Remembering Kalkaua

Upon sighting the USS Charleston on January 29, 1891, hundreds of citizens of the Kingdom of Hawaii rushed to Honolulu Harbor to celebrate the return of King David Kalkaua. Just two months earlier, their beloved m had left the islands on a mission to save Hawaii from the annexationist intentions of American businessmen and their sympathizers in Washington, DC.However, the king fell ill before he could complete his journey. The people watched in horror as the ship neared with its Hawaiian flag at half-mast: Kalkaua was dead. Out of this moment of enormous grief and uncertainty emerged Ka Moolelo o ka M Kalkaua I: Ka Hnau ana, ke Kaapuni Honua, ka Moolelo Piha o kona mau L Hope ma Kaleponi, Amerika Huipia, n Hike a Adimarala Baraunu me n Kauka, Etc., Etc., Etc.: Hoohiwahiwa ia me n Kii (The History of King Kalkaua I: The BirthThe Journey around the WorldA Full Record of his Last Days in California, United States of AmericaThe Reports of Admiral Brown and the Doctors, Etc., Etc., Etc.: Illustrated with Pictures). Written in Hawaiian by the esteemed intellectual Joseph Mokuhai Poepoe, this seventy-four-page publication sold for $1 at the ms funeral on February 15and provided crucial answers for a citizenry in mourning. In death as in life, the popular narrative of Kalkaua was largely defined by western conspirators who sought to discredit his leadership to justify an illegal overthrow, as well as by generations of English-only historians who relied on these revisionist accounts. With Remembering Kalkaua, Native Hawaiian scholar Tiffany Lani Ing has produced a complete English translation of Poepoes legendary pamphlet. This book restores to public discussion a record of Kalkauas endeavors to preserve Hawaiis independence and corrects 130 years of misrepresentation. Presenting Poepoes funerary narrative in Hawaiian and in English, this work features a kanikau (mourning chant) by Poepoe, Poepoes biography of the king from Kalkauas birth through his expansive reign, and a collection of correspondences that detail Kalkauas declining health and final daysan in-depth accounting that puts to rest rampant speculation about the nature of his demise.