Various Interesting Things About The Napoleonic Era Part I

Having read through the entire Sharpe and Aubrey-Maturin series, I realize I know perhaps a little too much about the Napoleonic era given my age, general disposition to pipes, and my inability to procure a single piece of furniture that might be described as an 'ottoman'.

Without resorting to taking strolls through the retirement communities of British ex-pats and striking up conversations with fellows sporting luxuriant moustaches and alarmingly hopeful comb-overs, I doubt I'll have opportunity to discuss the various interesting things about the Napoleonic Era.

And there are many.

The Sharpe series follows a loud, rambunctious, go-getter in the Army with recurring money problems and a taste for the wench as he climbs the ladder of promotion by grit, luck, and raw love of violence. The Aubrey-Maturin series features Jack Aubrey, who well, is very similar to Sharpe except that he's in the Navy, his idea of 'fiscally destitute' is quite different from Sharpe's, and he plays the violin.

Obviously, there are many other differences, the general gist is that they are both underdogs, and who doesn't love a good underdog story? Even if it happens to be 20 odd books long, right?

That era, early 1800's to about 1820's or so, was kinda the zenith of Crap We Can Just Make With Your Hands. Before industrialization and the whole machines making machines making machines things came into play. It's radically noticeable with the Navy. On a ship, you'd have a cooper (barrels), armourer, carpenter, gunner, surgeon (staunch the flow, amputate at will, no real training), sailmaker, and, I'm sure, about 20 other REALLY important positions I'm forgetting. But the thing is, that ship, say, a frigate, could land anywhere, and make stuff work from the rawest of materials. They could make boats, they could repair their own boat, they could slaughter and salt and store their own food. This is mind blowing to me.

Consider now, a boat made of carbon fibre, or steel, about a trillion transistors worth of electronics and radar and GPS and doppler. If that thing breaks, yer screwed. The amount of civilization to make the smallest component of a modern ship is enormous. Advances in mathematics, hydrodynamics, laminar flow, materials processing, metallurgy.

What that era was like is, well, I was thinking. It's basically the most advanced we could hope to get within a reasonable time after the zombie apocalypse. Or. Or a apocalypse.

Book Review : Patrick O'Brian

If you are red-blooded male of a certain stripe, the sort that likes Band of Brothers and Braveheart in which violence is visited upon bad guys and good guys form the sort of blood-brother connection that we office drones perpetually attempt to re-enact with company wilderness survival courses, whitewater rafting, or an open bar at the Christmas Party; where men of unusual heart and charisma lead other men to their peril, maiming, or worse; if you are, in short, 99% of all men, then I'm sure you've seen Master and Commander : The Far Side Of The World.

It's the story of a small British man-of-war around the early 1800's that has to pursue a much larger brig around South America, guns blazing, storms a-wrecking, men a-maiming. Terror and danger from the enemy, from nature, the tight lashing together of men who must or die. It, like so many of its ilk, hits some raw, primordial nerves, at least in me. Mastodons and hunters and all that.

So that movie, is actually an amalgamation of two books (of twenty) about Captain Aubrey and Dr. Maturin and their many adventures during the Nelsonic era of naval warfare. They are by Patrick O'Brian, an Englishman who lived in France and who had a predilection for reading source material from the National Maritime Museum for his inspiration. He was also a former intelligence agent and the biographer of Picasso. One of those writers of an entirely different age.

Much has been written about O'Brian, hailed as one of the greatest novelists, let alone historical novelists, of all time. I won't waste pixels going on about that, but about how something so utterly foreign, English 19th century naval dominance can hold any interest to me. I've never been terribly interested in history, or sailing (beyond a puttering a small Lazer around a lake), or the densely archaic language of medicine and biology during the Leeches are A Good Idea WHAT and So What's All This About Evolution Then era.

And yet I am drawn in. But O'Brian doesn't make it easy. He writes very much in that period, one gets the feeling you are reading a Jane Austen book without all the women and marriage business. It's the bit of Austen's novels that chronicles the dashing Lieutenant before he settles down and is pursued by, or pursues sharp-minded ladies buffeted by social pressures, mores, and their own individuality. The bit with the guns and the swords.

Everyone speaks as I imagine they would, not much is explained, not in the way of terms or very strange grammar. It's a bit like a good science fiction book where terms are thrown about, and either you figure it out from context or flounder in the effort. I get the feeling the O'Brian was so well versed that he just mentions things in passing. Thankfully when sea-going technicalities are of the most importance to the plot, O'Brian will expound.

There are quite a few phrases that are endearing in their candour, although through perpetual usage they likely mean no more than a 'sure' and 'whatever' in that time. But to the ears of any modern reader, they have their charm, phrases such as 'never in life', 'with all my heart', 'above all things', 'upon my honour' have pleasant, bare sense to them. Welcome in a modern time of sarcasm and indirection and faux-hip-wink-and-a-nod-kitschy-but-cool, sorta.

It also helps that Dr. Maturin, while also being the ship's surgeon and a naturalist, is also a spy for the British government. He's an idealist and cunning and vastly intelligent. There's ruses and counter-ruses, planting false information and discovering double agents.

Aubrey is jolly and a genius of a sea-men, if a bit dull in other respects. A man of action, of appetite and brimming with all those qualities that sum up a leader. He struggles to climb the ranks of the Navy, and meets fortune, both good and outrageous.

They are tremendous friends, who are so unlike they almost define each other in contrast. Their bound is music, another topic about which O'Brian shows a well-educated mind.

In both the intelligence work and in the direct action of whatever brig Aubrey happens to be in, there is a certain understability to it. That is, if you were to talk of ships today, there'd be AWACs and tomahawk missiles and it would very soon degrade into an appreciation of technology. In the Aubrey-Maturin book, things are so primitive that it's relatively simple to understand things straight away. When Maturin is found out to be a spy in one place, of course he will not be found out in another place because news takes a fair bit of time to travel. A ship that fires guns by being propelled by gunpowder is not far removed from bows and arrows. The differences and the contours that make the battles and intelligence intrigues engaging are human differences that can be grasped instantly.

So many things depend on the better qualities and baser in people. Greed and avarice, shame and pride.

It's a thumping good time, and I've been completely pulled into it. They are all good, but you can't go wrong with starting from the beginning, Master and Commander. I give the series ten broadsides out of ten.

China Mieville

In an effort to keep some sort of blasted focus on this site, I thought I'd give you a rundown on China Mieville. Which, in some circles, is like saying "Have you heard of this Stephen King guy? Apparently he writes novels".

China (as I'll call him since I'm too lazy to spell his last name and it's not like he cares) is one of the major figures responsible for bringing steampunk to the fore as a literary genre. It's also a wicked design aesthetic when crafting stuff, and an unfortunate fashion sense. Short short version: steampunk is what all those rad gadgets were in the veritable cinematic masterpiece, "Wild, Wild West". Lots of rivets, brass, and stuff with high falutin' names (that's not a blimp, it's a goddamn DIRIGIBLE!).

China did his masters degree in Cultural Anthropology at the London School of Economics, and it shows. The worlds he build are beautiful, intricate, dirty, and cruel. They're real. He has a beautiful prose style, making one think they are reading an early 20th century novel aimed at the Literary crowd.

So far, I've only read "The Scar" and "Perdido Street Station". They are fantastical, literary, and jaw dropping. His prose is rich and detailed, it's written by an extremely intelligent writer who refuses to dumb down anything for his audience.

He's one of those writers who made me think, "My god, you're not allowed to write like this!", and I adore writers who make me think that. Well, adore in the non-effeminate way, of course (other writers who've made me do this : Tom Robbins, Douglas Coupland, Salman Rushdie and Terry Pratchett).

So if you are into very real worlds, literature with a capital L, and writing that'll blow the brass rivets off your ansible, then pick up some China Mieville post-haste.

Alarming Whimsy

The great thing about the web is you can find just about anything. The worst thing about the web is you can find just about anything. The absolute worst thing about the web is you can find almost what you want to find ,but not quite. And the absolutely best thing about the web is finding something you didn't know you were looking for.

Exhibit A, and exhibit B. For exhibit A, just keep clicking the little image that says "Defeated by", and you'll get the gist of it. For exhibit B, keep clicking until you get to the pink whales that fly through the air and are piloted by large, terribly cute spiders.

There is something to be said for whimsy.

I'm all for it. More whimsy means less time for dogma, 24 hour news coverage about the latest white girl to go missing, and people dropping bombs on one another. Whimsy is a great way to disengage the brain from the boring gears of first, second, third,, and reverse, and throwing that gear into "Float carelessly on a rainbow powered breeze coming from somewhere under the polar bear's chin".

I think we're all drawn to it, instinctively. Children's stories, fair tales, nursery rhymes, they are RIFE with it. Whimsy coming out of the gills, as it were. But at some point, we let it go. We start reading very serious books about this depressing life or that soul-crushing relationship. This, we feel, makes us Adults. I'm of the opinion it makes us Boring, but that's just me.

We seem to be of conflicting opinions about whimsy. I mean, 9 top 10 highest grossing
films of all time I'd specify as fantasy/sci-fi, and really, any girl thinking they can get hot and heavy with Leonardo di Caprio has got to be living in a fantasy world, so let's just call it 10 out of 10.

And yet, we dismiss it. The genre of fantasy/sci-fi ,(a combined genre that is only combined because, believe it or not, one of the major publishers of sci-fi pulp mag in the States went to ... the UK? Something like that, to bring over major pieces of fantasy work. Well, that, and they are both big draws to adolescent boys. And grown men who think growing up is an option best left untaken.) is a pariah. Whimsy -- which I'd say is a subset of, or at least, included in that whole rigamorole -- is even more poo-pooed.

So I have no idea where I'm going with it. Except to suggest that we all embrace a little more whimsy. It's the brave choice. It's a choice that's good for your sanity.

JPod

So my Literary Book reading of the moment is JPod, by Douglas Coupland. So far, I like it. Although I hear later on Coupland pulls a Stephen King and starts inserting himself, and that might dampen my opinion of it somewhat.

But! The witty banter and entertaining email templates they send back and forth I found inspiring. I know JPod was supposed to be this really depressing dystopian group that has been caught, Kafkaesque, in the backwaters of some multinational conglomerate; but hell, it looks like they have a good time.

What's most important to note is that I'll be using their email templates as fodder for this blog. Some sort of wish fulfillment on my part. Perhaps somewhere the universe will listen and plunk me into a working cubicle group just like Jpod. My current group is sort of like JPod, actually, except more penis references, and a brand of humour that can only be labelled as post 90's two-drinks-from-alcohol-poisoning-frat-boy-chic. Oh, wait, there is a link to the ProdBlog on this blog, so for those of you who have ventured to click on the link (don't do it now, it's too late, and you can never unread the sort of crass, half-brain dead humour that sends us HOWLING into the aisles) you'll know what I'm talking about.

Book Review : Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell

In an effort to add more content to my blog -- besides the usually whinging and whining of a wannabe novelist -- I've decided to add book reviews. Now, I'm not one of those people who read disgustingly fast. Depending on the book, I can read at a speed approximating that of a slo motion turtle on heroin doing the moonwalk on a glacier (Atlas Shrugged) or with the voracious appetite of a 15 year old virgin reading through the instructions of a condom package (Enders Game).

Now Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell was a beast of a book. 1000 pages or something like that, written by an English professor. I think. A professor of something anyways. The sort of profession that loves foot notes and addendums, and boy howdy, does it show.

Summary Two magicians in Victorian Era England. Norrel teaches Strange stuff. War happens. Strange helps out. Norrel tries to wrest power from Strange. Some creepy guy with thistledown hair whisks various people to a dreary place to dance and stuff. Stuff happens. Strange and Norrel battle for supremacy.

What it's Like If Jane Austen wrote a fantasy novel, this would be it. It has that sort of tone. One gets the sensation of dreary, dull gray days spent in drawing rooms discussing social minutiae of waxy complexioned people who have more money than god but nevertheless have the constitution of an anemic Skeletor on his death bed. When you're done, you really get the sense of reading a Literary Novel. With the capital L, and the capital N. It's quite an accomplishment. If you like this sort of tone throughout, like magic, and love Victorian England, drop everything and buy this book.

Rating four scones out of a possible 23 lightly honeyed Earl Grey teas. It's good, just not something I would go out of my way to read. Again.