The Far Side of the World
Encyclopedia
The Far Side of the World is an historical novel
by Patrick O'Brian
set during the Napoleonic Wars
. It was first published by HarperCollins
in 1984 and is the tenth book in the Aubrey-Maturin series, concerning the adventures of naval commander
Jack Aubrey
, and his friend, ship's surgeon, naturalist and spy, Stephen Maturin. The novel provided part of the title and some of plot-structure for the 2003 Peter Weir
film, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
.
. Aubrey reports to his commander-in-chief at Gibraltar
, who sends him and to intercept the American frigate USS Norfolk which plans to attack British whaler
s in the South Seas
. Jack makes all haste to have the Surprise victualled as quickly as possible and recruits a new master, a Mr Allen. Not only is he an excellent seaman but he also has an in-depth knowledge of whalers, having sailed previously with James Colnett
on a semi exploration-whaling expedition to the South Atlantic. Stephen Maturin also persuades Jack to take Mr Martin along with them, a clergyman who Jack approves of and who is unhappy with his current ship.
Maturin receives disturbing news from his intelligence-chief in London, Sir Joseph Blaine, which tends to confirm his suspicions of treason and infiltration by the French. He also hears from his wife, who has heard rumours of the infidelity he pretended in Valetta, Malta
with the red-haired Mrs Fielding for intelligence reasons. He sends a letter to reassure her via Andrew Wray, unaware of the latter's role as a French agent.
The Surprise encounters many setbacks, suffering delays in Brazil
from a lightning-struck prow before they round Cape Horn
into the Pacific Ocean
to locate the Norfolk, which has captured and burnt several whalers. The crew of the Surprise, having nearly been shipwrecked by the tail of a typhoon, finally discover the Norfolk wrecked on a reef by the same typhoon and her crew encamped on an island. Aubrey, Mr Martin and some of the crew take Stephen ashore as he is in a coma after hitting his head in a fall and needs to be on land to be operated on. However, he makes a recovery without an operation. While they are ashore, another heavy storm blows the Surprise away and they are stranded. Relations between the two marooned groups deteriorate rapidly, particularly after Jack announces to the American Captain Palmer that he will have to take his crew prisoner. Some of them are from HMS Hermione
, a ship that mutinied in the West Indies and they know they will be hanged if returned to British authorities. The situation reaches a crisis point after Jack orders the crew of the Surprise to lengthen their boat so they can sail away, pushing them particularly hard when he sees an American whaler on the horizon. The crew of the Norfolk sabotage the boat after spotting the same whaler but it is at this point that they see her strike her colours
, having been pursued through a gap in the reef by the Surprise.
A sub-plot in the book is the illicit affair between the sweet singing but otherwise untalented Hollom, a passed midshipman
who never received a lieutenant's commission and is too old to fit in with the young midshipmen who Jack takes aboard in pity, and the pretty wife brought aboard by the sexually impotent gunner, Horner. Hollom is considered a "Jonah
" by the crew - someone who brings bad luck to the ship - and the two lovers are presumed to have been beaten to death by the ferocious, brutal and jealous husband on an island whilst the Surprise is being provisioned. Horner himself sinks into a black despair and is discovered hanged in his cabin.
as a way of protecting members of his crew, who are mutineers off of HMS Hermione
.
The USS Chesapeake
lay off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia
, and was under the command of Commodore James Barron
. HMS Leopard
, under the command of Salusbury Pryce Humphreys
, hailed and requested to search the Chesapeake for suspected deserters from the Royal Navy
; when the Chesapeake refused, the Leopard began to fire broadsides, killing three aboard the Chesapeake and injuring another 18 (one of whom, Robert Macdonald, later died from his wounds ashore). The Chesapeake, her decks cluttered with stores in preparation for a long cruise, managed to fire only a single gun in reply to the Leopard, and Barron quickly struck his colours and surrendered his ship; however, Humphreys refused the surrender, and simply sent a boarding party to search for the deserters.
HMS Leopard found four Royal Navy deserters among the Chesapeake crew: David Martin, John Strachan, and William Ware, run from HMS Melampus
; and Jenkin Ratford, run from HMS Halifax
. Of the four, only Ratford was British-born: Strachan was a white man born in the United States (though later serving in the Royal Navy), and Martin and Ware were African Americans (place of birth uncertain). Leopard carried the men to Halifax for trial: the British citizen, Ratford, was sentenced to death and hanged on the Halifax; the three Americans - as non-British nationals - were sentenced to 500 lashes each, but the sentence was later commuted, and the British government eventually offered to return them to the United States and pay reparations.
The USS Norfolk also recalls the historical expedition of the USS Essex
. Essex sailed in South Atlantic waters and along the coast of Brazil until January 1813 when Captain David Porter
undertook the decimation of English whale fisheries in the Pacific. Although her crew suffered greatly from a shortage of provisions and heavy gales while rounding Cape Horn, she anchored safely at Valparaíso
, Chile
, on 14 March, having seized schooners Elizabeth and Nereyda along the way. The next five months brought Essex 13 prizes.
In January 1814, Essex sailed into neutral waters at Valparaiso, only to be trapped there for six weeks by the 36-gun British frigate, HMS Phoebe
and the 18-gun sloop-of-war
HMS Cherub
. On 28 March 1814, Porter determined to gain the open sea, fearing the arrival of British reinforcements. Upon rounding the point, Essex lost her main top-mast to foul weather, forcing her return to the harbour. The British, disregarding the neutrality of the harbour, proceeded with the attack on the crippled ship. For 2½ hours, Essex, armed almost entirely with powerful but short range guns called carronade
s, resisted the enemy's superior fighting power and longer gun range. A fire erupted twice aboard the Essex, at which point about 50 men abandoned the ship and swam for shore; only half of them landing. Eventually, the hopeless situation forced the frigate to surrender. The Essex suffered 58 killed, 97 wounded, while the British casualties were 5 dead, 10 wounded.
film, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
, though the fictional USS Norfolk morphed into the fictional American-built French privateer Acheron, and episodes also migrated from other books in the series, including Master and Commander and HMS Surprise. The design and size of the fictional Acheron reflect those of the USS Constitution
.
Historical novel
According to Encyclopædia Britannica, a historical novel is-Development:An early example of historical prose fiction is Luó Guànzhōng's 14th century Romance of the Three Kingdoms, which covers one of the most important periods of Chinese history and left a lasting impact on Chinese culture.The...
by Patrick O'Brian
Patrick O'Brian
Patrick O'Brian, CBE , born Richard Patrick Russ, was an English novelist and translator, best known for his Aubrey–Maturin series of novels set in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars and centred on the friendship of English Naval Captain Jack Aubrey and the Irish–Catalan physician Stephen...
set during the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...
. It was first published by HarperCollins
HarperCollins
HarperCollins is a publishing company owned by News Corporation. It is the combination of the publishers William Collins, Sons and Co Ltd, a British company, and Harper & Row, an American company, itself the result of an earlier merger of Harper & Brothers and Row, Peterson & Company. The worldwide...
in 1984 and is the tenth book in the Aubrey-Maturin series, concerning the adventures of naval commander
Captain (Royal Navy)
Captain is a senior officer rank of the Royal Navy. It ranks above Commander and below Commodore and has a NATO ranking code of OF-5. The rank is equivalent to a Colonel in the British Army or Royal Marines and to a Group Captain in the Royal Air Force. The rank of Group Captain is based on the...
Jack Aubrey
Jack Aubrey
John "Jack" Aubrey, KB , is a fictional character in the Aubrey–Maturin series of novels by Patrick O'Brian. The series portrays his rise from Lieutenant to Rear-Admiral in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. The twenty -book series encompasses Aubrey's adventures and various commands along...
, and his friend, ship's surgeon, naturalist and spy, Stephen Maturin. The novel provided part of the title and some of plot-structure for the 2003 Peter Weir
Peter Weir
Peter Lindsay Weir, AM is an Australian film director. After playing a leading role in the Australian New Wave cinema with his films such as Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Last Wave and Gallipoli, Weir directed a diverse group of American and international films—many of them major box office...
film, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World is a 2003 film directed by Peter Weir, starring Russell Crowe as Jack Aubrey, with Paul Bettany as Stephen Maturin and released by 20th Century Fox, Miramax Films and Universal Studios...
.
Plot summary
The Far Side of the World continues the story of Jack Aubrey's exploits during the War of 1812War of 1812
The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain's ongoing war with France, impressment of American merchant...
. Aubrey reports to his commander-in-chief at Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...
, who sends him and to intercept the American frigate USS Norfolk which plans to attack British whaler
Whaler
A whaler is a specialized ship, designed for whaling, the catching and/or processing of whales. The former included the whale catcher, a steam or diesel-driven vessel with a harpoon gun mounted at its bows. The latter included such vessels as the sail or steam-driven whaleship of the 16th to early...
s in the South Seas
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...
. Jack makes all haste to have the Surprise victualled as quickly as possible and recruits a new master, a Mr Allen. Not only is he an excellent seaman but he also has an in-depth knowledge of whalers, having sailed previously with James Colnett
James Colnett
James Colnett was an officer of the British Royal Navy, an explorer, and a maritime fur trader. He served under James Cook during Cook's second voyage of exploration...
on a semi exploration-whaling expedition to the South Atlantic. Stephen Maturin also persuades Jack to take Mr Martin along with them, a clergyman who Jack approves of and who is unhappy with his current ship.
Maturin receives disturbing news from his intelligence-chief in London, Sir Joseph Blaine, which tends to confirm his suspicions of treason and infiltration by the French. He also hears from his wife, who has heard rumours of the infidelity he pretended in Valetta, Malta
Malta
Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...
with the red-haired Mrs Fielding for intelligence reasons. He sends a letter to reassure her via Andrew Wray, unaware of the latter's role as a French agent.
The Surprise encounters many setbacks, suffering delays in Brazil
Brazil
Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
from a lightning-struck prow before they round Cape Horn
Cape Horn
Cape Horn is the southernmost headland of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago of southern Chile, and is located on the small Hornos Island...
into the Pacific Ocean
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...
to locate the Norfolk, which has captured and burnt several whalers. The crew of the Surprise, having nearly been shipwrecked by the tail of a typhoon, finally discover the Norfolk wrecked on a reef by the same typhoon and her crew encamped on an island. Aubrey, Mr Martin and some of the crew take Stephen ashore as he is in a coma after hitting his head in a fall and needs to be on land to be operated on. However, he makes a recovery without an operation. While they are ashore, another heavy storm blows the Surprise away and they are stranded. Relations between the two marooned groups deteriorate rapidly, particularly after Jack announces to the American Captain Palmer that he will have to take his crew prisoner. Some of them are from HMS Hermione
HMS Hermione (1782)
HMS Hermione was a 32-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She was notorious for having the bloodiest mutiny in British naval history, which saw her captain and most of the officers killed...
, a ship that mutinied in the West Indies and they know they will be hanged if returned to British authorities. The situation reaches a crisis point after Jack orders the crew of the Surprise to lengthen their boat so they can sail away, pushing them particularly hard when he sees an American whaler on the horizon. The crew of the Norfolk sabotage the boat after spotting the same whaler but it is at this point that they see her strike her colours
Striking the colors
Striking the colors is the universally recognized indication of surrender, particularly for ships at sea. Surrender is dated from the time the ensign is struck.-In international law:# "Colors. A national flag . The colors . ....
, having been pursued through a gap in the reef by the Surprise.
A sub-plot in the book is the illicit affair between the sweet singing but otherwise untalented Hollom, a passed midshipman
Midshipman
A midshipman is an officer cadet, or a commissioned officer of the lowest rank, in the Royal Navy, United States Navy, and many Commonwealth navies. Commonwealth countries which use the rank include Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Kenya...
who never received a lieutenant's commission and is too old to fit in with the young midshipmen who Jack takes aboard in pity, and the pretty wife brought aboard by the sexually impotent gunner, Horner. Hollom is considered a "Jonah
Jonah
Jonah is the name given in the Hebrew Bible to a prophet of the northern kingdom of Israel in about the 8th century BC, the eponymous central character in the Book of Jonah, famous for being swallowed by a fish or a whale, depending on translation...
" by the crew - someone who brings bad luck to the ship - and the two lovers are presumed to have been beaten to death by the ferocious, brutal and jealous husband on an island whilst the Surprise is being provisioned. Horner himself sinks into a black despair and is discovered hanged in his cabin.
Characters
- Jack Aubrey - Captain of HMS Surprise.
- Stephen Maturin - ship's surgeon, friend to Jack and an intelligence officer.
- Sophie Aubrey (née Williams) - Jack's wife
- Mr Hollom - midshipman on HMS Surprise
- Mr and Mrs Horner - master gunner on HMS Surprise and his young wife
- Mr Allen - master on HMS Surprise
- Mr Martin - a Royal Navy parson
- Captain Pullings - a volunteer on HMS Surprise
- Barret Bonden - Jack Aubrey's coxwain
- Mr Mowett - lieutenant on HMS Surprise
- Preserved Killick - Jack Aubrey's shrewish manservant on HMS Surprise
- Padeen Colman - Stephen Maturin's huge, gentle Irish manservant and loblollyboy on HMS Surprise
- Captain Palmer - Captain of the USS Norfolk
- Haines - a British Navy deserter on the USS Norfolk
Ships
- British
- HMS Surprise - Aubrey's favourite command
- Intrepid Fox - a whaler burned by the Norfolk
- American
- USS Norfolk
Historical references
The marooned captain of the Norfolk reminds Aubrey of the Chesapeake–Leopard AffairChesapeake–Leopard Affair
The Chesapeake-Leopard Affair was a naval engagement which occurred off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia on June 22, 1807, between the British warship HMS Leopard and the American frigate, the USS Chesapeake, when the crew of the Leopard pursued, attacked and boarded the American frigate looking for...
as a way of protecting members of his crew, who are mutineers off of HMS Hermione
HMS Hermione (1782)
HMS Hermione was a 32-gun fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. She was notorious for having the bloodiest mutiny in British naval history, which saw her captain and most of the officers killed...
.
The USS Chesapeake
USS Chesapeake (1799)
USS Chesapeake was a 38-gun wooden-hulled, three-masted heavy frigate of the United States Navy. She was one of the original six frigates whose construction was authorized by the Naval Act of 1794. Joshua Humphreys designed these frigates to be the young navy's capital ships...
lay off the coast of Norfolk, Virginia
Norfolk, Virginia
Norfolk is an independent city in the Commonwealth of Virginia in the United States. With a population of 242,803 as of the 2010 Census, it is Virginia's second-largest city behind neighboring Virginia Beach....
, and was under the command of Commodore James Barron
James Barron
James Barron was an officer in the United States Navy. Commander of the frigate USS Chesapeake, he was court-martialed for his actions on 22 June 1807, which led to the surrender of his ship to the British....
. HMS Leopard
HMS Leopard (1790)
HMS Leopard was a 50-gun Portland-class fourth rate of the Royal Navy. She served during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, and the War of 1812.-Construction and commissioning:...
, under the command of Salusbury Pryce Humphreys
Salusbury Pryce Humphreys
Sir Salusbury Pryce Humphreys, CB, KCH was an officer of the Royal Navy who saw service during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812, rising to the rank of rear-admiral....
, hailed and requested to search the Chesapeake for suspected deserters from the Royal Navy
Royal Navy
The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...
; when the Chesapeake refused, the Leopard began to fire broadsides, killing three aboard the Chesapeake and injuring another 18 (one of whom, Robert Macdonald, later died from his wounds ashore). The Chesapeake, her decks cluttered with stores in preparation for a long cruise, managed to fire only a single gun in reply to the Leopard, and Barron quickly struck his colours and surrendered his ship; however, Humphreys refused the surrender, and simply sent a boarding party to search for the deserters.
HMS Leopard found four Royal Navy deserters among the Chesapeake crew: David Martin, John Strachan, and William Ware, run from HMS Melampus
HMS Melampus (1785)
HMS Melampus was a Royal Navy fifth-rate frigate that served during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. She captured numerous prizes before she was sold in 1815.-Design and construction:...
; and Jenkin Ratford, run from HMS Halifax
HMS Halifax (1806)
HMS Halifax was a ship-rigged sloop of the Merlin class built in 1806 for the British Royal Navy at the Naval Yard in Halifax, Nova Scotia...
. Of the four, only Ratford was British-born: Strachan was a white man born in the United States (though later serving in the Royal Navy), and Martin and Ware were African Americans (place of birth uncertain). Leopard carried the men to Halifax for trial: the British citizen, Ratford, was sentenced to death and hanged on the Halifax; the three Americans - as non-British nationals - were sentenced to 500 lashes each, but the sentence was later commuted, and the British government eventually offered to return them to the United States and pay reparations.
The USS Norfolk also recalls the historical expedition of the USS Essex
USS Essex (1799)
The first USS Essex of the United States Navy was a 36-gun or 32-gun sailing frigate that participated in the Quasi-War with France, the First Barbary War, and in the War of 1812, during which she was captured by the British in 1814 and served as HMS Essex until sold at public auction on 6 June...
. Essex sailed in South Atlantic waters and along the coast of Brazil until January 1813 when Captain David Porter
David Porter (naval officer)
David Porter was an officer in the United States Navy in a rank of commodore and later the commander-in-chief of the Mexican Navy.-Life:...
undertook the decimation of English whale fisheries in the Pacific. Although her crew suffered greatly from a shortage of provisions and heavy gales while rounding Cape Horn, she anchored safely at Valparaíso
Valparaíso
Valparaíso is a city and commune of Chile, center of its third largest conurbation and one of the country's most important seaports and an increasing cultural center in the Southwest Pacific hemisphere. The city is the capital of the Valparaíso Province and the Valparaíso Region...
, Chile
Chile
Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...
, on 14 March, having seized schooners Elizabeth and Nereyda along the way. The next five months brought Essex 13 prizes.
In January 1814, Essex sailed into neutral waters at Valparaiso, only to be trapped there for six weeks by the 36-gun British frigate, HMS Phoebe
HMS Phoebe (1795)
HMS Phoebe was a 36-gun fifth rate of the British Royal Navy. She had a career of almost twenty years and fought in the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812...
and the 18-gun sloop-of-war
Sloop-of-war
In the 18th and most of the 19th centuries, a sloop-of-war was a warship with a single gun deck that carried up to eighteen guns. As the rating system covered all vessels with 20 guns and above, this meant that the term sloop-of-war actually encompassed all the unrated combat vessels including the...
HMS Cherub
HMS Cherub (1806)
HMS Cherub was an 18-gun Royal Navy Cormorant-class sloop built in Dover in 1806.-West Indies and Pacific service:Cherub was stationed in the West Indies and took part in the capture of Guadeloupe in 1810 and remained on the Leeward Islands station until 1812. That year she returned to England with...
. On 28 March 1814, Porter determined to gain the open sea, fearing the arrival of British reinforcements. Upon rounding the point, Essex lost her main top-mast to foul weather, forcing her return to the harbour. The British, disregarding the neutrality of the harbour, proceeded with the attack on the crippled ship. For 2½ hours, Essex, armed almost entirely with powerful but short range guns called carronade
Carronade
The carronade was a short smoothbore, cast iron cannon, developed for the Royal Navy by the Carron Company, an ironworks in Falkirk, Scotland, UK. It was used from the 1770s to the 1850s. Its main function was to serve as a powerful, short-range anti-ship and anti-crew weapon...
s, resisted the enemy's superior fighting power and longer gun range. A fire erupted twice aboard the Essex, at which point about 50 men abandoned the ship and swam for shore; only half of them landing. Eventually, the hopeless situation forced the frigate to surrender. The Essex suffered 58 killed, 97 wounded, while the British casualties were 5 dead, 10 wounded.
Film adaptation
The novel provided much of the overall plot-structure for the 2003 Peter WeirPeter Weir
Peter Lindsay Weir, AM is an Australian film director. After playing a leading role in the Australian New Wave cinema with his films such as Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Last Wave and Gallipoli, Weir directed a diverse group of American and international films—many of them major box office...
film, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World is a 2003 film directed by Peter Weir, starring Russell Crowe as Jack Aubrey, with Paul Bettany as Stephen Maturin and released by 20th Century Fox, Miramax Films and Universal Studios...
, though the fictional USS Norfolk morphed into the fictional American-built French privateer Acheron, and episodes also migrated from other books in the series, including Master and Commander and HMS Surprise. The design and size of the fictional Acheron reflect those of the USS Constitution
USS Constitution
USS Constitution is a wooden-hulled, three-masted heavy frigate of the United States Navy. Named by President George Washington after the Constitution of the United States of America, she is the world's oldest floating commissioned naval vessel...
.
Editions
- Collins (1984)
- Fontana; Paperback edition (1985)
- W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint Paperback edition (1992) (ISBN 0393308626)
- Books on Tape; Audio edition (1993) (ISBN 5555768079)
- HarperCollins; Paperback edition (1994)
- W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint Hardcover edition (1994) (ISBN 039303710X)
- HarperCollins; B-format paperback edition (1997)
- Thorndike Press; Large-print Hardcover edition (2002) (ISBN 0754017834)
- Thorndike Press; Large-print Paperback edition (2002) (ISBN 0754091759)
- HarperCollins; Paperback edition (2003)
- W. W. Norton & Company; Reissue (movie tie-in) Paperback edition (2003) (ISBN 0393324761)
- Soundings Ltd; Audio CD Edition (2003) (ISBN 1842832689)
- Recorded Books, LLC; Unabridged Audio edition narrated by Patrick Tull (ISBN 1402591764)
- W. W. Norton & Company; e-book edition (2011) (ISBN 9780393063820)