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Tales of the South Pacific

by James A. Michener

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Reading for the 2nd time

read in June 2013

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Steve said: " Nellie Forbush, Emile de Becque, Bloody Mary, Lt Cable, Luther Billis that you know from the musical South Pacific are all in Michener's collection of short stories, and while you will recognize these characters from the musical, and some of the stor Nellie Forbush, Emile de Becque, Bloody Mary, Lt Cable, Luther Billis that you know from the musical South Pacific are all in Michener's collection of short stories, and while you will recognize these characters from the musical, and some of the story lines, their tales here are slightly different with somewhat different endings. Also, gone from the musical are much of the sexism and the racial bigotry that is presented in Michener's stories (okay, clearly the Lt Cable-Liat love story presents the love&marriage-limiting aspect of US racial attitudes, but the book covers a wider range of WWII era US racial discrimination than just the sexual). I guess one should expect the musical to be a somewhat expurgated version of the original work. But it's the difference between a chorus of guys in seaman's duds singing "we ain't got dames" and stories in which military men try to rape female nurses. Also less explicit in the musical, perhaps by the nature of the format - they are singing and dancing through their days, aren't they? - but well portrayed in these stories, is the daily struggle our soldiers had just dealing with the shear boredom of their mainly humdrum, sometimes make-work, daily lives while waiting and contemplating the unknown of coming battles, juxtaposed with the antithetical deadly and arbitrary mayhem of actual combat. Front line assault soldiers knew the probabilities of dying, and they very often did, but when a small group of brave soldiers charge attacking Japanese and they paradoxically become common victims with their enemies of Allied artillery fire, the reader is struck by the arbitrary nature of death in war. Even support staff that might assume some measure of safety could be seemingly arbitrary victims - Seabees killed by Japanese snipers while preparing an airplane runway. And why is a good and generous Commander killed by a Japanese soldier's suicide grenade attack at the opening of an airstrip, then succeeded in command by a bigoted jerk, while a bloviated Commander who talks large about his desire for combat is able to get sent back to Texas and safety before the big assault? Which is all to say that while the musical South Pacific is a fun production - who doesn't know the lines to several of the songs? - the book has a lot more meat to it.

The juxtapostion of the daily tedium and boredom in a seeming paradise with warfare and the paradox and arbitrariness of death is nicely pulled together in the final story, A Cemetery at Hoga Point. ...more "

Dec 30, 2020 12:38AM · see review