Reading Roundup, April 2024: Sailing from Malaysia to Polynesia Aboard the Surprise; a Deep History of Magic
The Nutmeg of Consolation by Patrick O'Brian (Bookshop|Library)
Something I think doesn't get talked about enough when discussing the Aubrey-Maturin series is just how good O'Brian is at writing action. I don't know if it's because the naval adventure genre takes it as a given that an author should be able to write it well, if it was the relative lack of action in the previous volume to this one, or a combination, but Nutmeg starts out with perhaps the most vicious action sequence in the series to this point and perhaps in the whole thing, just to remind you the stakes -- that there ARE mortal stakes in this fictional Napoleonic world war we're following.
It's something of a truism about this book that if you just read a quick plot synopsis of the major events - shipwreck, attack by pirates, blue-water sailing to Australia, politics ashore once there - it sounds like the pulpiest, least-interesting material. But again, Patrick O'Brian takes that and spins it into something incredibly literate and with a lot more going on beneath the surface, while at the same time excelling at delivering these big set-pieces.
All that doesn't make this one feel less episodic though, jumping from the fallout of the wreck of the Diane, to the attack on the camp by Dyak pirates, to the journey back to Batavia, then the pursuit of the Cornelie, reunion with the Surprise, discovery of the Emily and Sarah on the smallpox-ravaged island, and the journey and then experiences in New South Wales. That's a lot of ground to cover, but the themes did eventually reveal themselves, and I think O'Brian at this point was topping himself - just when you think the quality is falling off you realize he's just become somehow more nuanced and ingenious.
One of the persistent themes in the series that becomes a somewhat larger focus in this book is the treatment of "moral advantage."
His only fear was that on hearing the news she would sell her infamous great diamond, the Blue Peter, the joy of her life: for not only would doing so take away that joy but it would also give her an immense moral advantage, and Stephen was convinced that moral advantage was a great enemy to marriage. Few happy marriages did he know among his friends and acquaintance, and in those few balance seemed to him equal. Then again he found it more blessed to give than to receive; he had a strong disinclination to being obliged; and sometimes, when he was low-spirited, he put this down to an odious incapacity for gratitude.
It was not that he thought Diana would profit from her advantage in any way or even be aware that she had one - that was not her style at all. It was rather that he, with his fundamentally rather inferior character, should be oppressed by her generosity.
O'Brian, as ever, as a fairly jaundiced attitude toward marriage. He does, however, have a sunnier attitude toward friendship, and the moral advantage Stephen feels Jack has over him in this book has a fairly touching resolution.
The Truelove by Patrick O'Brian (Bookshop|Library)
This entry in the Aubrey-Maturin series is challenging. Much of drama takes place off-stage, and O'Brian's style is such that he can be dropping hint after hint and I'll completely miss it, absorbed as I am in the prose. This book is also completely preoccupied with sex and the subtleties of relations between men and women, and that is a topic I've never really smoked - if I'm being quite honest - in real life.
Entitled Clarissa Oakes in the UK (a much better title as pretty much universally recognized), this book is largely concerned with the catalyzing influence that the character - a New South Wales convict stowed away by midshipman Oakes - has on the ship's company. Clarissa is mysterious, consistently fending off any personal questions while taking pleasure in hearing all about the experiences of others. Of course it's Stephen who she finally opens up to about her sexually abusive past, and the murderous crime (or crimes?) she was transported for.
The sexual politics and drama she catalyzes aboard are never directly seen, and typically only obliquely referred to by O'Brian except in one, maybe two scenes where they are stilly fairly vaguely outlined verbally by one character to another. Mostly the scene is set through observations of surly attitudes between two characters, mysterious absences, even more mysterious bruises, etc. And there are even slyer, more subtle references to a possible syphilis outbreak on-board, unknowingly brought aboard by Clarissa, underscoring the innocent havoc-wreaking she is causing aboard the Surprise.
And that, perhaps, is the most important point to make - that Clarissa truly is innocent in all this. She is the creation - literally - of male abuse as permitted by society, and I thought it an astute observation in a forum discussion on the internet when somebody characterized her abuse as the original sin that wreaked havoc throughout the Surprise in this novel. A LOT to chew on in this one.
That said, while I understand why Clarissa is a controversial character in the canon, some opinions online - many, even - seem to condemn her for an unredeemable sociopath/psychopath, and I think this is a complete misreading of the character and Patrick O'Brian's intentions. I think the most interesting discussions of her personality have come about recently, as society becomes more aware of the effects of trauma, and the existence of asexuality and neurodiversity in the population. I think even though these were not very popular or event extant theories in the early 1990s when this book was written and published, they do much more to inform our reading of Clarissa as a character than merely pathologizing her as a monster and writing her character and the novel off. There is so much here to think about and explore, and this black-and-white attitude toward the character is too moralistically American an attitude for anyone to take seriously. Perhaps ironically, I think most of these reactions are a reflection of Clarissa's effect in the novel itself: her very existence is a direct threat to the patriarchal authority found onboard the ship, and I think that makes people very uncomfortable, even in a fictional setting.
Apart from Clarissa, the sexual frustration Jack experiences throughout this book adds another dimension to O'Brian's exploration of the theme. We are told explicitly within the first few pages that Jack has been celibate for the entire voyage thus far, and not always by choice. Indeed, in Australia he has even been made game of by one Selina Wesley, "a fine plump young woman with a prominent bosom, an indifferent reputation and a roving eye." We are even led to believe that this is the true root of Jack's depression early on in the book, more than whatever physical malady may be ailing him. I thought it was then an interesting parallel when Jack does get off at the very end of the book, after he catches the eye of Queen Puolani on Moahu: in both encounters Jack is very much in the passenger seat, and I think this rings true down through the entire canon. Despite Jack's reputation as a Lothario, he is always simultaneously characterized as naive in his interactions with women
Magic: A History by Chris Gosden (Bookshop|Library)
This one took me a couple years to finally finish, but it was well worth a read. Gosden's thesis is that despite seemingly being "sidelined" in favor of scientific rationality, magic, religion, and science do, can, and should make up a "triple helix" of understanding the world throughout human history. Furthermore, he argues that respecting the understanding that magic can give us, especially with regard to the natural world, will be an essential component of saving ourselves from the current environmental catastrophe we find ourselves in. To paraphrase him closely, where science asks "can we?", magic asks "should we?" Along the way he fills the book with many, many highly interesting examples and evidences of magic globally, largely from archaeological evidence. The book does still feel somewhat abbreviated when it is considering evidence from outside of the European world, but he still gives enough that I can see this book being followed by a whole library of further explorations.