Albert Wendt is the 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 book is the first full-length study of his work. 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. There is an extensive bibliography of works by and about Wendt.

In the 1960s and 1970s, the staff and students of two newly founded universities in the Pacific Islands helped foster a golden age of Oceanian literature. At the University of Papua New Guinea and the University of the South Pacific, bold experiments in curriculum design recentered literary studies around a Pacific modernity. Rejecting the established British colonial model, writer-scholars placed Pacific oratory and a growing body of Oceanian writing at the heart of the syllabus. From this local core, students ventured outward to contemporary postcolonial literatures, where they saw modernist techniques repurposed for a decolonizing world. Only then did they turn to foundational modernist texts, encountered at last as a set of creative tools rather than a canon to be copied or learned by rote. The Rise of Pacific Literature reveals the transformative role and radical adaptations of global modernisms in this golden age. Maebh Long and Matthew Hayward examine the reading and teaching of Pacific oral narratives, European and American modernisms, and African, Caribbean, and Indian literature, tracing how Oceanian writers appropriated and reworked key texts and techniques. They identify the local innovations and international networks that spurred Pacific literature’s golden age by reading crucial works against the poetry, prose, and plays on the syllabi of the new universities. Placing internationally recognized writers such as Albert Wendt, Subramani, Konai Helu Thaman, Marjorie Crocombe, and John Kasaipwalova alongside lesser-known authors of works published in Oceanian little magazines, this book offers a wide-ranging new account of Pacific literary history that tells a fresh story about modernism’s global itineraries and transformations.

In this lively satire of contemporary South Pacific life, we meet a familiar cast of characters: multinational experts, religious fanatics, con men, "simple" villagers, corrupt politicians. In writing about this tiny world of flawed personalities, Hau‘ofa displays his wit and range of comic resource, amply exercising what one reviewer called his “gift of seeing absurdity clearly."

We Are the Ocean is a collection of essays, fiction, and poetry by Epeli Hau‘ofa, whose writing over the past three decades has consistently challenged prevailing notions about Oceania and prescriptions for its development. He highlights major problems confronted by the region and suggests alternative perspectives and ways in which its people might reorganize to relate effectively to the changing world. Hau‘ofa’s essays criss-cross Oceania, creating a navigator’s star chart of discussion and debate. Spurning the arcana of the intellectual establishments where he was schooled, Hau‘ofa has crafted a distinctive—often lyrical, at times angry—voice that speaks directly to the people of the region and the general reader. He conveys his thoughts from diverse standpoints: university-based analyst, essayist, satirist and humorist, and practical catalyst for creativity. According to Hau‘ofa, only through creative originality in all fields of endeavor can the people of Oceania hope to strengthen their capacity to engage the forces of globalization. “Our Sea of Islands,” “The Ocean in Us,” “Pasts to Remember,” and “Our Place Within,” all of which are included in this collection, outline some of Hau‘ofa’s ideas for the emergence of a stronger and freer Oceania. Throughout he expresses his concern with the environment and suggests that the most important role that the “people of the sea” can assume is as custodians of the Pacific, the vast area of the world’s largest body of water.

In a time of dynamism and contradiction in Pacific cultural production, a time of 'turning things over' and 'writing from the inside out, ' this far-reaching volume provides a comprehensive set of essays and interviews on the emergent literatures of the New Pacific. With its dynamic combination of important position papers, polemics, and decolonizing critiques by noted authors and of analysis by new and established post-colonial scholars, this volume exposes 'the maze and mix of literatures and cultural identities breaking down and building up across the Pacific Ocean.' This pioneering work will be the definitive resource for anyone researching or teaching Pacific literature and will be invaluable for bringing Pacific culture to readers outside the region

For the first time, poetry, short stories, critical and creative essays, chants, and excerpts of plays by Indigenous Micronesian authors have been brought together to form a resounding—and distinctly Micronesian—voice. With over two thousand islands spread across almost three million square miles of the Pacific Ocean, Micronesia and its peoples have too often been rendered invisible and insignificant both in and out of academia. This long-awaited anthology of contemporary indigenous literature will reshape Micronesia’s historical and literary landscape. Presenting over seventy authors and one hundred pieces, Indigenous Literatures from Micronesia features nine of the thirteen basic language groups, including Palauan, Chamorro, Chuukese, I-Kiribati, Kosraean, Marshallese, Nauruan, Pohnpeian, and Yapese. The volume editors, from Micronesia themselves, have selected representative works from throughout the region—from Palau in the west, to Kiribati in the east, to the global diaspora. They have reached back for historically groundbreaking work and scouted the present for some of the most cited and provocative of published pieces and for the most promising new authors. Richly diverse, the stories of Micronesia’s resilient peoples are as vast as the sea and as deep as the Mariana Trench. Challenging centuries-old reductive representations, writers passionately explore seven complex themes: “Origins” explores creation, foundational, and ancestral stories; “Resistance” responds to colonialism and militarism; “Remembering” captures diverse memories and experiences; “Identities” articulates the nuances of culture; “Voyages” maps migration and diaspora; “Family” delves into interpersonal and community relationships; and “New Micronesia” gathers experimental, liminal, and cutting-edge voices. This anthology reflects a worldview unique to the islands of Micronesia, yet it also connects to broader issues facing Pacific Islanders and indigenous peoples throughout the world. It is essential reading for anyone interested in Pacific, indigenous, diasporic, postcolonial, and environmental studies and literatures.