Besides, If he was happy all the time it would be boring...

Unfortunately such fleeting encounters as Theroux describes, are no substitute for being a part of the region from birth. Had Theroux taken time to study the South Pacific in a space-time field that has its origins in the region, he would get to a better understanding of the local peoples, and would have done justice to the local people and provided a better return on the readers investment.

The book reads like fiction due its abundance of inaccuracies: "...Indians who never drank kava... Fijian men did little else but squat around a bowl and guzzle it". These statements are blatantly wrong! Also, "[Fijians] ... tended to prefer porky Chinese food over Indian curries."- Ch. 12. I would ask Theroux how many Fijian homes he had visited and dined within?

Unfortunately, Theroux misses a fundamental truism of the South Pacific peoples - be they indigenous or a descendent of colonial implants - they are extremely reserved people. Their friendliness and amiability may be apparent at the first encounter, but to really get know their thoughts, one needs to spend extended periods of time within relatively small communities.

Theres almost a hint of jealousy that folks in the South Pacific can prosper and are socially, technically and academically progressive, despite the seemingly carefree attitude that they exhibit. This results in expositions that are frequently punctuated by arrogance and racism on the part of the author.

It does make for entertaining reading, hence the two stars. However, it is not objective, as travel journals need to be, and is far from the truth that one would encounter. Visit the South Pacific and find out for yourself !

It took me all those 2 years living fully immersed within Fijian culture and among an interesting( and it must be said oddly racist, even amongst themselves) bunch of humans as one is ever likely to meet - to start to make sense out of their very complicated ways and mores. Paulie T. got to the crux pretty much immediately.

Personally, I got to hate running into locals who had recently encountered tourists - as it always made interactions more complicated for me. Thus American, Aussie and Japanese toursists were a big headache for me. They would over pay for everything and scamper about scantily clad - tweaking at the Fijian moral compass, developed, ironically, directly from the teachings of those good ol late 1800s Christian missionaries - who, at least had a hand ;-) in helping Fijians stop eating each other.

He nailed the Fijian culture - and I am assuming he does the same to the others described. Who said traveling was pretty? Sure, it can be if one takes great care to insulate oneself from the local actualities - but wheres the fun in that?!

I travel to see how the rest of the world lives. Although, one time I went to the b.v.i. to lay about on the beach completely cut off from reality - and you know what? THAT aint half bad either!

Paul Theroux is clearly on the right side of that well-worn distinction in travel writing, between the tourist and the traveler. Although many excellent guides (notably those from Lonely Planet) try to cater to both sides, in general, travel books are either written by tourists whove been hornswoggled by the locals, or by real travelers.

One genre of tourist book is the right-wing tirade against the society visited by the writer. It is an offensive American habit to announce ones bien-pensance by traveling the world and finding fault with the sanitation and architecture of other countries.

P. J. ORourke is an amusing fellow but ultimately rather dreary in that he blames the victim in his book Holidays in Hell. As it happens, writers on the right, who blame Third World capitals for crumbling architecture, or nonworking toilets, would do well to reflect on the simple physical properties of materials in heat and humidity, or the exorbitant trade school fees that parents in underdeveloped lands must pay, for their children to be educated in plumbing trades.

Which isnt to say that Theroux fails to identify negative features of the Pacific islands, which, for him, include its anti-intellectualism and the colonialist dependence most apparent in American Samoa, where a government, in order to secure the territory, does indeed kill traditional custom and future initiative (as a conservative would predict) by a system of thoughtless handouts...made after all in self-interest.

People in developed countries first romanticise the indigneous and are apt, when encountering its anti-intellectualism and suspicion of the outsider, to switch, like Mistah Kurtz in The Heart of Darkness, and Brando in Apocalypse Now, to the horrorshow view. Theroux is far more nuanced and this allowed him to deal with the sort of frightening scene he encountered both in the wilds and in American Samoa, of bullying of an adult loner by a group of local kids.

Being torn apart by children is a nameless fear of intellectual loners; Robert Crumb has a panel in which a kid announces to his father, "hey, Pop, we burnt a bum at recess." Theroux is exceptional, in facing this fear as did brother Adorno, in Adornos essay "Fascism is the nightmare of childhood".

However, Theroux does not regard indigneous people as Fascists and instead accounts for their dislike of the outsider as a rational need for family and clan cohesion, the most important fact of their lives.

To maintain a generally positive outlook on people with a healthy critical spirit is a rare accomplishment. It is easier to adopt the pose of Shakespeares Jaques and to conclude the worst from ones travels.

Americans, at least before Sep 11, were friendly travelers who liked everybody. Far rarer is the traveler who judges but based on observation. One type of South Pacific denizen Theroux does not like was manufactured by the triumphalism of Reagan and the elder Bush, and Bob Hawke of Australia, he of the cockatoos pompadour.

This is the Aussie, Kiwi, Brit or American prone to make generalizations about other groups and nature itself, the bore of the saloon bar. The most attractive features of the matey Australasian personality of the 1960s, who voted instinictively for liberals as long as they promised swagmen a fair shake was erased by CIA disruption in the 1970s (this is fact, not paranoia) and replaced by a property-owning swagman democracy.

Property-owning swagmen democracies are better than most political arrangements. We Yanks invented the idea of expropriating the toffee-noses and becoming utter swine in our turn: but expropriation results in insecurity which often emerges in boozy conversations in countless pubs and distraction from distraction by distraction, as the antics of powerless Royals, and Governor-Generals in pantaloons, conceals the sort of raw work one has seen in the US CIAs Australian monkeyshines, the silencing of British Labor on the war, the French nuclear nonsense, and the elimination of New Zealands David Lange, who Theroux met in the Marquesas.

Of course, the above paragraph might be read as complementary to and effectively the same as the worst kind of saloon bar rhodomontade and ordinary people may well ask, where does Theroux get off, or a fortiori, where do I (the answer at this writing is Suva Bay.) People who dont as a rule read books, including many sun gods and goddesses of the South Pacific, are apt to call such writing "generalization" and to remark, with passion, that it might hurt someones feelings, one of the writers occupational hazards, along with late checks and the bottle, being the bearer of bad news that hurts strangers and their Mum.

But if the charge sticks, then any kind of writing outside of sailing manuals would have to disappear.

There are curious parallels between Therouxs situation, and my current situation. He wrote at the time of the first Gulf War, I write this review after the end of the second. He was recently divorced (a strike against him in the traditional cultures of the South Pacific, where Ive already been asked my marital status) and I started reading Theroux at the time of my own divorce. Today, far more so than in 1981, the culture makes no provision for the divorced man who is expected to do Protestant penance, or else wander the isles gibbering and capering in the tropic moonlight.

No provision, today, is made for the partially shriven, and partially lost, soul. Instead, the Americans would convert him to Yankee salvation and go-ahead schemes. The sturdy sons of England, Canada, and Australia would buy the old lad of the castle strong drink. Distant drummers are after all unheard by ones mates, who cant figure out what makes yer go. In consequence, your old lad of the castle becomes set apart in thought.

Unfortunately I found the good things about the book (his description of the places, and people he encountered), rather spoiled by the views presented by Mr Theroux.

He seems to believe that having spent a short amount of time in a number of different countries gives him some great insight into the peoples that live there.

I find Mr Theroux to be racist (particularly about the Japanese), smug, and extremely condescending. His book is full of little inaccuracies which those who read the book and dont know the region well are probably not aware of.

Its easy I think to generalise about people based on a few examples that you encounter, but is it really useful or worthwhile?

So read the book if you dont come from the region, but just dont believe everything he says...

This is a wonderful, well-written read thats often very funny, and I found it matched my own observations of the parts I visited. Therouxs description of Australia and New Zealand struggling with their national identity as nations is very well observed - I saw the same thing and am glad I had his book along. His depiction of the wild Australian heavy drinkers ("ferals") is simply accurate, however painful it may be for some Australians to admit. Some of the Pacific islands Theroux described in all their boredom reminded me of places I was living (Hong Kong, Singapore) at the time I first read this, so they certainly werent unbelievable.

It should be pointed out that Theroux actually liked many of these places he visited - he has simply done a good job of observation while being beholden to no one - the essence of good travel writing. People who say only nice things about about a place write tourist bureau pamphlets or guidebooks.

Great read. The detached reader (and traveller) will love it.

He complains about islanders who don’t smile at him on the street, or who react to him with caution or suspicion. Rather than asking himself WHY they react this way (gee, maybe it’s because he’s a single, white, male STRANGER walking into their village…), rather than trying to understand, he simply labels them unfriendly, "fat," "stupid," "lazy," "clumsy" (his words). When he doesn’t find the young, nubile females he was hoping for, he insults the friendly women he does find, calling them "hooting fatties" with "fat, booby faces." On island after island, he ridicules people’s physical appearance and makes assumptions about their intelligence based on that. Is that what a travel writer does? A professional writer? Heck, is that what a mature adult does?

When every other tourist is like Mr. Theroux, is it any wonder that islanders are so reserved or distrustful? When your home has been overrun and your culture wrung-out by Europeans and Asians for centuries, is it such a surprise that islanders might tend to look at them with a wary eye? He expresses near-hatred of Japanese for coming to the Pacific and "taking over"...but forgets that Euros/Americans have been doing the same thing for hundreds of years. The level of contempt he seems to express toward everyone he encounters is remarkable, yet he continually boo-hoos about how lonely he is...is it any wonder?

If you’re looking for a detailed list of strip joints in Honolulu, this is the book for you - he seems to have visited every single one and describes their "specialties." If you want a book about Oceania, look elsewhere.

Despite his intellectual protestations to the contrary, Paul sets off in much the same way as Gaugin and others before him to find a world which never existed. Having recently separated from his wife, he embarks on a journey which could never satisfy and, finding the internal emptiness still present, proceeds to take out his frustration on the mirage which has haunted so many great artists before him.

In turn he savagely attacks islanders, Christians, the Japanese, the French, and any other group of people unfortunate enough to cross his path. The only people who seem to satisfy him are a group of islanders who celebrate a sexual freedom similar to that reported by early visitors to the region.

In his anger over the confimation of what he always knew to be a dream, he finds true companionship only in his own thoughts and solitude. In the process, unfortunately, he provides a superficial meandering through the landscape (seascape?) of a little understood region of the world.

But, then again, this is exactly what I like about this book. Frustrated negativism aside, Theroux provides a sufficient dose of current reality and informative history to serve as a foundation for deep thought by the careful reader. Rather than direct the audience through his own thought processes and conclusions, his transparent disappointment encourages others to come to their own conclusions.

Having worked for the past five years in this part of the world, I can appreciate the accuracy of his writing while seeing through the bias with which it is presented. I would encourage others to enjoy this book and to gain a glimpse into the contradictory world of Pacific island life. One can only wonder, however, how differently it may have been written had the author approached the region during a different season of his life.

For those who were offended with the references to ""Nipponization"" -- this is pointing to the negative effects of globalization upon traditional cultures. So in actuality, isnt this the exact opposite of xenophobia? As for the comments about Australians being a bunch of drunks -- well, can anybody actually say this is wrong?

This doesnt resonate with me like Riding the Iron Rosster did, but by the same token, Theroux seems somewhat happier paddling between the blue skies and waters of the South Pacific, than he ever did on a train.

Winston Churchill once said "A young conservative has a heart of Stone, an old liberla has a head of Stone." While the average course of personnel evolution tends to make people become more conservative as they grow older, Theroux demonstartes the opposite trends in his writing. His first book "Fong and the Indians," "Waldo" and the great "Great Railway Bizarre." show a independent almost liberterian mindset. Theroux has seemed to devolve into a pudding headed liberlaism in his later years. This book tends to be way too preachy in an annoying and naive unbecoming of an educated and experienced man like Theroux. In this book Theroux fancies himself as the moral avatar of what are proper beliefes and opinions in a country he has just arrived in. In fact he spends half of the his written words on specious peronnel affronts rather then the witty insights we are used to from him. Since he wrote this book in an admittedly bitter mood maybe we should not expect more. However I would opt for this great authors return to ephemeral diatribe on his insoucient peregrinations rather then this example or virulent polemic on social injustice.

The chapters on Australia are especially amusing, Theroux captures the spirit (literally) of the Aussies precisely.

It is a perfect desert island book!

John Dowd writes a great book about kayaking. "Alone At Sea" by Dr. Hannes Lindemann is a great kayak adventure story.

This book is about a whining, self-centered, British ex-pat, island hopping and complaining about everything, everywhere he goes.