The Book of Puka-Puka is not about travel, it is about staying still. It is about living as a conspicuous stranger and slowly allowing yourself to become absorbed into the ways of an ancient, indigenous community. This book was not composed by a colonial administrator, a missionary or an anthropologist, but by a hedonistic South Sea trader. This young American fishes, picnics, swims, sleeps and falls in love but fortunately he also listens out for good stories.

About the Author
Robert Dean Frisbie was born in Ohio (1896) but his health was crippled after fighting in the First World War and a doctor informed him that another North American winter would be his last. In 1920, he sailed for the Southern Pacific with a library of books, a desire to live and an ambition to write. His first job, aged 24, was managing a plantation in Tahiti from where he began to explore the scattered islands. In 1924 he travelled out to Puka Puka, where he ran a store for A.B. Macdonald. Over the next four years he wrote a series of twenty nine articles for Atlantic Monthly, which were later gathered together to create The Book of Puka-Puka.


Book Information
ISBN 9781780601410
Author Robert Dean Frisbie
Format Paperback
Page Count 224
Imprint Eland Publishing Ltd
Publisher Eland Publishing Ltd