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- Title
'Vell, I don't call dot very shentlemanly gonduck': The Portrayal of Germans as Ungentlemanly South Seas Traders in Louis Becke's Short Stories.
- Authors
Spennemann, Dirk H. R.
- Abstract
The second part of the nineteenth century saw a change in the Pacific from the age of beachcombers to that of organized trade and plantations, yet it was still a time when much of the colonial map had not been finalized. Arguably the best Australian author to capture this period is Louis Becke (1855-1913). Himself a trader in Samoa and Micronesia from the 1870s to the early 1890s, Becke turned writer in the mid 1890s. His exotic short stories, bringing an unusually realistic perspective to the hitherto romanticized depiction of the South Pacific, brought him rapid and widespread fame. In nine novels and over 400 short stories, Becke's work depicted the atmosphere of inter-cultural relations, as well as colonial rivalry at both the local island and atoll level. The paper discusses how Becke's portrayal of German traders and scientists in his stories articulated wider political transformations occurring in the Pacific region at the time, and in particular, emerging colonial rivalries between Great Britain and Germany.
- Subjects
BECKE, Louis; MERCHANTS in literature; GERMANS in literature; SCIENTISTS in literature; LITERARY criticism; SHORT story (Literary form)
- Publication
Pacific Asia Inquiry, 2014, Vol 5, Issue 1, p107
- ISSN
2377-0929
- Publication type
Article