I finished this book May 30, but just now got around to typing anything in। I want so much to share these books with you but I don’t want to disclose any of the plot, as there are so many twists and turns along the way, so I hope the following is a somewhat satisfactory summary of why I believe them to be wonderful:
O’Brian pulled off another sensational book, a tale set during the Napoleonic wars but which engenders such a strong human connection to the characters one would never think of the story happening long ago and far away। With that in mind, all the more amazing then is the attention to historical detail and accuracy:
It seems to me that where the Royal Navy and indeed the infant United States Navy are concerned there is very little point in trying to improve the record … and the only liberty I have taken is to place my heroes aboard. And even so, although they are not quite as peripheral as Fabrice on the field of Waterloo, they do not play a decisive part nor bend the course of history in any way. [Author’s note]
As much as microscopic interactions between atoms are what constitute the chair you sit upon, and as interaction between subatomical particles constitute those atoms, and all of these levels chair, atoms, subatomic particles exist at the same time and to the same extent of importance, so the Aubrey-Maturin novels can indeed serve as a reminder that personal experiences adventures, calamities, and otherwise- plenty of all! of individual people are indeed what make up any kind of historical event, and that intrapersonal conflict, struggles, and growth make up those individual people. Layers upon splendid, splendid layers.
O’Brian is a master of the English language, and I always thoroughly enjoy how he administers it and how the characters themselves play around with it especially Aubrey and Maturin, who often mix metaphors in jest. Also I love the shipspeak almost as much as the plot and the characters, which are all so well done- but the shipspeak to me is a new and vibrant way of using language to describe and communicate, and therefore it is poetry. Quoting a section for you here, with Captain Jack Aubrey and the surgeon and intelligence agent but not mariner! Stephen Maturin:
“Boat your oars,” said Jack. “Clap on to the halliard- no, the halliard. God’s death- haul away. Bear a hand, Stephen. Belay. Catch a couple of turns around the kevel- the kevel.”
The scow gave a violent lurch. Jack dropped all, scrambled forward, caught two turns round the kevel and slid back to the tiller. The sail filled, he brought the wind a little abaft the beam, and the scow headed out to sea.
“You are cursed snappish tonight, Jack,” said Stephen. “How do you expect me to understand your altumal cant, without pondering on it? I do not expect you to understand medical jargon, without giving you time to consider the etymology, for all love.”
“Not to know the odds between a halliard and a sheet after all these years at sea: it passes human understanding,” said Jack.
“You are a reasonably civil, complaisant creature on dry land,” said Stephen, “but the moment you are afloat you become pragmatical and absolute, a bashaw- do this, do that, gluppit the prawling strangles, there…” (p. 272)
