- Mass Market Paperback: 368 pages
- Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd; New edition edition (24 Feb 1972)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0140430709
- ISBN-13: 978-0140430707
- Product Dimensions: 17.5 x 10.9 x 2 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 820,609 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life (Penguin Classics)
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, and more.
Product Description
Review
"Attractive editions, clear type, good introductions and annotations."--Barbara Packer, UCLA
"An excellend edition. Blair's deeply informed introduction and notes lend contextual substance necessary to an historically aware appreciation of Typee."--Lawrence Howe, Roosevelt University
"Ideal teaching edition because of the splendid notes, bibliographies and chronologies."--Robert Regan, University of Pennsylvania
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
"An excellend edition. Blair's deeply informed introduction and notes lend contextual substance necessary to an historically aware appreciation of Typee."--Lawrence Howe, Roosevelt University
"Ideal teaching edition because of the splendid notes, bibliographies and chronologies."--Robert Regan, University of Pennsylvania
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Product Description
Webster's paperbacks take advantage of the fact that classics are frequently assigned readings in English courses. By using a running English-to-Hindi thesaurus at the bottom of each page, this edition of Typee by Herman Melville was edited for three audiences. The first includes Hindi-speaking students enrolled in an English Language Program (ELP), an English as a Foreign Language (EFL) program, an English as a Second Language Program (ESL), or in a TOEFL� or TOEIC� preparation program. The second audience includes English-speaking students enrolled in bilingual education programs or Hindi speakers enrolled in English-speaking schools. The third audience consists of students who are actively building their vocabularies in Hindi in order to take foreign service, translation certification, Advanced Placement� (AP�) or similar examinations. By using the Webster's Hindi Thesaurus Edition when assigned for an English course, the reader can enrich their vocabulary in anticipation of an examination in Hindi or English.<br>TOEFL�, TOEIC�, AP� and Advanced Placement� are trademarks of the Educational Testing Service which has neither reviewed nor endorsed this book. All rights reserved.
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Mass Market Paperback
Although Typee is based on his own experiences in the South Pacific, Melville's popular work is wonderful adventure fiction. Disillusioned with months at sea on a whaling boat Tommo/Melville jumps ship with his friend Toby on the island of Nuku Hiva in the Marquesas archipelago of what is modern day French Polynesia. They are quickly captured by the Typee tribe who carry a murderous and cannibalistic reputation but are surprised to find that they are treated with respect and hospitality by their captors. However, it is soon apparent that the Typee, for reasons that are not clear, have no intention of letting them go for they are shadowed everywhere and under constant surveillance by groups of villagers. Toby makes an early escape with the intention of summoning help for Tommo who is being nursed for a serious leg wound by the fair-skinned beauty, Fayaway. When his friend fails to return Tommo reluctantly acquiesces to his situation. His subsequent anthropological observations are not dry text but a humorous and fascinating glimpse into an inscrutable world where the jollity, sensuality and general indolence of the villagers are lights year away from the puritanical and Protestant New England of Tommo's/Melville's own background. Some of the customs and practices have survived to this day and the words are still in use (recognisable despite Melville's esoteric spelling) as Marquesan is spoken in preference to French throughout the islands. (Some years later the people of Nuku Hiva were to be converted to Catholicism and it must have come as a shock to them to discover that they had been praying to the wrong idols for the previous two millennia.) Although the attitudes of the day were apparent in places - `Kory-Kory, though the most devoted and best-natured serving-man in the world, was alas! a hideous object to look upon' - Melville compares the natural beauty of the many of the Typee, both men and women, most favourably with the over-preened, coiffured dilettantes of the `civilised' world. With the sumptuous Fayaway and devoted Kory-Kory, he passes the days in sloth, lying around, eating, and swimming. He is effectively in a `golden jail'. As months pass, though, he becomes gloomy at his isolation and inability to meaningfully converse with the villagers and, when he makes a gruesome discovery, he develops a dreadful foreboding as to the possible outcome for his captivity. The novel closes with tension and drama.
Today, the village of Taipivai (River Taipi) is as tranquil a place as one could imagine, with the villagers enjoying a pace of life barely changed since Melville's time 170 years ago. Highly recommended to all who enjoy old-fashioned adventure and those who are interested in the history and culture of Pacific island communities. A second book, the less well-known Omoo, continues the author's South Seas escapades.
Today, the village of Taipivai (River Taipi) is as tranquil a place as one could imagine, with the villagers enjoying a pace of life barely changed since Melville's time 170 years ago. Highly recommended to all who enjoy old-fashioned adventure and those who are interested in the history and culture of Pacific island communities. A second book, the less well-known Omoo, continues the author's South Seas escapades.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is Melville's first novel and was a bestseller.
It's not hard to see why. "Typee" is based on the true story of Melville's time living among cannibals on a Pacific island.
Later, Melville developed a more difficult, slower style, but this novel is rapid, clear and also funny.
It's not hard to see why. "Typee" is based on the true story of Melville's time living among cannibals on a Pacific island.
Later, Melville developed a more difficult, slower style, but this novel is rapid, clear and also funny.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Mass Market Paperback
An enjoyable enough adventure story based on Melville's own short stay with the Typee people of the South Pacific, as a young man.
His themes of Race,Religion,Western Imperialism,and cultural destruction are developed again in his later book Moby Dick.
The two books could not be more different in format,language, and style. Indeed if I had read Typee without knowing the author,I would not have guessed that it was the same author, who later wrote Moby Dick ,in such a dark,classical,and biblical narrative.
Partly because of this, it lacks the drama, scale,and prophetic power of the great classic, written later in his life,but the younger Melville's format, style,and vocabulary used in Typee, may very well make it more accessible, and readable for the younger, contemporary reader.
His themes of Race,Religion,Western Imperialism,and cultural destruction are developed again in his later book Moby Dick.
The two books could not be more different in format,language, and style. Indeed if I had read Typee without knowing the author,I would not have guessed that it was the same author, who later wrote Moby Dick ,in such a dark,classical,and biblical narrative.
Partly because of this, it lacks the drama, scale,and prophetic power of the great classic, written later in his life,but the younger Melville's format, style,and vocabulary used in Typee, may very well make it more accessible, and readable for the younger, contemporary reader.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
