Where It All Goes Down
Setting:The Marquesas, French Polynesia
Everyone Always Wants To Be First
The first human inhabitants of Aka and Pepe-iu were not indigenous, but actually explorers from Hawaii that settled there. Of course, they got there prior to 100 CE, so just maybe the fifteenth-century European explorers had a bit less claim to be first. (Because of their long tenure, you'll catch both us and Melville calling the Typee, Happar, and Nukuheva peoples "native." While that's not strictly true, it's true enough to separate them from those newbies, the French.)
As Tommo mentions, the Spaniards were the first modern interlopers in this paradise, "cruising in quest of some region of gold, these isles had sprung up like a scene of enchantment" (1.10). When Álvaro de Mendaña de Neira arrived in the late sixteenth century, he was looking for new lands to claim and colonize in the name of his Spanish-Peruvian boss. The landing went more than poorly for the native islanders, many of whom were killed at the hands of the bored sailors. When Mendaña died of fever (as folks did in those days), the expedition was dropped.
The islands remained undisturbed until 1791, and then again in 1813, when American explorers tried to claim them as U.S. territory, though the government never got around to making it official. At the time of Typee, the French had arrived. In 1842, they were beginning a formal occupation. Tommo claims to have been there to watch the handshake between the "the polished, splendid Frenchman, and the poor tattooed savage" (4.41) that made the Marquesas a part of French Polynesia.
So while Tommo waxes poetic about the extreme natural beauty of the place, looking as if it has been "untenanted since the morning of the creation," (7.13) that's of course hardly the case.
An Oversimplified Discussion of Colonialism
Say you're holding a sandwich. It's a good sandwich, delicious, your favorite kind. (We'd go with egg salad, but it's your sandwich.) Then some strange dude walks up and takes it from you, by force if necessary. "This is my sandwich!" he declares. And then he eats it super-noisily. Sound rude beyond all accounts? That, dear friends, is colonialism.
What, you wanted something more? We can do that. Head over to the Post-colonial Literature page for something a bit more in-depth.
Setting: The Typee Valley
Like Shangri-la or the Biodome, the Typee valley seems at first like a mythical, magical spot. Tommo can't get over it, saying: "Over all the landscape there reigned the most hushed repose, which I almost feared to break, lest, like the enchanted gardens in the fairy tale, a single syllable might dissolve the spell" (7.46).
But the Typee Valley—or Taipivai Valley, as it's called on modern maps—is a real place, alright. Now the kinds of sailors who drop anchor in Tior Bay aren't whalers, but locals, or vacationers in bikinis and jaunty captain hats. Ready to book a ticket?
During Tommo's time in the vale (that's valley, for short), he collects all manner of observations about the plants and animals—so much in fact that entire chapters are devoted to them. (Don't forget to head over to the "Symbols" section to get a load of the animal life.) But his time there is much more about being a guest—er, captive—of its inhabitants.
Marheyo & Tinor's Crash-pad
When Tommo and Toby arrive to the settlement, they're set up in a hut with Marheyo, Tinor, Kory-Kory, Fayaway, and a few other folks. The structure is a multi-roomed, bamboo-walled, coconut-tree framed structure that sits on a base of stones. In the general living area, everyone hangs out during the day and beds down for the night on mats. From the beams hang the storage sacks of tappa, holding everything from Tommo and Toby's extra gear to the preserved human heads that cause so much hub-bub in the final pages of the novel.
It's a simple set-up, says Tommo, "cool, free to admit the air, scrupulously clean, and elevated above the dampness and impurities of the ground" (11.26). It's Tommo's "permanent abode" in the valley and because of this he's "placed upon the most intimate footing with its occupants" (11.20). In other words, this is his Typee family.
Indeed, Marheyo and Tinor behave warmly toward him, like surrogate parents. Kory-Kory and Fayaway have less familial roles (servant and GF, respectively). The Typee are less invested in genetic family structure than in a tribal one, "where all were treated as brothers and sisters, [...] hard to tell who were actually related to each other by blood" (27.12).
So does the fact that the Typee want to keep him in the valley make him more like a grounded teenager, or a proper prisoner? It's hard to tell.
Setting: The Ti
The Ti, the "Bachelor's Hall" (22.1) on the sacred Hoola Hoola grounds, beyond the taboo coconut groves, is a center of governance for Mehevi and the chiefs—no girls allowed. Plus, it's an ad hoc armory, host to "six muskets [...] from the barrels of which depended as many small canvas pouches, partly filled with powder" (12.17).
But it's also used by Tommo as a sort of country club, where he knows he can always get a good meal alongside Mehevi, and afterward a relaxing smoke and daylight nap.
Setting: The Sea & The Ship
"Every one seemed to be under the influence of some narcotic" (2.2).
In Moby Dick, Melville's narrator is by turns bored, hypnotized, and angry at the endless sea. In Typee, we get only a taste of that in the early chapters, along with a bit about life on a whaling ship under the sinister (but incredibly minor) Captain Vangs.
When we first land on the Dolly, the crew has been sailing for six months and everyone's ready for a siesta on solid land. The food stores have been depleted, including the population of hens kept for chicken dinners. Last in the hutch is a lone rooster, nicknamed Pedro, but even he is scheduled to "be laid out upon the captain's table next Sunday, and [...] will be buried with all the usual ceremonies beneath that worthy individual's vest."
With the scheduled execution of Pedro, we feel Tommo's desperation intensify, as he exclaims: "oh! how I wish to see the living earth again!" (1.4). In this desperation, Melville seems to be busy building suspense, ready for the great relief and reveal of the beautiful mountainous Marquesas and their mysterious inhabitants. In other words, by shutting us up on the ship with Tommo at the start, he's making the wilderness adventure that much more dramatic.