An Island to Oneself: The Book That Left Me Alone with Two Baguettes

Some books inspire you to cook. Others encourage you to tidy your house or become a better person.

Tom Neale’s An Island to Oneself inspired me to ask a hotel to abandon me on an uninhabited island.

For a day, admittedly. I wasn’t quite ready to make a permanent commitment to coconut-based living.

Still, while other guests were presumably making perfectly sensible enquiries about lunch, I was arranging to remove myself from the comforts I had travelled so far to enjoy.

I blame Tom. Affectionately, but quite firmly.

A man with a rather ambitious idea of peace and quiet

First published in 1966, An Island to Oneself follows a New Zealander who chose to live on Anchorage Island in Suwarrow atoll, in the Cook Islands. He arrived in October 1952, shortly before turning fifty. The memoir covers two stays: 1952–54 and 1960–63.

Most castaway stories begin with somebody desperately wishing things had gone differently. Neale had spent years hoping things would go precisely this way.

His friend Robert Dean Frisbie and Frisbie’s book The Island of Desire helped feed that ambition.

I find this chain of influence rather lovely. One island enthusiast encourages another, who writes a book, which eventually persuades a German traveller to make an unusual request at a Polynesian hotel. Literature has consequences. Some of them require a boat.

Even paradise involves washing up

Neale grew vegetables, tended chickens, fished and cared for two cats. In Noel Barber’s introduction, we also meet a fastidious host who sweeps his hut and warms his teapot—even when reusing old tea leaves.

That teapot detail is magnificent. You can withdraw from society, but apparently there are limits to what civilisation should be asked to endure.

It also makes him feel wonderfully human. The dream might be enormous, yet the satisfaction often sits in small things: a useful routine, a tidy corner, something made to work properly.

That is where the book gets its hold on me. You begin to understand why an ordinary day might feel sufficient. Nobody needs to deliver a life-changing revelation before supper. Having supper at all is already a respectable achievement.

Tom had a pier. I had bread.

One substantial undertaking is rebuilding an old coral-block pier by hand. After months of labour, a storm damages his work. The memoir also includes illness and a frightening episode of back trouble in the lagoon.

These episodes put some weight behind the fantasy. Freedom still leaves you with a body that can fail and jobs that nobody else will finish.

I admire that determination. I also suspect that after my first unsuccessful afternoon moving coral blocks, I would have begun explaining the benefits of leaving the pier in its charmingly rustic condition.

If you are curious about the real setting, the Cook Islands tourism website has an introduction to Suwarrow. My own experiment took place elsewhere: on Tiaraunu, within Tetiaroa in French Polynesia.

My application for the position of temporary hermit

During my stay at Hotel Tetiaroa, I asked to be left alone for a day on another motu within the atoll.

For the wider setting, I’ve written about Tetiaroa and why the place stayed with me. It is exactly the sort of landscape that encourages extravagant thoughts about giving everything up and living beside a lagoon.

From a comfortable distance, the proposal seemed excellent. I would walk, enjoy the silence and experience a small taste of the freedom that had drawn Neale to his island.

There is something wonderfully convenient about imagining a simpler life while somebody else is still responsible for the boat.

Two baguettes and an unfortunate amount of confidence

A Zodiac took me across from Onetahi. My provisions included two baguettes; my expectations included a pleasant stroll.

Tiaraunu supplied heat, sharp coral and dense vegetation. A booby with a chick objected to my presence. In the shallows, I worried about stonefish and stingrays, while little reef sharks did very little to improve my composure. Eventually, I reached a sandy beach and collapsed beside a leaning coconut palm.

You can read the full account in Exploring Tetiaroa: Beauty Meets Danger.

My qualifications for island life were becoming clearer. I could appreciate a view. I could carry bread. Beyond that, the interview was going badly.

To be fair to the wildlife, it was going about its business. I was the visitor who had arrived with literary ambitions. The sharks had not read Tom Neale. They were under no obligation to make this a meaningful experience.

What the book gets wonderfully right

My little expedition gave me a fresh appreciation of the gap between wanting solitude and knowing how to live in it.

Neale’s attention to everyday tasks is a large part of the appeal. A meal or a repair becomes absorbing when the outcome matters enough. You understand the satisfaction because you have watched the effort involved.

That might sound an odd recommendation. “Do read this book; there’s plenty of maintenance.” But I mean it as a compliment.

The pace allows you to settle into somebody else’s priorities. So much travel writing promises transformation. Sometimes I would settle for paying proper attention to where I am. Preferably from somewhere shaded.

A few things to know before packing your imaginary bags

This is a memoir of a particular man pursuing a particular dream. His choices can fascinate you without becoming a sensible plan for your next holiday.

Readers who enjoy practical detail and a slower rhythm will probably get more from it than anyone expecting a cliffhanger every few pages. There is room to think, which is rather the point.

It is also a book of its time. The chapters involving killing animals may be uncomfortable reading. I would not recommend it as an entirely gentle collection of palm trees and sunsets.

Nor would I treat it as a modern instruction manual for island survival. My own contribution to that genre would be extremely short and feature an embarrassed baguette.

Would I recommend it?

Absolutely. I loved An Island to Oneself because it made an unusual life feel imaginable. It encouraged me to take a wish seriously enough to try a small version of it.

That seems a fairly impressive achievement for a book.

My day on Tiaraunu helped me understand my own dream more clearly. I wanted the quiet, the space and the feeling of being somewhere extraordinary. I was rather less committed to the lengthy apprenticeship required to become good at staying there.

I can admire Neale’s determination while acknowledging my own fondness for someone knowing where I am.

Would I have asked the hotel to leave me on that island without reading his book? Perhaps not. Would I read it again? Happily.

Would I attempt the island experience again? Possibly. But I would give more thought to the route, the shade and the provisions.

Two baguettes are a lovely lunch. They are a less convincing philosophy of survival.