Aubrey Maturin - greatest Englishmen that ever lived?
- Thread starter Magic_Sailor
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Magic_Sailor
Well-Known Member
Above is a picture of Thomas Cochranes "Speedy 24 4 pounders" aka "Sophie" attacking and taking the Spanish "El Gamo 32" aka the "Cacafuego"
O'Brian said that the exploits of the likes of Cochrane and Nelson were so fantastical that to embelish them was unnecesary - clearly he was right. He was also totally up-front about his use of historical personnel and battles as the basis of his books.
However, it's not these things that make them so, so good. It is the relationship between Jack and Stephen, the "honour" of the personnnel and the use of language that makes you feel like you have a window on the Geogian era.
Magic
O'Brian said that the exploits of the likes of Cochrane and Nelson were so fantastical that to embelish them was unnecesary - clearly he was right. He was also totally up-front about his use of historical personnel and battles as the basis of his books.
However, it's not these things that make them so, so good. It is the relationship between Jack and Stephen, the "honour" of the personnnel and the use of language that makes you feel like you have a window on the Geogian era.
Magic
absit_omen
Well-Known Member
Re: Schoolboy howlers in O\'Brien
"Remember Nelson" Was the signal in French?
"Remember Nelson" Was the signal in French?
Metabarca
Well-Known Member
Re: Schoolboy howlers in O\'Brien
Lord no, twere Hoste who hosted the signal, and the French admiral who rued the memory!
Lord no, twere Hoste who hosted the signal, and the French admiral who rued the memory!
Andrew_Fanner
Well-Known Member
Re: Schoolboy howlers in O\'Brien
Hornblower does suffer slightly from a 1930's liberal conscience which occasionally doesn't ring quite true. Jack Aubrey is noteably, and commented on by his peers, an 18th century character who is just a little loose-living by the standards of the 1810-1820 period. Think of it as perhaps someone of your age getting up to all the things your father is alleged (usually by Mum!) to have done in the 1960s. Well, the analogy fits me anyway.
Iuan Gruffudd's Hornblower was far better than Gregory Peck, a pity that M&C was such as hotch potch of the books, HMS Surprise would have been a better film IMO, but there again, I'm not a film director needing to attract people who can't/won't read.
Hornblower does suffer slightly from a 1930's liberal conscience which occasionally doesn't ring quite true. Jack Aubrey is noteably, and commented on by his peers, an 18th century character who is just a little loose-living by the standards of the 1810-1820 period. Think of it as perhaps someone of your age getting up to all the things your father is alleged (usually by Mum!) to have done in the 1960s. Well, the analogy fits me anyway.
Iuan Gruffudd's Hornblower was far better than Gregory Peck, a pity that M&C was such as hotch potch of the books, HMS Surprise would have been a better film IMO, but there again, I'm not a film director needing to attract people who can't/won't read.
Mirelle
N/A
Hey, some of us remember the 1960\'s - well, bits of it, anyway...
Do you mind! My father's youth was mis-spent, insofar as it was, in the '20's, and my mother recalled popping Benzedrine at London University in the '30's.
I am not so sure about the moral perspective of the two characters, either.
Hornblower's agonisings look rather like those that a lower-middle-class boy of the period might well have gone through. They look like the sort of view of life that was rapidly gaining ground at the time, one which in due course gave us "Victorian Values", whilst Aubrey's louche behavior looks remarkably like that of a 1960's intellectual, backdated.
Hornblower's worries are nicely contrasted with Barbara's far more relaxed view of things.
Do you mind! My father's youth was mis-spent, insofar as it was, in the '20's, and my mother recalled popping Benzedrine at London University in the '30's.
I am not so sure about the moral perspective of the two characters, either.
Hornblower's agonisings look rather like those that a lower-middle-class boy of the period might well have gone through. They look like the sort of view of life that was rapidly gaining ground at the time, one which in due course gave us "Victorian Values", whilst Aubrey's louche behavior looks remarkably like that of a 1960's intellectual, backdated.
Hornblower's worries are nicely contrasted with Barbara's far more relaxed view of things.
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