Colin Firth to play Donald Crowhurst!

I see, thanks. Very sad tale, but it could make a very compelling film. Hopefully it'll rival the Deep Water documentary...

...I seem to remember (sorry if it's been mentioned here) that two films were made about famous attempts on K2...these were an excellent thoroughly business-like documentary, and a pretty lousy Hollywood version with decidedly doubtful acting & screenwriting talent.
 
Lots of mention of "Deep Water" (my copy of which sadly got lost in a move a few years ago) but for those who're interested and haven't read it the book "The Strange Last Voyage of Donald Crowhurst" contains extensive excerpts from primary source material:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Strange-Voyage-Crowhurst-Sailors-Classics/dp/0071414290
(not an affiliate link :-)
Well worth reading although anyone who hasn't read Peter Nichols's "A Voyage for Madmen" might want to read that first for the background to the race. Then obviously read "A world of my own", "La Longue Route" and "Trimaran Solo"...
 
dancrane said:
The Crowhurst story is new to me, but I'll certainly be very keen to see the film, provided the dread expressed here about hokey Hollywood treatment, proves unfounded.

But there's one thing I don't understand about Crowhurst's plan, considering how grand the deception was meant to be...why, when his competitors all dropped out or sank, could he not proceed to the finish, in whatever state he might have felt Teignmouth Electron would have reached after the harsh weather he was claiming to have experienced?

It is said he intended to come in 3rd or 4th, escaping close scrutiny...but if the race committee believed until the end that he really had been round the world, what post-race scrutiny could have proven otherwise, if he had eventually, slowly crossed the line unopposed? Wouldn't completing the deception have seemed far more appealing than suicide?
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You're thinking like a rational man. Crowhurst had lost that facility by the end. The irony is that the multi hull community thought he was a hero for sailing so far. His wife would have welcomed him back bankrupt or not. So would have his children. But he didn't know this, and his British resolve to keep up appearances led him to mental failure.
I'm looking forward to seeing the film, though, and Colin Firth is an excellent choice to play him.
 
dancrane said:
Wouldn't completing the deception have seemed far more appealing than suicide?
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I believe that as time went on he realised that he would have been found out sooner or later, particularly after Tetley pulled out. From his book he sounded like a fairly outwardly upright and decent character (I think image was important to him), and perhaps as time went on, what started as a clever hoax was the cause of his going off the rails. It was the pressure of the finish line looming, and probable ridicule, that probably set him off - in the end he could not live with the deceit he had started.
 
dancrane said:
It is said he intended to come in 3rd or 4th, escaping close scrutiny...but if the race committee believed until the end that he really had been round the world, what post-race scrutiny could have proven otherwise, if he had eventually, slowly crossed the line unopposed? Wouldn't completing the deception have seemed far more appealing than suicide?
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I believe the answer is: scrutiny of his logbook, which would reveal his cheating. And the upshot of that was not just infamy but financial ruin.

Donald Crowhurst had got funding from a local investor to build his plywood boat to compete in the Sunday Times' round-the-world-alone open competition. A term of his funding was that he wouldn't cheat, as that would bring his investor into disrepute. He put up his house as collateral. All he had to do was compete and not cheat: he didn't even have to finish, let alone get a good place.

Instead, he cheated - grossly - and well before his logbook shows any sign of madness. While the rest of the fleet circumnavigated the south end of the planet, he hovered around the South Atlantic, stopped ashore for repairs and reported false positions over the radio, intending to slip in behind the leaders once they got back round to the South Atlantic and take a minor place in the finish. Only the logbooks of the first three finishers were really going to attract any scrutiny from the adjudicators.

Unfortunately for Crowhurst, who was by now being touted as the unexpected likely winner, participants started dropping out. IIRC a couple gave up, a couple died and the solitude got to the French Bernard Moitessier who overshot the Atlantic and kept going in the Southern hemisphere.

This left him between a big rock and a very hard place. Now there were only podium positions left, and owing to his late start it was quite possible he'd end up with first place on time even after RKJ had finished. His plan to slink in to a quiet finish was no longer an option. His logbook wouldn't stand up to the resulting scrutiny, his investor would get his house and he and his wife and kids would be homeless.

His alternative was, um, not to finish or be seen again. Ever.
 
BelleSerene said:
I believe the answer is: scrutiny of his logbook, which would reveal his cheating. And the upshot of that was not just infamy but financial ruin.

Donald Crowhurst had got funding from a local investor to build his plywood boat to compete in the Sunday Times' round-the-world-alone open competition. A term of his funding was that he wouldn't cheat, as that would bring his investor into disrepute. He put up his house as collateral. All he had to do was compete and not cheat: he didn't even have to finish, let alone get a good place.

Instead, he cheated - grossly - and well before his logbook shows any sign of madness. While the rest of the fleet circumnavigated the south end of the planet, he hovered around the South Atlantic, stopped ashore for repairs and reported false positions over the radio, intending to slip in behind the leaders once they got back round to the South Atlantic and take a minor place in the finish. Only the logbooks of the first three finishers were really going to attract any scrutiny from the adjudicators.

Unfortunately for Crowhurst, who was by now being touted as the unexpected likely winner, participants started dropping out. IIRC a couple gave up, a couple died and the solitude got to the French Bernard Moitessier who overshot the Atlantic and kept going in the Southern hemisphere.

This left him between a big rock and a very hard place. Now there were only podium positions left, and owing to his late start it was quite possible he'd end up with first place on time even after RKJ had finished. His plan to slink in to a quiet finish was no longer an option. His logbook wouldn't stand up to the resulting scrutiny, his investor would get his house and he and his wife and kids would be homeless.

His alternative was, um, not to finish or be seen again. Ever.
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I don't think anyone else died. Cheating was the option Crowhurst chose when he realised that his boat was completely inadequate and poorly built. He couldn't quit and he didn't want to risk his life in the South Atlantic.
 
Didn't Nigel Tetley overstress his boat after hearing of D.C.'s claimed fast progress ?

However Crowhurst couldn't have foreseen that, and ' just tooling around in the North Atlantic ' sounds quite a major achievement to me, and plotting some sort of bogus course even moreso; when one reads of his various gizmo's in mind like anti-capsize recovery buoyancy, it seems to me he was way unprepared, and it's doubtful he ever would be - nice ideas though.
 
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ronsurf said:
Don't forget, he killed himself a while afterwards
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I thought he perished in ladies underwear, during sado-masochistic activities which went tragically wrong?

edit, according to the google, Coroner recorded an open verdict, and said there was no evidence of an attempt at suicide.
 
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Now that really sounds like peril at sea, in RKJ's book about Suhali NJ just got a bit overcome with the race and thought DC was beating him.

Then again Rosie Swayle's book was a bit of an eye-opener ! :)
 
Yes, to race around Cape Horn in a plywood trimaran, then die of knicker-related trauma in Kent..poor fellow. He was an expert on the thermal base layers though ;)
 
ronsurf said:
I don't think anyone else died. Cheating was the option Crowhurst chose when he realised that his boat was completely inadequate and poorly built. He couldn't quit and he didn't want to risk his life in the South Atlantic.
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You're absolutely right, I'm sorry. Tetley sank but was rescued; six including Moitessier retired; Crowhurst's suicide was the only death; and RKJ was the only finisher.
 
Memory begins to return; Robin Knox Johnston's book is, of course, ' A World Of My Own '.

Chay Blythe also tried to take part in the race, but his Kingfisher 30 took too much damage.
 
Seajet said:
I think it was ' Children Of Cape Horn ', but it definitely wasn't a children's book ! :)
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No I have her book right next to me, it's the story, written en-route in tough conditions, of a circumnavigation via Cape Horn..in a 30' plywood cruising cat!

With a 2-yr old and a six month baby, astronav only.

Most yachtsmen on the planet will never approach this family's achievement, it took them seven weeks to round the Horn in atrocious weather.

They travelled 30,000 miles in 18 months, absolutely fecking hardcore mariners.

Did I mention, hand steering all the way.

The kids had a cockroach for their pet, and he was ultimately buried at sea, with full ceremonial in a weighted Smarties tube labelled: "CUTHBERT COCKROACH, MASTER MARINER" ;)
 
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