Easter Island and Its Mysteries
While Easter Island and Its Mysteries might not be as great a book as it was deemed to be by Dr. Étienne Loppé, Chief Curator of the Lafaille Museum in La Rochelle (France), who wrote a gushing preface, it certainly provides interesting insights into ethnography in the mid 1930s.
A translation of this 1930s French ethnography is freely available online, as “a gift from [Dr. Ann Altman] to the academic community and to everyone else who is interested in Easter Island.” It includes copious footnotes by the translator.
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Not only does the translation include footnotes by the translator but it also includes copious notes by the Editor, Shawn McLaughlin, the erudite author of “The Complete Guide to Easter Island,” which was published recently by the Easter Island Foundation (www.islandheritage.org).
Shawn’s notes bring Stéphen-Chauvet’s text into the 21st century by correcting many of the author’s misconceptions. The translated text provides an excellent introduction to the mindset of ethnographers in the mid 1930’s. However, Shawn’s notes are an essential antidote to much that is dated or just plain wrong in the original text.