Help understanding Aubrey/Maturin Series by Patrick O'Brian.

September 13, 2007 10:04 PM

I am seeking recommendations for Reference Books/Companions to the Aubrey/Maturin Series by Patrick O'Brian.

What is the best way to prepare for reading the series?

I know nothing about the ships of that era and want to understand what I am reading.

Should I do some reading before attempting the series?

Are there books mefites can recommend that I can keep nearby while reading the series so that I can stop and look up what "Avast" or "Mizzentop" means?

posted by Francophone to Grab Bag (19 answers total)

I would suggest starting out with them and then seek references as you need them, by page 2000 or so it starts to become second nature. This is how I read the series, I've read it twice so far, truly one of the most enjoyable experiences I've had to date.
posted by iamabot at 10:07 PM on September 13, 2007

Best answer: Here's the text I learned from (at the USCG Academy it comes with an actual ship to practice on): Eagle Seamanship.
posted by jet_silver at 10:16 PM on September 13, 2007

Best answer: I asked a similiar question on here a while back:

http://ask.metafilter.com/28842/Im-drowing-in-a-sea-of-sea-terms

All the recommendations were helpful, enjoy the series!
posted by meta87 at 10:41 PM on September 13, 2007

Looks like A Sea of Words is the reference from the other thread.
posted by iamabot at 11:04 PM on September 13, 2007

A sea of Words, "Atlas to Aubrey-Maturin", "Lobscouse and Spotted Dog", plus "What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens knew"
posted by BrotherCaine at 1:16 AM on September 14, 2007 [1 favorite]

Just start reading, it's explained as you go. Maturin somehow manages to spend year after year at sea without learning anything, so Aubrey has to patiently explain it all to him.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 1:36 AM on September 14, 2007

Just start reading, it's explained as you go. Maturin somehow manages to spend year after year at sea without learning anything, so Aubrey has to patiently explain it all to him.

Sound advice. I'm reading "Blue at the Mizzen" (the last one! whew!) and I feel like I've gone from being rated Ordinary Seaman to Midshipman.

I have "Patrick O'Brian's Navy" and it's interesting, but it's full of spoilers. You don't need it-- you can learn like Maturin learns.
posted by Mayor Curley at 3:52 AM on September 14, 2007

Also, when you are done with Patrick O'Brian, you can read the next best at www.nauticalfiction.com.
posted by BrotherCaine at 4:45 AM on September 14, 2007

Thirding A Sea of Words and Harbors and High Seas: An Atlas and Geographical Guide to the Aubrey-Maturin Novels of Patrick O'Brian.

I read the first couple last year without any advance preparation and loved them, at first using the Web to define terms as I came across them, which was often, then using A Sea of Words. A friend then loaned me his copy of the Atlas, which really helped me get a visual grip on the stories and added to the enjoyment a lot.

Aside from keeping those two handy, you don't need any advance prep at all. Be ready to start reading a lot about naval history *after* you get a few O'Brian books under your belt, though. They'll make you want to dig deeper. :)
posted by mediareport at 5:37 AM on September 14, 2007

Keep reading. It makes a lot more sense as you go. Also, don't worry too much about the spankers and the star sails and whatever goes up on the top of the mast. The technical details are almost never important. The whole show is about human interaction.
posted by yerfatma at 7:00 AM on September 14, 2007

I agree with meta 87. I wish i had read it first, before having read most of the books in the series. I also read "Lobscouse and spotted dog" which is basically a historical research cook book. Being a "foodie", what and how they ate really intrigued me. O'Brian goes into good amount of detail here. Most of they recipes seemed rather bland, or just plain nasty, IMHO.
posted by Wezzlee at 7:36 AM on September 14, 2007

Read CS Forester's Horatio Hornblower novels instead. It's a lot more accessible than the Patrick O'Brien stuff. You can simply read the story without O'Brien trying to show off his terminology every paragraph.

Start with Beat to Quarters.

Read that and you can read any Age of Sail novel and know the basics.
posted by Argyle at 8:07 AM on September 14, 2007

Best answer: Nthing A Sea of Words and Harbors and High Seas. Note that Harbors and High Seas has some plot spoilers in it, so be forewarned.

I'll also recommend N.A.M. Roger's work, The Wooden World: An Anatomy of the Georgian Navy. It's part of it's own series on the history British Navy, not created as a companion volume to the Aubrey-Maturin series, but it explains an enormous amount and it's a fascinating read to boot.

Enjoy! I was very sad to reach book 20 and know there wasn't any more coming.
posted by ambrosia at 8:48 AM on September 14, 2007 [1 favorite]

Read CS Forester's Horatio Hornblower novels instead. It's a lot more accessible than the Patrick O'Brien stuff.

Right, but it's also straight escapism that lacks nuance or insight about the human condition.
posted by yerfatma at 9:07 AM on September 14, 2007 [3 favorites]

Notice how everybody keeps suggesting A Sea of Words? That is because it is awesome. A friend of mine and I both got into the series at around the same time, and I gave him A Sea of Words as a gift, and bought myself The Patrick O'Brian Muster Book. The Muster Book is great for more background on characters, especially as you get further on and forget who's who and who's dead and whatever happened to whatshisface and was Jack really sleeping with Lady whoshername?

But let me put it this way - while I am always looking stuff up in his book, the reverse is almost never true.

Also, not only is yerfatma right about the focus on human interactions obviating a nuanced understanding of the technical aspects, but also Maturin starts off completely ignorant of those aspects. And stays there, despite numerous explanations that will be at least somewhat helpful to you.

Even so, some things will just confound you. Ahem. On a side-note, does anybody who's read the books have any idea what was going on with the mainyard in the first book?
posted by averyoldworld at 9:43 AM on September 14, 2007

CS Forester? Bah. The Aubrey/Maturin books are one of the greatest works of sustained narrative ever written in English. Hornblower is for n00bs.

Beyond A Sea of Words, mentioned above, you don't really need much reference. The author of that work, Dean King, also published a biography of O'Brien that is interesting on its own but not required reading (spoiler: turns out O'Brien was a world-class jerk! He was obsessed with the minutiae of the British navy during the Napoleonic era! He was a terrible sailor! He liked wine, disliked people, and fought with his kids! He may or may not have been a British spy! There, now you don't need to read it.)

I predict that by the time you're halfway through the second volume, you'll have the vocabulary down. It embeds itself in your mind. O'Brien's a genius.

I envy you -- I've yet to have a literary experience more satisfying than my first read-through of these books.

Just wait until you get to Desolation Island! Squee!
posted by BitterOldPunk at 9:51 AM on September 14, 2007

Sea of Words, and Lobscouse & Spotted Dog (which I bought for my brother but surreptitiously peeked into), were a great help. But reading without the minutiae of knowledge was just fine. I read all the books this year and loved them.
posted by mdiskin at 9:55 AM on September 14, 2007

When I first read Master and Commander, I didn't understand most of the naval terminology, but it didn't seem to matter much to my enjoyment of the book. You can gauge from the reactions of the characters whether something is helping or hurting their cause, and the more complicated technical parts are great in a purely phonetic way, as collections of wonderful nonsense syllables communicating varying degrees of urgency. By H.M.S. Surprise or so, you begin to understand what's going on instinctively, and Aubrey spends a lot of time telling Maturin what's going on in lubber's terms.

I'm halfway through Post Captain on my second run-through now, and we own a copy of Sea of Words that I looked through sometime around the middle third of my first reading.
posted by migurski at 10:01 AM on September 14, 2007

A Sea of Words is indeed fabulous. Buy it and have it nearby for the glossary; you can read it through after book 8 or so, to avoid any early spoilers.

One of the best ways to understand the life of a common sailor and some nautical terminology is to read Charles Henry Dana's Two Years Before the Mast. I can't recommend this nonfiction work enough; it is simply awesome.
posted by ikkyu2 at 12:03 PM on September 14, 2007 [1 favorite]