Hope for Melal

The book “Melal “by Robert Barclay takes place in 1981 in The Marshall Islands of the South Pacific. The people known as the Marshallese are the natives to these islands. Overtime other cultures began to settle on these islands also, such as the Spanish, Japanese, and Americans. Out of these three cultures the Americans were the most domineering and devastating to the Marshallese people. The Americans took over the Marshallese native land and forced all of them to live on one island in deplorable conditions. The Marshallese had their freedom revoked from them; they then had to live under the Americans rules. Two of the Marshallese characters in this story who believes strongly in withholding many of the native …show more content…

All boys should go if they have the chance, instead of just lying around and drinking. He slapped Lazarus’s knee. Maybe we all should go, Alfred said. We should go live on those islands and tell the Army to shoot their missiles at Ebeye instead! Kinoj and the others, not laughing, seemed to be giving Alfred’s proposal serious thought” (Barclay 279). I think that this passage shows that a lot of the Marshallese agrees with Rujen. They have hope that if all the Marshallese stick together and try to take their land back over, that they will be successful. The Marshallese has real hope that they can believe in. Hope that there belief’s and traditions will be carried on for many generation’s. If they stick together, I think that they can be successful in gaining their lives back. I believe the Americans and Marshallese will find a common ground and live happily together, and share the land. They are two different cultures, but many different cultures co-exist. People to have different beliefs and values and we can all learn from one another. If in the South Pacific everyone was governed by the same laws, and was treated equally I feel that the quality of life would drastically improve for the natives in that region.

Barclay, Robert. Melal: A Novel of the Pacific University of Hawaii Press; (July