The Marriage of Loti (Rarahu)

By Pierre Loti

Book Overview

Pierre Loti's short novel tells the story of a young naval officer who falls in love with a beautiful Tahitian girl named Rarahu. The book is a haunting and lyrical exploration of the tensions between Western and non-Western cultures and the complexities of human desire.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.

This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.

Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1021169595
• ISBN13: 9781021169594
• Release Date: July 2023
• Publisher: Creative Media Partners, LLC
• Length: 232 Pages
• Weight: 0.73 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.1" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Romantic and Exotic

Every love story has the plot that two people want each other but for some reason they can't have each other. In addition to that plot there must be another story and a background landscape that is interesting. In The Marriage of Loti the central love story concerns Loti and his 14 year old native wife, Rahahu. Loti is in the Navy and has to leave paradise. Rahahu has to stay. Hence the reason they can't have each other forever. It's sad, but it's true. It's true because the story is taken from Julien Viaud's (the real Pierre Loti) autobiographical notes. The landscape is also true including the portrayal of the court of Pomare IV, the last Queen of Tahiti. True even to the details of how the Queen is attended when she must answer the call of nature. The other story, and the one of little real interest, concerns Loti's search for the children of his brother, a quest that has a tacked on unreal quality. That story deserves little praise. But the book as a whole deserves great praise. In its day this book sold well, over 300,000 copies. Because of it, Loti was made a memeber of the French Academy and he was much praised as "a new Chateaubriand" and the "most original, the most delicate, and yet the most popular of contemporary French novelists." Loti's reputation has dwindled, but with the renewed interest in other cultures, especially the exotic cultures of the South Pacific, it may be due for a revival. I read this novel in three hours (185 pages plus several beautiful pictures drawn by Loti). When I had finished I was left with the feeling that I had read one of the great love stories of that time, one of the most sensitive descriptions of Polynesia, and the most sympathetic approach to the understanding of Tahiti ever done in the analogical matrix that we call fiction.