to restrict it. Rarely was a haole elected to the lower house of the legislature by the Hawaiians and throughout the latter half of the century Hawaiian converts to Ameri can Protestantism drifted to other Christian denominations less ob viously allied with aggressive Ameri canism.
In the 20th century, the Massie case, the treatment of the Japanese during World War II and the argu ments raised against statehood for Hawaii in the 1950 s are further evidence of the racism that has inter mittently but consistently marred Hawaii’s history. As Daws empha sises in his conclusion, aloha, how ever one translates it, has been con spicuously absent from much of Hawaiian history despite the tourist industry’s propaganda to the contrary.
Shoal of Time is a concise but imaginative history of Hawaii, of the indigenous Hawaiians and the flow of immigrants who have settled there since European contact. The dif ference in attitude and viewpoint be tween Daws and Joesting is perhaps not so surprising when one realises that Joesting is a representative of one of the Big Five, the five white companies which for decades had a stranglehold over Hawaii’s economy, and which Daws argues have at times had a baleful influence on the islands’ development.
In 400 pages it is not reasonable to expect detailed analyses of the many major changes that have occurred in Hawaii over the last 200
years. For 19th-century Hawaiian history, R. S. Kuykendall’s three volumes, The Hawaiian Kingdom, will remain the definitive work, but as a one-volume history of the islands, Shoal of Time fulfils a long felt general need. It is soundly re searched, sensitively handled and well, often wittily written; for both the general reader and the Pacific historian it has much to offer.— Caroline Ralston. (SHOAL OF TIME: A HISTORY OF THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS, by Gavan Daws.
Reprinted by the University Press of Hawaii, Honolulu, $U54.95 (paperback)
And Hawaii; An Uncommon History,
by Edward Joesting. W. W. Norton and Company, New York, $U510.9&.)
New Issue Of Bert Covit's
Tahiti Guide
The sixth edition of Bernard Covit’s Official Directory and Guide Book for Tahiti, has now been published, and is available in Tahiti, or direct from Bernard Covit at 8P602 Papeete, priced at CFP3OO, or SUS 4. Covit’s guide book is always something of a labour of love, loaded with all kinds of useful information, including local words and phrases, and with plenty of advertising. It has taken him three years to produce this one, and he says it will remain in use for the next three years. It’s most welcome.