Circling The Void

Since the 1970s a new breed of artist has appeared, telling the stories of Oceania from the inside. Albert Wendt is a leading writer and exponent of Pacific literature. His work is consistently different in style, politically challenging, and ranges across essays, plays, poems, stories and novels, two of which have been filmed. This text places Arnold Wendt's work in cultural and historical context, tracing archival sources of themes and key influences, and offers close readings of all the major texts. There is an introduction to Pacific literature as a whole and Wendt's Samoan background. Chapters offer readings of all Wendt's major texts in chronological sequence, relating them to his essays, to literary movements of the time and to key motifs from Polynesian culture. Pacific literature is now being taught in Australia, the US, New Zealand, Canada, France, Germany, the UK and the Pacific Islands. This book, a much-needed addition to the critical resources in this growing field, should prove a useful aid to students of both Pacific writing and postcolonial studies in general, from the level of high school through to teaching and research.