The House of Pride and Other Stories of Hawaii by Jack London:
The London Book You Didn’t Know Existed
Jack London is best known for his stories about Alaska, but I was happy to learn on a recent trip to Hawaii that he also wrote a book of Hawaiian stories. For years now, it has been a habit of mine to seek out literature written by someone from the place I am traveling or in lieu of that, written about the place I am traveling. In Ecuador, I had an impossible time finding any translated Ecuadorian literature. In Argentina, I discovered one of my favorite authors, Cesar Aira. In India, I read Salman Rushdie. For Hawaii, my choices were more limited than I expected. I couldn’t read the Descendants because I just saw the movie and I was not up for Paterson’s 600 page epic. London’s collection enticed me as I always loved Call of the Wild and hadn’t read anything else by him.
The book takes place in a Hawaii of another time, the early part of the 20th century, and deals with historic issues that probably still affect the culture to this day. Each tale builds on the theme of the last so that the reader is able to gain a broader and broader perspective of the era.
The first story, “House of Pride,” shows the animosity that some haoles (white people) of the missionary class had toward the local natives, particularly a sense of superiority (big surprise). The next story, “Koolau the Leper,” is based on a true story about how lepers were forced into quarantine in Molokai, many against their will. One of my favorite stories is, “Goodbye, Jack,” beautifully written from the perspective of a young mainland woman who visits the island with her father and doesn’t realize that the man she has been spending time with is in love with her until her boat is leaving port to return home. In the same moment, she realizes, not only her requited love for him, but the reason he never told her, because he is a “half-caste,” and would never be accepted by her father. London has a beautiful way of unveiling this young and tragic love.
In the story, “Chin ah Chun,” a Chinese immigrant comes to Hawaii as an indentured servant, but soon makes his fortune with good business dealings. It’s a good story if you can stomach the character being referred to as a coolie (which continuously annoyed me). The last story, “The Sherriff of Kona,” served to tie all the other stories together in conversation topics- lepers, love, half-castes, missionaries and immigrants.
I gained a tremendous amount of insight into the culture of Hawaii from reading a book of short stories written a hundred years earlier. Humans are not quick to let go of our history, especially when it is a traumatic one. Hawaii is at once completely different from London’s time there, and so much still the same.
