Crossing ‘The Beach’: Samoa, Stevenson and ‘The Beach at Falesá’

Abstract

Across the islands of the Pacific during the 19th century, a resignification of the term ‘the beach’ occurred, as it took on a different and very specific meaning. It came to indicate a particular space of contact, where cultures and races mixed, and where trade, missionising and colonising occurred and new subjectivities developed. The figure of the ‘afakasi (mixed race Samoan) exemplifies many of the contradictions and possibilities of the beach, as ‘afakasi were both marginalised and yet often spectacularly successful in this environment. Stevenson lived in the vicinity of one of the more notable new Pacific beaches, Apia, and he and his extended family took a particular interest in the ‘afakasi members of their beach society. This interest provides a specific context for Stevenson's Pacific fiction, especially ‘The Beach at Falesá’, in which he acknowledges the potential emptiness of the late-colonial project, yet never quite abandons its iteration of white colonial masculinity.