Saturday, June 07, 2014

Book Excerpt for the Day


    Cook and his men attempted to recover a stolen boat by trying to take the high chief hostage.  This was, needless to say, frowned upon.  The Hawaiians stopped the Brits from kidnapping their chief, and when Cook turned to retreat, natives hit and stabbed him, “his face,” a shipmate wrote, “falling into the water.”

     I have a friend whose father, a native of Liverpool, refused to eat pineapples his entire life because he held a grudge against Hawaiians for killing Britain’s greatest explorer.


    (from Unfamiliar Fishes,  by Sarah Vowell)


    8*/10.  The full review is here.
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