Living Language

Re “Keeping a Culture Afloat,” Jan. 28: The cultural importance and recognizability of Rapa Nui as a Polynesian tongue cognate with Maori, Tahitian and Hawaiian was not lost on the early Europeans who made contact with its speakers. In January 1778, reflecting on the discovery of Hawaii, Capt. James Cook wondered in his remarkable diary, “How shall we account for this Nation spreading it self so far over this Vast ocean? We find them from New Zealand to the South, to these islands in the North and from Easter Island to the Hebrides.”

David R. Ginsburg

Santa Monica