Return to Paradise

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Return to Paradise Page 52

by James A. Michener


  The South Pacific was once the playground for ship-sick European sailors. Then it became the roistering barricade of the last great pirates. Next it was the longed-for escape from the canyons of New York. Then the unwilling theatre for an American military triumph. But now it has become the meeting ground for Asia and America. Wherever you go in the South Pacific you find present wealth in the hands of white people and most of the business energy in the control of Chinese or Chinese-natives. The exception is Fiji, where the Indians play the role of the Chinese, and play it more effectively.

  In New Guinea the pressure of Asia is enormous. Indonesians claim the former Dutch half, and if they acquire that surely they will absorb the eastern half and perhaps Australia, too. In Rabaul fatalistic planters make wry bets as to how soon Japan or China will occupy that magnificent harbor. In the New Hebrides the Tonkinese bide their time, remembering that the French have broken a dozen promises regarding repatriation and listening with somber joy to the secret radio reports of French defeats in Tonkin-China. Asia is everywhere.

  There is only one sensible way to think of the Pacific Ocean today. It is the highway between Asia and America, and whether we wish it or not, from now on there will be immense traffic along that highway. If we know what we want, if we have patience and determination, if above all we have understanding, we may insure that the traffic will be peaceful, consisting of tractors and students and medical missionaries and bolts of cloth. But if we are not intelligent, or if we cannot cultivate understanding in Asia, then the traffic will be armed planes, battleships, submarines and death. In either alternative we may be absolutely certain that from now on the Pacific traffic will be a two-way affair. I can foresee the day when the passage of goods and people and ideas across the Pacific will be of far greater importance to America than the similar exchange across the Atlantic. Asia must inevitably become more important to the United States than Europe. That is why we must all do all that we can to understand Asia. That is why it is stupid folly to look upon the South Pacific as a lecher’s paradise or a wastrel’s retreat. It has become, especially as it leads to New Zealand and Australia, one of our highways to the future.

  To

  THE MEN AND WOMEN

  OF THE ISLANDS:

  Fred Archer of Rabaul

  Tom Harris of Santo

  Yorky Booth of New Guinea

  Lew Hirshon of Tahiti

  Brett Hilder of all over

  Eddie Lund of Quinn’s Bar

  and, above all,

  Tiger Lil of the Gold Fields

  BY JAMES A. MICHENER

  Tales of the South Pacific

  The Fires of Spring

  Return to Paradise

  The Voice of Asia

  The Bridges at Toko-Ri

  Sayonara

  The Floating World

  The Bridge at Andau

  Hawaii

  Report of the Country Chairman

  Caravans

  The Source

  Iberia

  Presidential Lottery

  The Quality of Life

  Kent State: What Happened and Why

  The Drifters

  A Michener Miscellany: 1950–1970

  Centennial

  Sports in America

  Chesapeake

  The Covenant

  Space

  Poland

  Texas

  Legacy

  Alaska

  Journey

  Caribbean

  The Eagle and the Raven

  Pilgrimage

  The Novel

  James A. Michener’s Writer’s Handbook

  Mexico

  Creatures of the Kingdom

  Recessional

  Miracle in Seville

  This Noble Land: My Vision for America

  The World Is My Home

  with A. Grove Day

  Rascals in Paradise

  with John Kings

  Six Days in Havana

  About the Author

  JAMES A. MICHENER, one of the world’s most popular writers, was the author of the Pulitzer Prize–winning Tales of the South Pacific, the best-selling novels Hawaii, Texas, Chesapeake, The Covenant, and Alaska, and the memoir The World Is My Home. Michener served on the advisory council to NASA and the International Broadcast Board, which oversees the Voice of America. Among dozens of awards and honors, he received America’s highest civilian award, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, in 1977, and an award from the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities in 1983 for his commitment to art in America. Michener died in 1997 at the age of ninety.

 

 

 


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