Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life

“Unsophisticated and confiding, they are easily led into every vice, and humanity weeps over the ruin thus remorselessly inflicted upon them by their European civilizers.”

Tommo criticizes the corrupting effect of European colonizers on the local people of the Polynesian Islands. However, he cannot help but take the same moral perspective. He views the locals as having been corrupted, disregarding their own views of sex, sin, and shame, and denies them any agency over their actions or morals, insisting that they adhere to his moral code rather than their own.

“How often is the term ‘savages’ incorrectly applied!”

Tommo demonstrates his willingness to break from typical Western thought regarding the Polynesian peoples. Many Westerners think of these people as “savages,” so they consider it almost an obligation to colonize and rule over them. In a blunt, direct statement, emphasized with an exclamation mark, Tommo insists that such labels are incorrectly applied. He signals to readers, even this early in the book, that his goal is to dispel the harmful myths about these people that Europeans use to justify colonialism.

“His real name he would never tell us.”

Tommo and Toby experience a great deal together, abandoning the ship and living among the Typee people. However, Tommo never learns Toby’s real name. Despite their closeness, a mystery remains around Toby that Tommo can never discern. This hint of mystery about someone so seemingly familiar hints at the feeling of otherness that Tommo later encounters among the Typees. Even though he lives with them and learns about them, something about them always remains hidden from him.

“Over all the landscape there reigned the most hushed repose, which I almost feared to break.”

Tommo and Toby arrive at the ridge overlooking the Happar and Typee valleys by an unconventional route. They may be the first Westerners to ever take this path and, in this novelty, Tommo discerns a responsibility. He does not want to break or change the beautiful world he has encountered. This desire to leave everything untouched distinguishes him from the colonizing powers, which seek to own everything they encounter in the name of power and profit, regardless of what they might destroy.

“The remotest idea of returning to Nukuheva, unless assured of our vessel’s departure, never once entered my mind.”

With their backs to the bay and having abandoned the Dolly, Tommo and Toby are fully committed to their choice. If they turn back, they know that Captain Vangs will punish them. Knowing that they have transgressed against institutional power by breaking their contracts, they embrace the wilderness ahead rather than atone. They stare into the unknown, willing to risk their lives rather than return to the ship. Their commitment underscores the awful conditions that prompted them to flee the ship.

“Come on, my hearty, there is no other alternative!”

After climbing the mountain and before encountering the Typee people, Toby and Tommo are alone together in the island’s dense forest. They do not necessarily know where they are or where they need to go but are keenly aware of the dangers surrounding them. This portion of the novel is akin to a traditional adventure story, as they hack and slash their way through the forest, overcoming natural obstacles. The sense of adventure foreshadows the fear that the men experience once they encounter the Typees but is later revealed as absurd once Tommo learns about the paradise-like existence of the Typees.

“I verily believe the poor creatures took us for a couple of white cannibals who were about to make a meal of them.”

When Toby and Tommo first encounter the young Typee figures in the jungle, Tommo demonstrates a moment of searing sympathy. He and Toby are terrified of them, but Tommo realizes how terrifying the two men’s appearance must be to the young boy and girl. This is the first hint of Tommo’s capacity for sympathy, which eventually turns him into a critic of his own culture.

“My feelings of propriety were exceedingly shocked, for I could not but consider them as having overstepped the due limits of female decorum.”

Previously, Tommo was accustomed to being part of the dominant cultural group. Even aboard the Dolly, the sailors adhered to the Western world’s moral and social expectations. Here, however, Tommo and Toby are the outsiders. The behavior that is normal to the Typee people offends Tommo on their behalf, imposing on his feelings of propriety. Tommo must adjust to being in another culture and another world, where his expectations mean much less.

“The noble savage seemed to be in the same pleasant mood.”

Tommo’s description of Mehevi explicitly frames the chief in the form of Jean-Jacques Rosseau’s idea of the “noble savage.” To Tommo, Mehevi seems innately pure and admirable because of his relationship with the natural world. Mehevi’s pleasant mood and noble disposition is alien to the corrupted, decadent Western world. Tommo may not agree with Rosseau yet avoids Rosseau’s framing.

“No tidings of Toby ever reached me; he had gone never to return.”

Toby disappears and leaves Tommo, without explaining his departure, and Tommo mourns Toby as if he were dead. The novel’s Addendum reveals that he learned Toby survived only after the novel was published. This structural choice and the emotional impact of Tommo’s mourning add realism to the novel. Tommo structures Toby’s survival in a way that conveys sincere emotion.

“I never used my razor during my stay in the island.”

After abandoning the Dolly, Tommo also abandons many of Western society’s conventions. He has his shaving kit with him, suggesting that he anticipated the need to shave when he returned to society, but his time with the Typees has been defined by his slowly surrendering Western beliefs. He does not shave while living with them and feels no need to do so, showing how he is steadily discarding the rituals of Western existence in favor of a more Typee-oriented worldview.

“Civilization, for every advantage she imparts, holds a hundred evils in reserve.”

The meaning of civilization begins to change for Tommo. After living with the Typees and experiencing their relaxed way of life, free from quarrels and close to nature, he no longer feels the need for Western technology or philosophy. As Tommo learns from the Typees, extensive violence underlies Western civilization even though it may claim to be moral and important.

“Every article, however trivial, which belonged to me, the natives appeared to regard as sacred.”

Part of what Tommo likes about the Typee community is that he is a novelty. During his many years of life in America and Europe, he failed to distinguish himself in any real capacity. As the story begins, for example, he is just another sailor who hates life at sea. For the Typees, however, he is a constant source of novelty and mirth. His mere existence makes him important, as his naiveté about their ways and his many differences entertain them. They are as curious about him as he is about them, and for the first time, he feels valued by those around him.

“Neither he nor the rest of his countrymen knew anything about him.”

Kory-Kory tries to educate Tommo about the local religion but struggles with certain statues and idols. They represent old gods that predate his understanding of the world and may even predate the Typees. This hints that the Typees, much like Tommo, are surrounded by fragments and remains of cultures that they do not understand. In addition, life on the island is not new. People have lived there long enough that they have forgotten more about themselves than Tommo could ever know.

“I should certainly be led to suppose that they had exaggerated the evils of Paganism, in order to enhance the merits of their own disinterested labors.”

The more time Tommo spends with the Typees, the more he criticizes his compatriots and fellow Christians. Since he spends his days surrounded by the non-Christian Typees, he can no longer believe the missionaries’ stories about Typee savagery. His own experiences make him realize that these stories are untrue, so his loyalties begin to shift.

“They are sunk in spiritual sloth, and require a spiritual revival.”

Despite Tommo’s scathing criticism of the missionaries for their violence and prejudice in efforts to Christianize the people of the South Pacific islands, he often reaches the same conclusions. Watching the Typees lounge around and ignore their sacred statues, he thinks they need “spiritual revival.” He agrees with the missionaries’ aims, though he disagrees with their methods.

“They ought to have been ashamed of themselves.”

Tommo spends much time with the Typees but can never completely abandon his Christian morality. When discussing Typee polyamory, he tries to assign a sense of shame to their understanding of sex. Their attitude toward sex offends his Christian morals, even if he never directly criticizes them. He may feel fond of the Typees, but he cannot shed the formative moral education that defines him as an outsider.

“Let the savages be civilized, but civilize them with benefits, and not with evils.”

Tommo does not hesitate to criticize colonization. He abhors the colonizers’ violence and brutality, especially when they dedicate so much energy to framing the local people as the truly violent people and declaring that they need Western colonization. In truth, however, Tommo never completely abandons the broad idea of colonialism; he just disagrees with the methods. He favors colonizing to benefit the local people without using brutality but he agrees with the end of Christianizing the Polynesians.

“I assert that those who indulge in it are in other respects humane and virtuous.”

Tommo cannot abide the Typee people’s practice of cannibalism. He considers this the greatest taboo. Although he will never accept it, he strives to contextualize and explain the ritual. It is not the brutal, animalistic cannibalism that Tommo was led to believe existed. Instead, it is highly ritualized and rare. His dedication to explaining it alludes to his love for the Typees. He may not forgive their cannibalism but loves them enough to explain it to people who share his distaste.

“Fayaway, how could you have ever contracted so vile a habit?”

Tommo watches Fayaway eat raw fish. Repulsed, he feels as though she has somehow transgressed, possibly because her consuming raw fish reminds him of cannibalism, which he loathes. When he sees the beautiful, innocent Fayaway eat raw fish, Tommo is horrified because he remembers that she may not be averse to eating human flesh.

“The sight of these birds, generally the ministers of gladness, always oppressed me with melancholy.”

On the island, much of Tommo’s life is different. The people he once considered savages have proven kind and gentle (though they are still cannibals, much to his displeasure). Likewise, his own expectations and assumptions have inverted. On the island, even the birdsong that once seemed joyous now seems melancholy.

“The capricious operations of the taboo is not its least remarkable feature.”

In the Typee culture, the word taboo can refer to many things. It has so many unique and nuanced meanings that Tommo cannot possibly explain them all. His inability to explicitly define the word demonstrates his lack of cultural understanding. Tommo never truly integrates into Typee society because a fundamental cornerstone of their culture continues to elude him and seems capricious.

“Every attention was bestowed upon me that humanity could suggest.”

When Tommo escapes the Typee people and makes it to the Australian ship, he is once again a novelty. The sailors want to know everything about the man who lived so long with the people they presume are mere cannibals. This scene mirrors Tommo’s earlier entry into the Typee village, when he was a novelty there. Tommo enjoys being the center of attention, and now he is a novelty in both Typee and Western cultures.