The far-away Gilbert Islands (now called Tuvalu) were immortalised by Robert Louis Stevenson in the 1880s, when he and his family arrived as voluntary castaways on the island of Abemama, but it was left to a twentieth-century government officer to make this particular 'pattern of islands' a household name with this book:
Arthur Grimble went out as a young cadet in 1914. He became a Gilbertese scholar, publishing learned ethnological papers. But it was not until the 1950s, with his broadcasts and his first, bestselling book, that he revealed himself as a tusitala, a teller of tales in Stevenson's mould. These minute specks of coral became real and vivid to people in Britain 12,000 miles away.
Grimble dedicated "A Pattern of Islands" to 'the District Officers of the Colonial Administrative Service and their long-suffering wives'. But young newcomers such as Andrew Armstrong knew Grimble through a rather different publication in the 1920s: "Grimble had written a book called 'Hints and Instructions to District Officers', and we were all brought up on that. He was a charming person, very tall and thin and good-looking, and had a wonderful voice. He was a brilliant linguist and spoke Gilbertese, a strange and difficult language of only thirteen letters and a range of guttural sounds, as nobody has ever spoken it, I think."
Of course, I have Grimble's bestselling book "A Pattern of Islands" as well as its sequel "Return to the Islands", but I hadn't heard of the 1956 film adaptation "Pacific Destiny" until I discovered its trailer on YouTube.
I immediately searched on ebay for a copy but all I found is this one expensive copy in the USA, priced at US$65.99 plus a strangely precise $37.13 in postage, altogether a total of over AUS$150 in real money.
I think I pass until something a little less expensive comes along!
