In Author Under Sail: The Imagination of Jack London, 1902–1907, Jay Williams explores Jack London’s necessity to illustrate the inner workings of his vast imagination. In this second installment of a three-volume biography, Williams captures the life of a great writer expressed though his many creative works, such as The Call of the Wild and White Fang, as well as his first autobiographical memoir, The Road, some of his most significant contributions to the socialist cause, and notable uncompleted works. During this time, London became one of the most famous authors in America, perhaps even the author with the highest earnings, as he prepared to become an equally famous international writer. Author Under Sail documents London’s life in both a biographical and writerly fashion, depicting the importance of his writing experiences as his career followed a trajectory similar to America’s from 1876 to 1916. The underground forces of London’s narratives were shaped by a changing capitalist society, media outlets, racial issues, increases in women’s rights, and advancements in national power. Williams factors in these elements while exploring London’s deeply conflicted relationship with his own authorial inner life. In London’s work, the imagination is figured as a ghost or as a ghostlike presence, and the author’s personas, who form a dense population among his characters, are portrayed as haunted or troubled in some way. Along with examining the functions and works of London’s exhaustive imagination, Williams takes a critical look at London’s ability to tell his stories to wide arrays of audiences, stitching incidents together into coherent wholes so they became part of a raconteur’s repertoire. Author Under Sail provides a multidimensional examination of the life of a crucial American storyteller and essayist.
Long regarded as a leading authority in the sailing world, Eric Hiscock provides here a helpful reference for ocean voyaging. Illustrated with numerous photographs and maps, it ranges from tying knots to global weather patterns--the essential resource for any open water sailor.
A new classic from one of the world's most respected sailing authors More than 35 years ago, Hal Roth quit his job as a journalist and went sailing. Since then, he's logged more than 200,000 sea miles. Along the way, Roth also has authored eight voyaging classics, including the 1978 bestseller After 50,000 Miles. Taking that book as its starting point, this handsome new volume incorporates the new technologies and discoveries of the last quarter century along with another 150,000 miles of experience. A compendium of mature, time-tested sea wisdom from one of the world's most respected sailing writers, How to Sail Around the World will tell the reader: How to choose and equip a sailboat for long-distance cruising, with an emphasis on simplicity and a modest budget How to plan and conduct a voyage anywhere in the world How to master the arts of navigation, anchoring, and daily life aboard in exotic places How to cope with storms at sea--the most complete and authoritative treatise on this critical topic ever published
The pilot cutters that operated around the coasts of northern Europe until the First World War were amongst the most seaworthy and beautiful craft of their size ever built, while the small number that have survived have inspired yacht designers, sailors and traditional craft enthusiasts over the last hundred years.??Even in their day they possessed a charisma unlike any other working craft; their speed and close-windedness, their strength and seaworthiness, fused together into a hull and rig of particular elegance, all to guide the mariner through the rough and tortuous waters of the European seaboard, bought them an enviable reputation.??This new book is both a tribute to and a minutely researched history of these remarkable vessels. The author, perhaps the most experienced sailor of the type, describes the ships themselves, their masters and crews, and the skills they needed for the competitive and dangerous work of pilotage. He explains the differences between the craft of disparate coasts Ð of the Scilly Isles and the Bristol Channel, of northern France, and the wild coastline of Norway Ð and weaves into the history of their development the stories of the men who sailed them.??Written to complement the recent histories of pilot schooners and open boat pilotage, edited and written by the author, this book will be an essential addition to the libraries of historians and enthusiasts of traditional boats.??As seen in the Wiltshire Times.
In an age of discovery and empire building, the map of the world was drawn by those on long voyages. Their achievements had as much of an impact on world history as did the admirals' success in implementing tactics that won the battles for colonialism."--Jacket.
With his novels, journalism, short stories, political activism, and travel writing, Jack London established himself as one of the most prolific and diverse authors of the twentieth century. Covering London's biography, cultural context, and the various genres in which he wrote, The Oxford Handbook of Jack London is the definitive reference work on the author.
A mother and her three children struggle to survive on the most shocking vacation of their lives. James Patterson, America's #1 bestselling thriller writer, presents his most suspenseful, explosive tale ever. Only an hour out of port, the Dunne family's summer getaway to paradise is already turning into the trip from hell. The three children are miserable, and not shy about showing it. Katherine Dunne had hoped this vacation would bring back the togetherness they'd lost when her husband died four years earlier. Maybe if her new husband had joined them it would all have been okay. Suddenly, a disaster hits-and it's perfect. Faced with this real threat, the Dunnes rediscover the meaning of family. But this catastrophe is just a tiny taste of the true danger that lurks ahead: somewhere out there, someone wants to make sure that the Dunne family never leaves paradise alive.
“It was the best of dreams, it was the worst of dreams, it was an age of consulting the nautical experts, it was the age of landlubber foolishness, it was the epoch of determination, it was the epoch of despair, it was the season of hurricanes, it was a spring of beachcombing...” If you dream about chucking it all away and sailing toward an island life, read this first Renee and Michael didn’t have any boating experience and when their plans to remedy that fell through the two had to learn everything the hard way. Despite themselves they managed to get from Miami to Grenada, eventually dropping the anchor of their cruising catamaran at the island of their dreams. Determined to save future sailors from themselves, A Sail of Two Idiots includes lessons Renee and Michael learned and shares them with you as examples of what and what not to do. This a how-to guide wrapped in a funny story—kind of like getting your serving of vegetables from a slice of pizza. Read this and make your dream of sailing away a reality. Includes: “What Broke?” sections explores the ongoing maintenance and upkeep of a cruising multihull "Island” section provide assessments of the islands of the Caribbean
Numerous successful reprints of contemporary works on rigging and seamanship indicate the breadth of interest in the lost art of handling square-rigged ships. Modelmakers, marine painters and enthusiasts need to know not only how the ships were rigged but how much sail was set in each condition of wind and sea, how the various manoeuvres were carried out, and the intricacies of operations like reefing sails or 'catting' an anchor. Contemporary treatises such as Brady's Kedge Anchor in the USA or Darcy Lever's Sheet Anchor in Britain tell only half the story, for they were training manuals intended to be used at sea in conjunction with practical experiences and often only cover officially-condoned practices. This book, on the other hand, is a modern, objective appraisal of the evidence, concerned with the actualities as much as the theory. The author's facility in a remarkable range of languages has allowed him to study virtually every manual published over a period of nearly four centuries. This gives the book a completely international balance and allows the author to describe for the first time the proper historical development of seamanship among the major navies of the world.