Typee: A Romance of the South Seas

by Herman Melville

Typee, published in 1846, was Herman Melville's first book and in his lifetime his most popular. Drawing on his own desertion from a whaler in the Marquesas in 1842, it tells how the narrator, Tommo, and his shipmate Toby escape into the mountains of Nukuheva and stumble into the valley of the Typee, a people reputed to be cannibals. Toby disappears, Tommo's injured leg keeps him a captive guest for four months, and he describes the islanders' feasts, tattooing, tabus and easy life with a mixture of delight, suspicion and sharp criticism of the missionaries and navies that were destroying it. This edition of 1892 adds Arthur Stedman's introduction and the sequel, The Story of Toby. The full text is available to read online in your browser on Vinteuil, and the first chapter is free.