Each of the major characters in Hawaii represents one of the races making up the genetic pool of Hawaii's melting pot. Tamatoa, Teroro, and Marama, Polynesians who emigrate to Hawaii in A.D. 817, are the predominant characters in "From the Sun-swept Lagoon," the second section of Mkhener's novel. Like all of the emigrants who follow them, Teroro and King Tamatoa are unhappy with their fates, for as Michener's narrator states, "No man leaves where he is and seeks a distant place unless he is in some respects a failure." Disgusted by the bloodthirsty rites of the new god Oro, King...
Source: Beacham's Encyclopedia of Popular Fiction, ©2001 Gale Cengage. All Rights Reserved. Full copyright.
(The entire page is 1534 words.)
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