Philip Castille
“encounter” experiences with indigenous peoples.
London had toyed for years with a “struggling writer” novel (Watson,
“Composition,” 402) before he began Martin Eden in the summer of 1907 in
Honolulu; he continued it while he sailed the Snark to French Polynesia. To
settle some business affairs in California, he and Charmian took a steamship
from Tahiti to San Francisco and back. London worked on Martin Eden during
the Snark
that he felt with title character is apparent; Martin Eden’s initials spell “ME.”
The manuscript had several working names, including the ambiguous title
“Success.” Before publication by Macmillan in1909, London settled on the
title Martin Eden. While the book was in press, the Snark left Tahiti and
voyaged westward. London and his crew eventually sailed into Melanesia and
the Coral Sea region, where the Snark voyage ended in physical and mental
breakdown.
Much like his creator, Martin Eden has been to Polynesia (but not yet to
Melanesia). Martin recounts his vivid memories of visiting Hawaii as a young
sailor—only a few years after Hawaii was annexed by the U.S. in 1898 as
part of an expanding American colonial empire. Martin recalls this thrilling
He lay on a coral beach where the coconuts grew down to the mellowthe light of which danced the hula dancers to the barbaric love-calls
of the singers, who chanted to tinkling ukuleles and rumbling tomtoms. It was a sensuous, tropic night. In the background a volcano
crater was silhouetted against the stars. (Martin Eden 55)
With these powerful, sensuous memories as inspiration, Martin writes at least
one “Hawaiian story” for the magazines during his literary apprenticeship
(Martin Eden 356). He also