thumb|Inside cover art of 1941 edition. Art by Gontran De Poncins.
Kabloona is a book by French adventurer Gontran de Poncins, written in collaboration with Lewis Galantiere. It was first published in the United States in 1941 as a selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club (via Time-Life Books), in England in 1942, and in French (as a translation of the English version) in 1947.
Description
Kabloona recounts Poncin's solo unsupported journey in the Canadian Arctic near King William Island, Canada, where he lived with the Inuit (in those days, still generally called the Eskimos
In Kabloona, Poncins explores Inuit culture and the Inuit world view, leaving the reader with a deeper understanding of such things as wife-swapping, living in an igloo at , why and how Inuit have feasts lasting 20 hours at a stretch, their concepts of time and family life, their perspectives on Europeans and European food and gear, the Inuit diet, hunting techniques, wildlife, nomadic life, dogs, weather, clothing, communal sharing of goods, and notions of private property. waitress Jody Gilbert calls W.C. Fields a "big kabloona". Fields replies: "Kabloona – I haven't been called that for two days."
The Firesign Theater recording "In The Next World You're On Your Own", Side 2 is labeled "We've Lost Our Big Kabloona"
Editions
- Gontran De Poncins (author), Lewis Galantiere (collaborator). Kabloona. 1941.
- Gontran De Poncins (author), Eric Linklater (intro). Kabloona. London, 1942. Full-text online. Scanned book via Internet Archive.