The Wager
David Grann's (true) tale of shipwreck, mutiny, and murder
Mōrena, and welcome back to Field Notes.
I have read two terrific narrative non-fiction books in recent weeks. The first was Say Nothing, Patrick Radden Keefe’s book about the Troubles in Northern Ireland. The second was The Wager by David Grann. More on that below.
The Wager: A tale of shipwreck, mutiny, and murder by David Grann
Being a sailor in the 18th century wasn’t a heck of a lot of fun. David Grann makes this clear from the outset of his latest book, The Wager, which tells the story of a British navy vessel that was shipwrecked off the coast of Patagonia in 1741.
Even before the shipwreck and the horrors that follow, Grann writes of sailors crammed onto vessels and dying in droves of ailments such as typhus and scurvy, which were mysteries at the time. Many of the men didn’t want to be there, some were hurled onto the ship by armed gangs who pressed sailors into service — some were even plucked from a pensioners home of navy veterans.
To drive this point home, Grann quotes the 18th-century English writer Samuel Johnson, saying “No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned.”
That being said, things do get worse for the sailors aboard The Wager, one of a handful of British ships that sailed into the dangerous waters around Cape Horn in the hope of stealing loot from the Spanish.
The Wager becomes separated from the fleet and is shipwrecked on a desolate island off the coast of Patagonia. On this island is where we get our mutiny and murder.
Although the events took place over 250 years ago, Grann does well to place the reader right in the action. The desperation and deterioration of the sailors grows greater with every passing paragraph.
There is also a flare to Grann’s prose, which carries the narrative along at pace. A series of firsthand accounts of seamen on the Wager are used throughout the book and even these, somewhat surprisingly, contain passages of crafty writing.
Those first-hand accounts also play a part in the back end of the book when Grann’s attention turns to who gets to be believed, or who gets the chance to tell their story at all.
Postscript: An unexpected pleasure of the book was learning how many common phrases originated during this period of seafaring. Such as “under the weather”, which as Grann tells it, comes from when “ailing seamen were shielded belowdecks from the adverse elements outside, they were said to be ‘under the weather’”.
It’s a good day to…
Watch Wes Anderson’s short film The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar on Netflix. It’s based on the Roald Dahl short story and is a delightful 40 minutes.
Enjoy the finalists of this year's Comedy Wildlife Photo Awards. Sure to make you smile.
Listen to this new tune from Wellington musician Ebony Lamb. It’s the opening track of her debut solo album.
That’s all for today. Thanks for reading.