ABSTRACT
Campbell’s Polynesian heritage is clearly evident in his physiognomy, and this was to create severe psychological problems as the young Campbell, growing up in an orphanage in Dunedin – a particularly Pakehadominated area of New Zealand – attempted to pass himself off as a Pakeha in order to fit in with his peers. As Campbell reports, racism was ‘rife’ in 1930s New Zealand, and in spite of his best efforts to conceal his Polynesian ancestry, he was ‘brutally exposed’ by a white boy who called him ‘“Nigger”’ (Sarti 1998b: 16). Despite such personal difficulties, Campbell proved to be highly successful in his educational and vocational endeavours: he was a top scholar at Otago Boys’ High School, and published Mine Eyes Dazzle (1950), his first poetry collection, while studying at Victoria University College, Wellington. As he matured into adulthood, however, his sublimation of his Cook Island ancestry contributed to the onset of an increasingly debilitating series of emotional crises which eventually culminated in psychosis in the early 1960s. Campbell argues that it was only by coming to terms with his Polynesian roots that he was able to overcome his problems with mental illness:
for the first half of my life I denied my Polynesian heritage, and recognized only my European side. I was divided; and this was to land me in a psychiatric hospital. I came right when I recognized what had
been troubling me, and with recognition came understanding and forgiveness.
