Who is Joshua Slocum? I asked three friends, none knew. Could be my company? Perhaps, but Mr. Slocum’s exploits happened a while back, 1895 to be precise. Slocum or Captain Slocum as he was known, was the first person to circumvent the globe, live to tell about it and publish a best selling memoir called, Sailing Alone Around the World. (1900). Sailing Alone won him widespread fame throughout the world and he became known as the “American Sinbad”, even though he couldn’t swim. Slocum long forgotten by those not part of the seafaring crowd has now been brought back to life in Geoffrey Wolff’s recently released biography, The Hard Way Around: The Passages of Joshua Slocum. Slocum was a “interesting character” and Wolff does a good job of bringing Slocum’s life into a realistic perspective without losing the sense of adventure that Slocum inspired in his own day. Even though Wolff’s book is a roaring tale of hardship and sea adventure it is also and more importantly a story about the end of the glorious age of sail, and the passing of an era of genuine heroes. Wolff’s book is more though than an adventure story, it is also a literary biography. Something that has also passed out of fashion I think. Slocum’s personality was complex and Wolff handles this well, piecing the events of his life together carefully, but in at a pace fast enough to keep the story moving. Eventually Slocum went mad and was arrested for rape on a reduced to a charge of indecent exposure. He spent 42 days in jail. In 1909 Slocum set sail for the West Indies and was never heard from again? It is presumed he was lost at sea, but that’s not certain. So if you would like to read a true story that is a cross between a Patrick O’Brien novel and Robert Lewis Stevenson novel you have found the book.
No comments:
Post a Comment