Aubrey–Maturin series

Aubrey-Maturin series
Author Patrick O'Brian
Country Great Britain
Language English
Genre Nautical fiction, Historical Fiction
Published 1969–2004

The Aubrey–Maturin series is a sequence of nautical historical novels—20 completed and one unfinished—by Patrick O'Brian, set during the Napoleonic Wars and centering on the friendship between Captain Jack Aubrey of the Royal Navy and his ship's surgeon Stephen Maturin, a physician, natural philosopher, and intelligence agent. The first novel, Master and Commander, was published in 1969 and the last finished novel in 1999.[1] The 21st novel of the series, left unfinished at O'Brian's death in 2000, appeared in print in late 2004. The series received considerable international acclaim and most of the novels reached The New York Times Best Seller list.[1] These novels comprised the canon of an author often compared to Jane Austen, C. S. Forester and other British authors central to the English literature canon.[2][3][4][5]

The 2003 film Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World took material from books in this series, notably Master and Commander, HMS Surprise, The Letter of Marque, The Fortune of War, and particularly The Far Side of the World. Russell Crowe played the role of Jack Aubrey, and Paul Bettany that of Stephen Maturin.

Development

Patrick O'Brian's The Golden Ocean (1956) and The Unknown Shore (1959) both depict fictional pairs of young men loosely based on real seamen who participate in George Anson's voyage around the world. In these two novels, O'Brian began to develop the models for the characters of Aubrey and Maturin as well as the storytelling techniques used in the series.[6]

The series

A replica of HMS Surprise at the San Diego Maritime Museum, based on HMS Rose and used in the film.

Novels in order of first publication (American titles as noted)

  1. Master and Commander (1969)
  2. Post Captain (1972)
  3. HMS Surprise (1973)
  4. The Mauritius Command (1977)
  5. Desolation Island (1978)
  6. The Fortune of War (1979)
  7. The Surgeon's Mate (1980)
  8. The Ionian Mission (1981)
  9. Treason's Harbour (1983)
  10. The Far Side of the World (1984)
  11. The Reverse of the Medal (1986)
  12. The Letter of Marque (1988)
  13. The Thirteen Gun Salute (1989)
  14. The Nutmeg of Consolation (1991)
  15. Clarissa Oakes (1992) – (The Truelove in the USA)
  16. The Wine-Dark Sea (1993)
  17. The Commodore (1995)
  18. The Yellow Admiral (1996)
  19. The Hundred Days (1998)
  20. Blue at the Mizzen (1999)
  21. The Final Unfinished Voyage of Jack Aubrey (2004) – (21 in the USA)

Internal chronology

O'Brian's books were written and published in the same chronological sequence as the events they describe, beginning with Master and Commander, set in 1800, and carrying through to the final novel, set in late 1815 after the Battle of Waterloo.

However, they do not strictly follow history. The first six books quickly move through twelve years of the Napoleonic Wars, as established by frequent reference to historical events, with The Fortune of War ending on 1 June 1813 with the battle between the HMS Shannon and USS Chesapeake. Yet the series then enters a kind of fantasy-time in which it takes another dozen novels to progress to November 1813. Much of this period is spent at sea, with little or no connection to real-world years, and the events of the novels take up substantially more time than the few months 'available'. External historical reference returns with The Yellow Admiral, the 18th book in the series. Towards the beginning of this novel, it is stated that the British army under the Duke of Wellington has entered France from Spain, which occurred in November 1813. Time is then paused again for a few chapters, as a narrative apparently lasting several months ensues before a specific arrival at Christmas 1813. Thereafter, the book and the next in the series (The Hundred Days) move swiftly through the historical events of Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Russia and his defeat in the War of the Sixth Coalition, his exile and escape from Elba, and his final campaign and defeat in June 1815. The last completed book in the series, Blue at the Mizzen, is the only volume which is set entirely after the conclusion of the Napoleonic Wars.

In his introduction to The Far Side of the World, the 10th book in the series, O'Brian wrote that if the author "had known how many books were to follow the first, he would certainly have started the sequence much earlier" in real historical time. He goes on to explain that "if his readers will bear with him", books of the series will be set in "hypothetical years, rather like those hypothetical moons used in the calculation of Easter: an 1812a as it were or even an 1812b".[7] In effect, the period from June to December 1813 is stretched out to accommodate events that ought to occupy five or six years.

Characters

The series focuses on two main characters, naval officer Jack Aubrey and physician, naturalist, and spy Stephen Maturin, and the ongoing plot is structured around Aubrey's ascent from Lieutenant to Rear Admiral in the Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.

Jack Aubrey is a large man (both literally and figuratively) with an energetic, gregarious, cheerful, and relatively simple personality and a deep respect for naval tradition. Remarkable early success earned him the nickname "Lucky Jack Aubrey" and a reputation as a "fighting captain", a reputation which he sought to retain throughout his career. But while frequently "brilliant" and much respected at sea, he is less competent on land, as indiscreet liaisons, impertinent remarks, and poor financial decisions often bring him trouble. Aubrey's professional life of daring exploits and reverses was inspired by the chequered careers of Thomas Cochrane and other notable captains of the Royal Navy from the period.[8]

Irish-Catalan Dr. Stephen Maturin ostensibly serves as an adept ship's surgeon on Aubrey's various commands. However, unknown to many of his associates, he also serves as a particularly skilled volunteer intelligence agent for the British Admiralty. Maturin is described as a small, quiet, "ugly" man who is known to cast a "dangerous, pale, reptilian eye" towards his enemies. Unlike his action-oriented friend, Maturin is very well educated with several intellectual pursuits. He is passionately fascinated by the natural world,and takes every opportunity to explore the native wildlife of his ships' ports of call around the world. He is also deeply introspective, and frequently muses on philosophical concepts of identity and self-understanding in his ciphered personal journal.[9] Another aspect of this complex character is portrayed by his long-lasting and frequently frustrating romantic pursuit of the beautiful but unreliable Diana Villiers. He uses several addictive substances, including opium and coca leaves from Peru, arising from scientific curiosity, control of his reactions to physical problems or the character of an addict. He has the values of a gentleman of the era, including a strong sense of honour and involvement in duels. The latter led him to develop a strong skill with pistols and duelling by swords.

Maturin's various professional roles and personal interests allow the series to leave the sea and explore different aspects of the political and social order during the Napoleonic Era.[8] Eventually, Maturin upstages Aubrey in character development within the series due to the diverse situations in which O'Brian can place him.[8]

On the surface, the two main characters have little in common. As O'Brian wrote in The Ionian Mission, "Although (they) were almost as unlike as men could be, unlike in nationality, religion, education, size, shape, profession, habit of mind, they were united in a deep love for music, and many and many an evening had they played together, violin answering cello or both singing together far into the night." This musical connection began in the first paragraph of the first book in the series, when the two characters meet at a concert. They also share a delight in puns and dry witticisms, and particularly memorable wordplay is sometimes repeated in subsequent novels in the series, years later in book-time. One character in the novel, Sir Joseph Blaine, saw the two friends as romantics, in his remarks on Maturin in HMS Surprise Chapter 4: "As I was saying, strong; but not without his weaknesses. He was blaming his particular friend for romantic notions the other day - the friend who is to marry the daughter of that woman we saw just now - and if I had not been so shocked by his condition, I should have been tempted to laugh. He is himself a perfect Quixote: an enthusiastic supporter of the Revolution until ‘93; a United Irishman until the rising, Lord Edward’s adviser.... And now Catalan independence. Or perhaps I should say, Catalan independence from the beginning, simultaneously with the others. But always heart and soul, blood and purse in some cause from which he can derive no conceivable personal benefit."

Despite their many differences, the pair are invaluable and indispensable companions throughout many years of adventure and danger. Reviewers have compared Aubrey and Maturin to other seemingly mismatched yet inseparable fictional duos such as Don Quixote and Sancho Panza in "Don Quixote", Holmes and Watson in the Sherlock Holmes stories, and Kirk and Spock in the original Star Trek TV series.[10][11][12]

Style

A diagram of 1728 illustrating the exterior and rigging of a third-rate ship and the interior of a first-rate ship.

The stories are primarily told in third person from the points of view of the two main characters, Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin. The author sometimes employs a form of first person voice when his characters write in private journals or letters about events that are not otherwise described. The narrative point of view strays from the two main characters only briefly and seldom over the course of the series. One example is the opening scene of The Hundred Days, in which a gossipy conversation between anonymous sailors imparts important news and information about the main characters.

Period language and naval jargon

Patrick O'Brian once wrote "Obviously, I have lived very much out of the world: I know little of present-day Dublin or London or Paris, even less of post-modernity, post-structuralism, hard rock or rap, and I cannot write with much conviction about the contemporary scene."[13] This becomes obvious for readers of the Aubrey-Maturin Series, as he adopts a narrative voice contemporary with their setting.[10] Richard Ollard, in examining the general reception to O'Brian's books, suggests that O'Brian's naval officers would be able to talk with and recognise Jane Austen's characters.[8]

In addition to the period language, O'Brian is adept at using naval jargon with little or no translation for the "lubberly" reader. The combination of the historical-voice narration and naval terms may seem daunting at first to some readers; but most note that after a short while a "total immersion" effect results.[14] Occasionally, O'Brian explains obscure nautical terms by placing Stephen Maturin into the tutelage of seamen, allowing the author to vicariously teach the reader about various parts and functions of a period sailing vessel without breaking from the narrative. This was especially common early in the series, when Maturin was still new to the Royal Navy.[8]

Also, O'Brian often addresses the historical events and themes within his books indirectly, allowing a fuller immersion for his readers without flaunting his historical understanding unlike other similar nautical authors.[8]

Humour

O'Brian's bone-dry and cutting wit is present throughout all his novels.[15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] Its delivery, whether in the form of narration or dialogue, is often so forthright that the reader may not perceive it at first. At times, however, O'Brian will spend a considerable portion of a volume setting up comedic sequences - for example, Jack's use of rum in the "debauchery" of Maturin's pet sloth in HMS Surprise or Jack's assertion to William Babbington, while discussing nautical terminology, that "Sheep ain't poetical", supporting his statement by saying: "Remember that fellow in the play who calls out: 'My Kingdom for a horse'? Would not have been poetry at all, had he said sheep." (See The Ionian Mission.) Drunk animals are a common motif through the series; for instance the following conversation between Jack and Stephen in Post Captain: "'The carrier has brought you an ape.' 'What sort of an ape?' asked Stephen. 'A damned ill-conditioned sort of an ape. It had a can of ale at every pot-house on the road, and is reeling drunk. It has been offering itself to Babbington.'"[23]

Puns - often "bad" on the part of Jack - are also common throughout the novels, much to the chagrin of Stephen Maturin. Jack takes a special, perhaps overzealous, interest in nautical puns. For example, Jack often repeats one of Stephen's spur-of-the-moment puns regarding dog-watches. At a dinner, replying to a lubber's question on the term 'dog-watch' (Post Captain, Chapter 12), Stephen suggests it is "because they are curtailed, of course" ("Cur Tailed", "cur" meaning "dog"), and like other puns, Aubrey repeats the witticism as often as occasion allows. The use of humor contrasts the two central characters. Aubrey is direct and forthright while Stephen is subtle and cunning, mirroring the overall personality of each man, especially regarding warfare tactics (ships, cannons and swords compared to intelligence gathering).

O'Brian has Aubrey speaking many proverbs (Brunvand, 2004), but usually in mangled form, such as "There's a great deal to be said for making hay while the iron is hot" (from Treason's Harbour and similarly in Desolation Island). In HMS Surprise (Chapter 6), Aubrey says that "A bird in the hand is worth any amount of beating about the bush". Sometimes Aubrey gets in a muddle and Maturin affectionately mocks him by playing on the mixed metaphor: '... they have chosen their cake, and must lie in it.'; Maturin replies, 'You mean, they cannot have their bed and eat it?' (also from HMS Surprise, Chapter 7).

Related to proverbs, Aubrey tells Maturin a clever Wellerism, "'It's not a fit night out for man or beast,' as the centaur observed, ha, ha, ha!" (Yellow Admiral).

Publication history

Master and Commander was first published in 1969, in the US by Lippincott, and in Great Britain and Ireland by Collins. The series continued to be a modest success in both countries. However, in 1989 Starling Lawrence of W.W. Norton discovered the novels on a plane flight between London and New York.[24] W. W. Norton began printing the books, and they became more seriously taken by critics and a publishing success. His novels sold over 400,000 copies in the next two years and continued to be a success, selling over 2 million copies by 2000.[1] In its review of the last unfinished novel, Publishers Weekly reported that the series had sold over 6 million copies.[25] W. W. Norton released the novels in e-book format on 5 December 2011.[26] The full series has been published in German, French and Italian translations, the twenty finished books also in Spanish, and part of the series in Catalan, Chinese, Czech, Finnish, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese, Swedish and Russian translation.[27]

Literary significance and criticism

Though sometimes compared to Trollope, Melville, Conrad and even Proust, the Aubrey–Maturin series has most often been compared to the works of Jane Austen, one of O'Brian's greatest inspirations in English literature.[1] In a cover-story in The New York Times Book Review published on 6 January 1991, Richard Snow characterised Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin naval adventure novels as "the best historical novels ever written. On every page Mr. O'Brian reminds us with subtle artistry of the most important of all historical lessons: that times change but people don't, that the griefs and follies and victories of the men and women who were here before us are in fact the maps of our own lives."[28] And in a Washington Post article published 2 August 1992, Ken Ringle wrote, "The Aubrey/Maturin series far beyond any episodic chronicle, ebbs and flows with the timeless tide of character and the human heart."

Frank McNally, writing in honor of the author's 100th birthday, reflects on the breadth of the appeal of the series of novels, for the quality of the writing and the relationships between the characters, which put them beyond the typical naval adventure, and gain interest from readers who "wouldn’t touch Horatio Hornblower with a bargepole."[29] Lucy Eyre wrote to point out the appeal of the series to women readers, mentioning the nautical detail, and how it might be viewed the same as precise medical language on the television program ER. She notes that "O’Brian is never heavy-handed with his research: it’s simply that the books are set in a perfectly realised world, which happens to be a ship at war."[30]

Even critics uninterested in the Aubrey–Maturin series have praised the intricacy and character development of the books. When reviewing The Wine Dark Sea in the Hudson Review, Gary Krist is very critical of the plot of the books, suggesting that the books are full of elements of "pop fiction" and O'Brian's excessive "delight in the sheer specificity of seafaring mechanics."[31] However, he did not deny the qualities that "push it close to that great, fuzzy art-entertainment meridian" including character development and at times, "the sense of being in the presence of an active, complex, and compassionate intelligence."[31]

Numerous authors have admired the Aubrey–Maturin series, including Iris Murdoch, Eudora Welty and Tom Stoppard.[1] Science fiction author David Drake has stated that his RCN Series was inspired by the Aubrey–Maturin books.[32]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Prial, Frank J. (7 January 2000). "Patrick O'Brian, Whose 20 Sea Stories Won Him International Fame, Dies at 85". The New York Times. Retrieved 21 February 2010.
  2. ↑ Prial, Frank J. (19 October 1998). "The Seas of Adventure Still Beckon a Storyteller; At 83, Patrick O'Brian Journeys Into History". The New York Times.
  3. ↑ "Master of invention". The Sydney Morning Herald. 29 November 2003.
  4. ↑ "O'Brian: the most Irish Englishman". The Daily Telegraph (London). 22 January 2000. Archived from the original on 3 January 2015.
  5. ↑ Jeet Heer (November 13, 2003). "Tall Tales from the Sea: C.S. Forester and Patrick O'Brian". National Post. Retrieved 25 April 2014.
  6. ↑ King, Dean (2000). Patrick O'Brian:A Life. MacMillan. pp. 179–180. ISBN 978-0-8050-5977-9.
  7. ↑ From the introduction to The Far Side of the World
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Ollard, Richard (1994). "The Jack Aubrey Novels: an editorial review". In A.E. Cunningham. Patrick O'Brian:Critical Essays and a Bibliography. New York: W.W. Norton. pp. 23–32. ISBN 0-393-03626-X.
  9. ↑ Beinart, William (December 1998). "Men, Science, Travel and Nature in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth-Century Cape". Journal of Southern African Studies 24 (4): 775–799. doi:10.1080/03057079808708601. JSTOR 2637474.
  10. 1 2 "The odd couple all at sea". The Telegraph (London). 11 January 1997. Archived from the original on 3 January 2015. Retrieved 21 February 2010.
  11. ↑ Spock is Dr Stephen Maturin « Back to Basics
  12. ↑ Burr, Ty (5 May 2009). "Star Trek". The Boston Globe.
  13. ↑ Patrick O'Brian: Critical Essays and a Bibliography, edited by Arthur Cunningham
  14. ↑ King, A Sea of Words 3rd ed. xviii–xx
  15. ↑ "The Hundred Days". Publishers Weekly. October 1998. Retrieved 13 March 2015. He offers a wealth of sly humor (Navy officers' talk is ""really not fit for mixed company because of its profoundly nautical character"")
  16. ↑ Jonathan Yardley (5 January 1997). "Newcomers Face Rough Seas in O'Brian's Admiral". Washington Post (Orlando Sentinel). Retrieved 9 February 2015. O'Brian's characteristically wry, understated fashion
  17. ↑ "The Commodore" (15 February 1995 ed.). Kirkus Reviews. 20 May 2010. Retrieved 20 January 2015. Maturin's enlightened 18th-century speculations on love, sex, and politics endow the action with rich, often comic, ironies, expressed as always in O'Brian's hyperbolic, nearly Joycean flights of rhetoric.
  18. ↑ "The Nutmeg of Consolation" (1 July 1991 ed.). Kirkus Reviews. 20 May 2010. Retrieved 11 December 2014. witty, literate and engaging
  19. ↑ "The Letter of Marque" (1990 ed.). Publishers Weekly. Retrieved 26 November 2014. swift witty tale
  20. ↑ T. J. Binyon (1977). "The Mauritius Command". quoted on W W Norton site. London: Times Literary Supplement. Retrieved 16 May 2014. O'Brian has a gift for the comic
  21. ↑ Kevin Myers. "More Praise for O'Brian and his Work". quoted on WW Norton site. Irish Times. Retrieved 16 May 2014. no one can make you laugh so loud
  22. ↑ Walton, Jo (11 October 2010). "Out of his element: Patrick O’Brian’s Post Captain". Tor.com. Retrieved 10 December 2014. There’s a wonderful scene where he runs from the bailiffs back to sea and calls back “Mr Pullings, press that man!” He presses the bailiffs who have come to arrest him for debt!
  23. ↑ Post Captain, Harper Collins, paperback edition, 2003, page 51
  24. ↑ Mark Horowitz (May 16, 1993). "Patrick O'Brian's Ship Comes In". Book Reviews. New York Times. Retrieved 24 April 2014.
  25. ↑ "21: The Final Unfinished Voyage of Jack Aubrey". Editorial Reviews. Publishers Weekly. October 2004. Retrieved 31 March 2015.
  26. ↑ Bosman, Julie (20 November 2011). "O'Brian Novels Are Going Digital". New York Times.
  27. ↑ "The Aubrey/Maturin series by Patrick O'Brian, in reading order". Archived from the original on 3 January 2015. Retrieved 3 January 2015.
  28. ↑ Snow, Richard (6 January 1991). "An Author I’d Walk the Plank For". The New York Times. Retrieved 14 December 2009.
  29. ↑ Frank McNally (12 December 2014). "The Life of O'Brian". The Irish Times. Retrieved 20 February 2015.
  30. ↑ Lucy Eyre (28 November 2014). "Why Patrick O’Brian is Jane Austen at sea". The Guardian. Retrieved 15 March 2015.
  31. 1 2 Krist, Gary (Summer 1994). "Bad Art, Good Entertainment". The Hudson Review 47 (2): 299–306. JSTOR 3852288.
  32. ↑ Drake, David. "With the Lightnings". Archived from the original on 3 January 2015. Retrieved 5 June 2009.

Bibliography

External links

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