Where the waves fall

Published in 1984, this study by Professor K. R. Howe puts the peoples of the Pacific at the centre of the story, asking how European explorers and colonisers reshaped their lives. It begins with the voyagers who reached one island after another across the largest ocean on Earth, then follows the growth of their societies. From the sixteenth century onward, a steady succession of arrivals, including explorers, traders, beachcombers, missionaries and merchants, brought these islands into contact with the wider world, and the book examines those exchanges closely.

Howe's framework allows him to reinterpret events that have often been studied in isolation. He offers original explanations for why some island groups developed into kingdoms during the early years of European contact while others did not, and for why missionaries were welcomed on certain islands but rejected on others. He also makes bold, sometimes contentious claims about the ambitions and strategies of island leaders and about how far islanders themselves initiated change.