You have to wonder how Hawai'i and its literature fit in the changing views of history and uses of new technology.

In various forms, Hawai'i has much history that is written, on film or otherwise ready for screening. Newspaper stories are sometimes called "the first draft of history." Editorials, columns or other opinion pieces in the paper might be a sort-of second draft.

A trip to your bookstore or library shows shelves of histories, large and small, short and long. A partial list of historical topics might include Hawaiian music, hula, aloha shirts, surfing, local food and cookbooks, various biographies, books on Island companies and social groups, reports on colonies of Hawai'i folks now living on the Mainland and, of course, histories of ethnic and racial groups who have moved here.

On other levels, author and filmmaker Tom Coffman has produced notable works on important Hawai'i historical turning points. And some feel the cutting edge of local history now is works using old and new material produced by ethnic Hawaiian scholars at the University of Hawai'i.

And yet more is needed. It's said that every generation needs to produce its own version of history. In that sense, Hawai'i is a couple of generations behind when it comes to a masterful, balanced, sweeping, comprehensive view of our history. In fact, it has been more than 40 years since former UH professor Gavan Daws did the research for his fine 1968 one-volume history of Hawai'i, "Shoal of Time."

Fiction can be a strong form of historical writing, as I was reminded preparing to take part in a panel on using history at the 2006 Bamboo Ridge Writers Institute earlier this month.

Thanks in good part to Bamboo Ridge and some other publishers, Hawai'i has produced some good fiction, much of it by local writers, as well as outsiders.

But what about a great Hawai'i novel? A panel of writers and scholars at a City Hall program earlier this year seemed to make these points:

Maybe the closest we have to a great Hawai'i novel is Ozzie Bushnell's "Ka'a'awa," which is set in the 19th century. As for the future, someone from any racial group could write a great novel catching the many facets of Hawai'i. Still, it will probably take an ethnic Hawaiian to write what will be accepted as the great Hawaiian novel.

In the meantime, we have James Michener. He's had plenty of critics, but my point today is that his novel "Hawaii," which set a pattern for his subsequent books, captured many of our Islands' racial and historical themes in a way that has appealed to millions. When Michener died in 1997 at age 90, the Economist magazine in its long obituary suggested he was more important as a historian than a literary figure.

So maybe both the great Hawai'i and the great Hawaiian novels are yet to be written.

It's important to realize that history is not written in stone but always changing, sometimes as new facts emerge; yet also as times change and historians (and journalists and others) re-evaluate their views.

A recent New York Times story remade that point in telling how the trauma of Sept. 11, 2001, changed the views of history of both professors and also their young students looking at the world. A new book of essays on this 9/11 impact has this quote from historian-editor Joanne Meyerowitz:

"(History) is written and rewritten in each generation. The events of the present always help us reframe the events of the past. And the events of the past always help us reframe the age we are living in."

Many historians feel the effect of 9/11 accelerated a push toward "internationalizing" American history, looking at common causes for central events in the world. But others see more American "exceptionalism," an opposite view that the United States is fundamentally different from other developed countries, and so we have a special role in the world.

I can't say how that difference can be shrunk down to Hawai'i. Here, on one hand, it seems 9/11 and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (including casualties) have increased our world view and concerns. Yet, we also still tend to see these Islands as "a special place." And the rise of the Hawaiian nationalist movement, the fate of the Akaka bill, and other developments may have changed old views on the overthrow of the monarchy and subsequent events.

These developments and debates come as new information technology is affecting our lives. Blogs, for example, are often reports and opinion that are another early draft of history. Internet chat rooms can be another.

UH English professor Craig Howes, my history-literature panel mate at the Bamboo Ridge conference, also made the point that blogs are often a form of autobiography.

Howes, who heads the university's Center for Biographical Research, told of different ways to do what's called "life writing." His own recent work has included video biographies of important Hawai'i people and events using collaboration with several others. He also noted a "new age" when memoirs outsell novels.

There's a final irony in all this: In this new age, when we talk much about new technology, publishing on the Internet, etc., high among the best-sellers recently have been old-fashioned nonfiction books on recent history. One big example: Bob Woodward's "State of Denial" about Bush administration shortcomings in Washington and Iraq.

So the good news is both that we seem to be in an age when history is more appreciated, and there are more new as well as good old ways to present it.

John Griffin, a frequent contributor, is a former Advertiser editorial page editor and the author of two recent novels on modern Hawai'i, "Halfway to Asia" and "Web of Islands."