This is another book I picked up for research for our family trip to Hawaii in 2016. I’m already a fan of Vowell, and at this point I’d already done a fair amount of research so I was excited to add Vowell’s perspective. I knew there were certain things I could count on in a Vowell history. 1- She was going to be cutting. 2- She was going to find the ridiculous. 3-She might eviscerate the colonists. I was right on all counts.
Vowell starts her Hawaiian travel history (if that is what this type of book is? I am still not sure) remarking on the interesting Hawaiian cuisine and banyan trees and her own presence on the island. None of these things are native. None of them belong naturally. In Vowell fashion, she visits historical sites and ruminates on the events that lead to the current moment and tries to draw parallels with the political climate today. In Hawaii Vowel waxes poetic about Imperialism. Vowell speaks about the United States military involvement in Iraq and the strategic nature of the Hawaiian Islands to the Navy. Vowell ruminates on the Americanization of Hawaii, but more than Americanization it seems a various melting pot of different cultures, ethnicities, religions, and competing interests. Vowell shares her own feelings of growing up in an america that was two different things, rapacious, greedy, oppressive, and at the same time a land of great opportunity that brought out the best in its inhabitants. It is a fine line to follow and one that I am not sure Vowell does to my satisfaction (or her own, for that matter).
Vowell covers how missionaries came to Hawaii in the first place. Vowell is not kind to organized religion in general, which I think to be narrow minded. Most of her sarcasm is about those early missionaries and the genuine fervor they felt to leave home, family, relative comfort to go to a strange and hostile place in the hopes of making things better. Now, their version of better might be debatable, but I don’t think Vowell has such strictures about the Peace Corps. or any non religious organization that gets together to improve the world around them. But I suppose that would be something for Vowell and I to discuss over lunch (or touring crumbling monuments). A fact that often creeps up when reading about Hawaiian history is that many of the missionary couples who came in that first batch were newlyweds who married for the sole purpose that they would not take single men and women as missionaries. I find this disturbing. Vowell finds this disturbing. Again, this can probably be labeled under the category of “different times” and put away. Also of interest is that the ABCFM (church missionary organization) cautioned the missionaries not to get involved in political or commercial interests. Vowell is quick to point out that this would be impossible to follow those instructions. In order to teach Christianity they would have to confront the idea of Hawaiian aristocracy and the various religious beliefs tied to their governance.
Vowell also mentions her sister and nephew, Owen, who figures into a lot of Vowell’s writings. I like when he appears because, as most kids, he says ridiculous things which Vowell as a proud aunt is happy to relate. Another aspect of Vowell’s writing that I find light hearted and fun is that though she interviews or speaks with historians and fellow writers, she also just talks to people on the street with no education or history background and writes about their thoughts and experiences. This gives relief to a lot of the more heavy handed themes. Overall, I liked this book. It was chirpy and enjoyable but I didn’t feel that Vowell’s style really worked 100% with the complex themes. It was like the scratch on a surface. A good start, but certainly not the definitive work. If you like Vowell’s other books, this is a nice read, and if you are looking to increase your knowledge of Hawaii. It is not, however, the best Hawaiian history I’ve read.
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