This is part 2 of 22 in the Aubrey/Maturin series and Patrick O'Brian, despite his eloquent, colorful timepiece language, could do so much more for the series if he wrote more lengthy passages about naval maneuvers and fighting action in Post Captain. Instead he spent well over 450 pages maturing the relationship between our two protagonists. Hands down, though, the best part is the language. "Ahoy, lubber, sheet the mains'ls and run-out the 24 pounders."O'Brian gives us only two teasing passages about nautical battle. The first, an audacious, brilliant attack on a French port occurs in the middle of the novel; the second, a tantalizingly short, but important intercept at the very end. Yes, there's description of life aboard a square rigged frigate, and throughout there's talk about the royal navy, but the real action is during battle, and there's little of that.I'm convinced, like I outlined in my review of the first book in the series Master and Commander, that O'Brian conceived these books as installments in a very long series. Consequently, the books don't stand alone as a traditional novel, one with mounting intrigue, escalating crisis, inexorable confrontation, or a unexpected or permanent change to a character. There's no denouement, no satisfactory ending. The novel simply builds into the next novel. That's a lot for O'Brian to ask from a reader after 500+ pages. It's even more to ask through several sets of 500-page books. I intend to read a couple more novels in the series and reevaluate.However, he achieved what, perhaps, was the intent of Post Captain, the development and expansion of the relationship between two unforgettable characters. They are well-drawn and leverage each other's attributes. Here's how I see them, in no certain order of adjectives:Jack. Love-able, weathered, big puppy dog, red-faced, speaks his mind, raucous, feelings on a sleeve, intrepid, merry, loud, traditional, well-mannered, team player, reliable, one of the guys, decisive, firm, experienced, deft, cordial, institutional yet thinks outside-the-box, passionate, voluble.Stephen. Introspective, humble, intelligent, ladies-man, mysterious, independent, academic, contemplative, polyhistor, smooth, compromising, monied, healthy, proactive, subtle, gentle, democratic, hale, non-conformist, clever, romantic, restrained, watchful. Writing that caught my eye:"He was recalling the scene and sipping his tea with little sounds of inward complacency when he saw Heneage Dundas stop on the pavement outside, shade his eyes, and peer in through the window, evidently looking for a friend. His nose came into contact with the glass, and its tip flattened into a pale disk. 'Not unlike the foot of a gasteropod,' observed Stephen, and when he had considered its loss of superficial circulation for a while he attracted Dunda's attention, beckoning him in and offering him a cup of tea and a piece of muffin." (p. 353)"Less downright in his approach than Jack, Stephen opened the simple lock of the garden gate with a piece of wire, and the kitchen door with a Morton's retractor. He walked composedly up the stairs, through the green-baize door and into the hall. A tall thirty-day clock was still going, its weight nearly touching the ground; a solemn tock-tock that echoed through the hall and followed him up into the drawing-room. Silence; a perfection of dust-sheets, rolled carpets, ranged furniture; rays of light that came through the shutters, motes turning in them; moths; the first delicate cobwebs in unexpected places, such as the carved mantelpiece in the library, where Mr Lowndes had written some lines of Sappho large on the wall in chalk . . . Silence; anonymous perfection; unstirring air--never a waft or a movement; silence. The smell of bare boards. A tallboy with its face turned toward the wall. In her room the same trim bare sterility; even the looking-glass was shrouded. It was not so much severe, for the grey light was too soft, as meaningless. There was no waiting in the silence, no tension of any kind: the creaking of the boards under his feet contained no threat, no sort of passion: he could have leapt or shrieked without affecting the inhuman vacuum of sense. It was as meaningless as total death, a skull in a dim thicket, the future gone, its past wiped out. He had the strongest feeling of the déjà vu that he had ever experienced, and yet it was familiar enough to him, that certain knowledge of the turn of a dream, the sequence of words that would be said by a stranger in a coach and of his reply, the disposition of a room he had never seen, even to the pattern of the paper on its walls. In the waste-paper-basket there were some balled-up sheets, the only imperfection, apart from the living clock, in this desert of negation, and the only exception to the completeness of his déjà vu. 'What indeed am I looking for?' he said, and the sound of his voice ran through the open rooms. 'An out-of-date announcement of my death?' But they were lists in a servant's hand, quite meaningless, and one paper where a pen had been tried--spluttering lines of ink that might have had a meaning once, but none that could be understood. He tossed them back, stood for a long moment listening to his heart, and walked straight into her dressing-room. Here he found what he had known he should find: the stark bareness, the pretty satinwood furniture huddled against the wall was of no importance, did not signify; but here, coming from no particular shelf or cupboard, there was the ghost of her scent, now a little stronger, now so tenuous that his most extreme attention could hardly catch it." (p. 459)"'Now, Mr Simmons,' said Jack, appearing upon deck, 'this is very capital, is it not? How she does love to sail upon a bowline.' It was a warm, bright afternoon, with patches of cloud moving across the sky, and her brilliant canvas, her white rigging, shone splendid against them as she heeled to the wind. There was nothing of the yacht about her; her paintwork was strictly utilitarian and even ugly; but this one point of snowy cordage, the rare manilla she had brought back from the Philippines, raised her to an uncommon height of beauty--that, and of course, her lovely, supple command of the sea. There was a long, even swell from the south and a surface ripple that came lipping along her weather bow, sometimes sending a little shower of spray aft across the waist, with momentary rainbows in it. This would be a perfect afternoon and evening for gunnery." (p. 465)New words: mountebank, raffish, stoat, mésalliance, dolorous, tememarious, tope, anfractuosity, dropsical, dissimulation, gammoning, expatiating, fanfaronade, adumbration, postillion, arenaceous, coruscation, importuned.***Please VOTE***
Patrick O'Brian, you have exposed yourself.Exposed yourself as a Jane Austen wannabe, that is. One who is a bit sniffily about the fact that Jane (quite unfairly, I'm sure!) did not give us the thoughts of the male half of the regency romance equation.The first 200 pages of this novel do really read like a historical romance. Albeit one with a very masculine touch- there's just as much swearing and angst and tinkering with the natural world in odd ways as ever there was before, but now its all in the presence of Ladies. The male half of the romance ncludes a number of entirely un-romantic things, most of which are questions of money and position, in much greater detail than one would get in a normal romance- things that a man very legitimately could not propose to a woman without. Also, Stephen's analysis of his own romantic torment is truly not to be missed- we get to see the Enlightenment trying to do a lab analysis of love. Wonderful. O'Brian also deals with the fact that these are men. Men who like sex. He's much more open about the slightly more adult sections of Polite Society who deal with this kind of thing. For example, Diana Villiers, the Whore of the Madonna/Whore pair that are the main females of this novel (there are others, but they're mostly easily dismissed cariactures), embodies a certain type of woman who took advantage of the strict proprieties to advance her own very slender chances of finding financial security and someone to look after her. As you can see, for all of his generally masculine world, he shows a surprising sensitivity to the delicacy of the feminine world as well. There's several very good depictions of the nuances of the social heirarchy in provincial England, and the various things that could immediately put one up or down that ladder- money and rank, of course, but also family associations, number of suitors, age, the material of one's dress, etc. The most interesting status depiction, of course, is that of the service of the Navy as a whole. Jane herself dealt with the interesting mobility of a service of men who could rise instantly to the top and sink back down again within weeks (Persuasion)- this rapid status change was something new and unusual, something that rarely happened in the closed ranks of the Upper Ten Thousand. The book as a whole really focuses on a bunch of uncouth Navy men try to mend their ways to fit in on land, and the various levels of difficulty they find adjusting to the ways that people are judged and what matters here as opposed to Out There on the ocean waters, as well as the fact that even off land, you can never quite get away from all your problems there. Also, O'Brian brings up again and again throughout his books the fact that war really did change many people's lives for the better (if you're cool with probably losing a limb, at least, to get what you want). He doesn't let us forget that. Jack Aubrey is of course the most extreme example of this, but there are plenty of other ones brought up on every page of the book. Its one of the more interesting ins and outs of his work, and it is the forefront of the entire book.... But never fear, O'Brian fans who are in it for the swashbuckling action and adventure! There's plenty of that to come as soon as our fellows get off land (come on, that's not really a spoiler). There's also some espionage, some fights, some excellently stupid bromantical angst between Jack and Stephen (they almost break up, oh noes!), and lots of running away from, beating up on, and dodging debt collectors (one of those scenes was my fav).I think the quality of the book remained the same- the only reason I give it four stars instead of five is that I already know how good these books are, so I didn't get quite the same jolt of expectations surpassed x1000 that I did last time.
What do You think about Post Captain (1990)?
In the second installment of the Aubrey/Maturin series we see O'Brian really flesh out his characters giving them great depth and believability. In Post-Captain we see the more social sides of Jack and Stephen as they peruse their future wives. We see the main characters outside the setting of Ships and gun smoke during the Peace of Amiens. We learn that Stephen Maturin is more than he seems as he is a Naval Surgeon and a British Intelligence agent. The book is really well paced and juxtaposed between cruises of HMS Polychrest and Jack and Stephens social life and courtships of Sophie and Diana; Which are just as intense as roaring broadsides and boarding actions.I feel like this book really sets in stone that the series is more than just seafaring adventures and battles. And to me to really shows the friendship of Jack and Stephen and their ups and downs throughout life. It doesn't feel like the typical story arc, instead there is a lot of rest, action, and anticipation that ends in anticlimax and repeated in varying order. This to me makes it all the more relate-able to the reader as it doesn't feel necessarily planned out but that these two characters are just living their lives.I highly recommend this book/series, the only negative thing about Post-Captain involves getting out of France and bear...
—Ryan
I almost gave this 3 stars, but I have too many reservations. I almost abandoned the book early on. I don't care for O'Brian's style - it's too Victorian. Sure, that's a plus for some, but I hate it & the story was very uneven. The first third of the book with threads running all the way through concentrated on ridiculous love interests & land problems. Very true to life, but Aubrey doesn't shine. It does make quite a statement about the economics of the war & the idiocy of societies, though.On the plus side, Steven is a far more intriguing character now. He really grew in this book & I loved Diana, one of the love interests. Best of all, the book finally found its legs in the last half & ended very well, but it was long. Took far too long getting there.I've never heard of a sailing ship that could go in either direction. No doubt it was tried, but it seemed more of a distraction than an addition to the story. And the bear costume! That was just awful & completely unbelievable. Some of my problem with the book is that I just read the Hornblower books which handled the same time period & issues far better.I'll continue reading the series, at least one more book, but I'm not in a rush. As much as I love the characters, the writing wears on me & another book of such length & uneven quality will likely end it for me.
—Jim
"There she is, sir, just under the sprits'l yard. Tops'ls: maybe mizen t'garns'ls. Close-hauled, I take it."Nope, me neither. But you know what? This book is such ruddy good fun that it really doesn't matter - I spent most of my reading time with a huge grin on my face when I wasn't laughing. Life's been a bit rocky lately, and this did a fantastic job of cheering me up and keeping my mind occupied, which was just what I needed.Spending the first third of the book on land, the 'Jane Austen for blokes' tag has never fit more as Jack and Stephen become entangled in a love triangle (or rather, quadrangle) by the grasping Mrs Williams attempts to find husbands for her girls. Personally, I think the only people they should be considering settling down with are each other - and if Stephen wants me to stop imagining smutty happenings between them then he really needs to stop calling Jack 'my dear'. With Jack not doing nearly so well on land as he does on sea, I loved Stephen's theories of tars on land and the psychological problems of day to day life (Maybe I should have been a sailor? Apart from being terrified of the sea, sharks and authority) Needing to escape his debtors (which he does, rather awesomely, by (view spoiler)[disguising himself as a dancing bear (hide spoiler)]
—Lisa
