The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters

00:00:00.000 Hello, and welcome to the 10th episode of Chronicles, where as a bit of fun, we thought

00:00:18.220 we'd celebrate by covering Master and Commander, the first novel in the Aubrey Maturin series

00:00:24.860 by Patrick O'Brien, and here to help me along and talk all about naval warfare and the fun

00:00:31.760 of the novel is Admiral Dade himself.

00:00:36.080 Admiral of the fleet.

00:00:38.300 It's a great book, isn't it?

00:00:40.200 It is.

00:00:40.760 It is very good.

00:00:41.740 Yeah.

00:00:42.040 Very, very good.

00:00:43.300 It's been a long time since I'd actually read it, and then I've revisited it in preparation

00:00:49.000 for this.

00:00:49.640 One thing I will just say, though, off the bat, is I had a look through a lot of online

00:00:55.440 forums for just people who are fans of the series, and a lot of them don't even rank this

00:01:01.460 in the top five.

00:01:03.020 Bear in mind, there's 20 novels.

00:01:04.380 I was going to say, there's a load of them, aren't there?

00:01:06.480 Okay.

00:01:07.060 So this is not regarded as the strongest start, actually, in the world.

00:01:13.340 Oh, that's interesting.

00:01:14.040 It's still him finding his stride with it.

00:01:17.560 It is an opening.

00:01:19.220 It is an opening of a much, much longer saga, sure.

00:01:22.800 Yeah.

00:01:23.740 In my mind, I put Hornblower, Master and Commander, and Sharp together, because, of course, they're

00:01:31.860 all sort of 19th century in the Napoleonic era stuff.

00:01:35.160 And actually, I came to the series late.

00:01:42.100 I was always a Hornblower man myself, because Hornblower was written long before these.

00:01:52.200 These were written in, what, like the 70s, 80s, 90s?

00:01:54.820 Well, actually, on that point, so C.S.

00:01:57.720 Forrester, who wrote Hornblower, he passed away in 1966.

00:02:02.480 Right.

00:02:02.860 And this first novel came out in 1969.

00:02:06.300 Ah.

00:02:06.700 So everyone was really looking to fill that hole that Hornblower had left behind.

00:02:13.320 Yeah.

00:02:13.560 And when this first came out, the reviews were not kind at all.

00:02:16.480 Oh, really?

00:02:16.900 Not kind at all.

00:02:17.940 Well, O'Brien must have read, I've never seen O'Brien in an interview, but he will have

00:02:24.440 read Hornblower, right?

00:02:25.540 I can only imagine he's a massive Hornblower fan.

00:02:28.060 Yes, you'd think.

00:02:28.860 He must be.

00:02:29.840 Yes.

00:02:30.300 Because they're very similar.

00:02:32.460 They're very similar stories.

00:02:34.380 In other ways, completely different.

00:02:35.740 Yep.

00:02:35.980 In other ways, completely different.

00:02:36.940 Like, Captain Jack Albury is not Hornblower.

00:02:42.280 No.

00:02:42.620 Absolutely not.

00:02:43.400 They're completely different characters.

00:02:44.660 But the fact that it's set in that sort of the classic late 18th century or early 19th

00:02:50.500 century age of sail, and he's a brilliant Royal Navy hero, there is sort of a similar

00:02:57.120 thing.

00:02:57.680 They are.

00:02:58.280 They are.

00:02:59.100 Let's, before we actually talk about the story itself, and let's just discuss a little

00:03:03.000 bit about Patrick O'Brien himself.

00:03:05.180 Okay.

00:03:05.520 Because the guy actually had a very, very interesting life.

00:03:08.840 So he was born in Buckinghamshire, and he was actually English.

00:03:14.660 Despite his surname, which we'll come on to.

00:03:17.320 But his mother died when he was quite young.

00:03:20.320 And from there, he ended up moving to Ireland.

00:03:24.760 He moved to, what was it?

00:03:26.560 Connemara, off the coast of Ireland.

00:03:29.860 When would that have been, Al, interesting?

00:03:31.320 Like, the 30s or during the war or something like that?

00:03:33.280 1920s.

00:03:33.820 Okay, all right.

00:03:34.320 1920s.

00:03:35.320 And he, apparently he had a friend, quite a wealthy friend, who had a yacht.

00:03:43.820 Right.

00:03:44.040 So that was his first time having some experience on a ship from quite a young age, which left

00:03:50.580 quite a profound effect on him.

00:03:52.600 Then from there, in World War II, he went on to work for British intelligence during the

00:03:59.820 war.

00:04:00.160 Okay.

00:04:01.080 And from there, he obviously went on to have a very, very successful career as a novelist.

00:04:07.940 Do you know what?

00:04:08.640 Just out of interest, this is new to me.

00:04:10.220 I've never really looked up Patrick O'Brien, the man.

00:04:13.440 Do you know what?

00:04:14.000 Just out of interest, what he did in the war?

00:04:15.320 Was it naval intelligence?

00:04:16.520 Or was it all shrouded in secrecy?

00:04:18.860 You must please forgive me for the whiplash and deceptions, Beau, but I was somewhat counting

00:04:23.740 on your ignorance here because, in fact, everything I just told you was a lie. 0.54

00:04:27.860 Oh, okay. 0.81

00:04:29.140 And I didn't just do that for no reason.

00:04:30.940 The reason that I told you that...

00:04:33.300 I'm confused.

00:04:34.200 The reason that I told you that is because that's what he told the world.

00:04:38.980 Oh, right.

00:04:39.980 So that was the official story of his life from him, right until his 80s.

00:04:47.600 That's what everyone thought of him.

00:04:49.400 And it's not true?

00:04:50.140 It's not true.

00:04:51.140 None of it's true.

00:04:52.220 It's kind of cool, isn't it?

00:04:53.640 Yes.

00:04:54.220 If you're going to make up a backstory for yourself, saying, yeah, I was in intelligence

00:04:57.320 and very, very hush hush, can't tell you about it, but I was basically a spy.

00:05:02.120 I was basically James Bond.

00:05:03.320 Yeah.

00:05:03.720 But I can't really tell you any details.

00:05:05.980 So do we know what his life really was?

00:05:08.480 So there was an expose on him back in 1998, so just two years before he died in his mid-80s.

00:05:17.300 And in this expose, they revealed the fact that actually he had been born not Patrick O'Brien,

00:05:24.300 who obviously by the name, everyone had just assumed he was Irish, but rather he'd been

00:05:29.160 born Robert Patrick Russ, and he lived most of his life in abject poverty.

00:05:35.980 Real poverty.

00:05:37.540 He was one of nine.

00:05:39.040 He mostly lived around London and Sussex, and he failed the entrance examination for Dartmouth Naval College.

00:05:47.260 Oh, okay.

00:05:47.840 And then had a three-month stint in the RAF before not really being up to scratch for it.

00:05:54.260 Right.

00:05:54.540 He did do some writing at the time.

00:05:57.080 He wrote a children's novel in about 1930, and he also went on to write a novel called,

00:06:04.420 I think it was The Golden Ocean, based on the voyages of George Anson from the 18th century.

00:06:12.280 But everything, and even the intelligence services claim, turns out that what he wasn't, rather,

00:06:22.060 was an ambulance driver during the Blitz.

00:06:26.560 During the war?

00:06:27.480 Yes.

00:06:27.920 Okay.

00:06:28.940 So not nothing.

00:06:30.200 Yeah, he did his bit.

00:06:31.260 Yes.

00:06:32.200 Yeah, he did his bit.

00:06:33.480 But not this legendary figure that he'd...

00:06:37.280 Having said that as well, though, he was also a deeply private man, and I think that...

00:06:44.120 And let's, you know, just address...

00:06:45.620 So in 1945, he changed his name officially to Patrick O'Brien by deed poll.

00:06:52.840 That's interesting, isn't it?

00:06:53.820 It is.

00:06:54.520 It's a very Irish name.

00:06:55.740 It's like being called Paddy O'Flanagan or something.

00:06:58.000 It's like it couldn't be more Irish, almost. 0.96

00:07:00.180 I wonder why, if he's from London and Sussex or whatever, I wonder why he decided to do that, of all things.

00:07:06.260 It's very peculiar, isn't it?

00:07:07.720 Yeah.

00:07:08.140 It's very peculiar.

00:07:09.260 However, the larger point is that he wasn't a charlatan, and he did write all of these books.

00:07:16.760 Right.

00:07:17.120 Right.

00:07:17.460 The books are his.

00:07:18.580 Yeah.

00:07:19.040 And they are remarkable.

00:07:21.420 And what's even more incredible about his life was that right up until his 70s, he was very, very poor.

00:07:28.720 He was writing these for decades before they started to actually gain some sort of recognition, and he started to be invited to the fancy dinners and to give speeches and all those sorts of things.

00:07:43.780 So how you always say about was he famous in his own time, the answer on this occasion is only just, really.

00:07:50.920 Only just.

00:07:51.600 And you say he died in the year 2000.

00:07:53.900 Yeah.

00:07:54.200 January 2nd.

00:07:55.240 So he just crossed over.

00:07:56.280 So he didn't live to see the Russell Crowe.

00:07:59.060 No.

00:07:59.800 What a shame.

00:08:00.560 Yeah.

00:08:00.960 What a shame, indeed.

00:08:01.900 Because everyone loves that movie, right?

00:08:04.180 It's in my top ten.

00:08:05.480 Yeah.

00:08:05.880 I adore him.

00:08:07.240 What a shame that he, yeah.

00:08:09.320 Well.

00:08:10.380 Yeah.

00:08:11.240 But quite a remarkable, remarkable backstory.

00:08:13.980 With the mystery as well.

00:08:16.280 It just adds another layer to him.

00:08:18.440 I'm surprised he wasn't actually in the Navy.

00:08:21.560 Hmm.

00:08:22.380 Because a lot of it, I feel like, I don't know if C.S. Forrester was, but you get the feeling from Hornblower and from Master and Commander that they genuinely, genuinely know these ships inside out.

00:08:35.480 Hmm.

00:08:36.460 Well, what he lacked in experience, he obviously made up for an enormous historical appetite for the era.

00:08:42.840 Yeah, research.

00:08:42.940 Just research and reading the archives.

00:08:46.140 And you get this a lot through the series, of course.

00:08:48.560 The historical fictions work, the way Aubrey just weaves himself through actual historical events, such as the Battle of Algericus.

00:08:58.860 Two battles of Algericus towards the end of this particular novel.

00:09:02.200 But one thing...

00:09:04.460 Just like Cornblower and Chop. 0.99

00:09:06.020 Just like Cornblower, yeah.

00:09:08.000 And, but one of the things as well that's also just something worth mentioning about his life that, and this is not embellishment, I promise you, this is, this is a truth.

00:09:17.080 He went on to marry a woman called Mary Tolstoy.

00:09:22.540 And the Tolstoy was directly related to the writer.

00:09:26.600 Okay.

00:09:26.920 Um, she had already married into the Tolstoy family.

00:09:31.420 And then since meeting O'Brien in London during World War II, the two had divorced from their original marriages and ended up marrying one another.

00:09:40.700 And living next to the Pyrenees for the rest of their lives, really.

00:09:44.520 The next 50 years.

00:09:46.280 The Pyrenees were in Spain or in Southern France or something?

00:09:48.840 On the French, yeah, side of things.

00:09:51.060 Oh, okay.

00:09:51.520 Lived there in a quiet little village for decades and decades until his wife passed away in 98, I believe it was.

00:10:00.420 And O'Brien spent his final year, perhaps aptly, in Ireland, in Dublin, where he died.

00:10:05.880 Huh.

00:10:06.800 So, yeah.

00:10:08.140 So, now that we've said all of that about O'Brien himself and his very curious life, let's start talking about the novel itself.

00:10:16.640 So, one thing to say is that collectively, all 20, 21 if you count the manuscript that he was working on when he died, all 20 novels are collectively known as the Aubrey Maturin series.

00:10:35.640 And I think that's very, very apt, rather than because it really is their story, more than any naval engagement, more than any event that happens to one or two of them.

00:10:47.180 Really, it's that brotherly bond that the two share, not obviously literal brothers, but as close to brothers as you can get.

00:10:54.740 It's the strength of their relationship and the way that they continually get each other out of these terrible situations and always support one another.

00:11:03.680 That really is the heart and soul of the series.

00:11:07.120 Well, that first book opens with them meeting, doesn't it?

00:11:11.700 Yes.

00:11:11.800 And it's interesting because actually, when they very, very first meet, Aubrey's a bit annoyed with Stephen, isn't he?

00:11:19.780 He is, yeah.

00:11:20.460 Because he corrects him on his timing.

00:11:22.820 They're at some parlour, some soiree.

00:11:25.480 Yeah.

00:11:26.700 And so their very first meeting...

00:11:27.880 Jack's just tapping on his knee in the time.

00:11:30.940 They don't sort of immediately hit it off.

00:11:33.140 No.

00:11:33.320 But very quickly, they do.

00:11:36.680 Because I think one of the great things about it, the thing I love, I think that's great about it, is that Aubrey, who's really the main character, I mean, it is a joint thing and it is about their relationship and their brotherly relationship.

00:11:48.940 But really, it's Lucky Jack, who's the main character.

00:11:54.220 Indeed.

00:11:54.440 And he's a nice guy.

00:11:59.000 He is.

00:11:59.700 Right?

00:11:59.920 He's an affable, likeable, well-meaning, warm-hearted type person.

00:12:07.200 A genuinely good captain.

00:12:08.280 And so very quickly, they just strike up a great friendship and off we go.

00:12:16.480 Because one of the things I think a lot of people have got, or I certainly have got a bit of a preconception that in real life, in real history, a lot of sort of 18th century captains or early 19th century captains will very often be sort of very strict taskmasters, perhaps even cruel.

00:12:38.500 There's like the classic sort of Captain Blyer stereotype.

00:12:44.000 Of course, they wouldn't all have been.

00:12:45.780 No.

00:12:46.060 Some would have been very pleasant, affable, nice guys.

00:12:49.820 Sure.

00:12:50.100 I'm sure some would have been, but a lot wouldn't have been.

00:12:54.660 And anyway, when you read the book, and if you watch the Russian Crow film, it's made apparent pretty straight away that this isn't a cruel master.

00:13:05.000 No.

00:13:05.700 No, not at all.

00:13:06.380 This is a gentleman.

00:13:08.920 And as I say, even affable, got a sense of humour, all that.

00:13:12.740 Yeah.

00:13:13.540 It's almost impossible not to like him.

00:13:16.020 Oh, I agree.

00:13:16.860 Yeah, he's effortlessly likable.

00:13:18.340 One of the things as well, just to make a distinction from the film in two ways, is that first of all, unlike in the film, where it has a very focused plot, and the mission is to find the French Acheron,

00:13:36.380 and capture or sink it, in this, the story is much more meandering.

00:13:42.100 He takes his, he's given, obviously, his charge, and he's promoted to master and commander.

00:13:49.440 So he's not quite, he's not post-captain.

00:13:52.040 He can't command his own frigate.

00:13:53.820 But what he can be given is charge of a 14-gun sloop called the Sophie.

00:13:59.820 Which is still reasonable.

00:14:01.400 Yes.

00:14:01.700 I mean, it doesn't stand a chance against a first-rater.

00:14:05.120 No.

00:14:05.440 But it's still decent.

00:14:07.500 Yeah, it is.

00:14:07.860 It's still be able to...

00:14:08.780 It's real responsibility.

00:14:09.980 It's still be able to blow up most things on the sea, if he wanted to.

00:14:14.140 So that's another thing, I think, is not a parallel with Hornblower, is the first book starts, and he's already a captain.

00:14:23.700 Right?

00:14:23.880 He's, well, he's given...

00:14:25.380 His first, he's a lieutenant, and then he receives the promotion at the beginning.

00:14:30.460 Yeah, but he's already hoping for his own command.

00:14:33.420 Yes.

00:14:33.860 He's already a senior officer, basically.

00:14:37.100 And, yeah, sorry, this is his first command, isn't it?

00:14:39.880 No.

00:14:39.980 But, yeah.

00:14:40.860 So, basically, it starts with him being a captain.

00:14:43.660 The first book, he's the captain.

00:14:46.280 Whereas Hornblower is different.

00:14:47.940 He, like Sharp, he starts at the bottom.

00:14:50.720 The first book, he's, in Hornblower's case, he's like a boy, a ship's boy, or a midshipman.

00:14:57.100 I can't quite remember.

00:14:57.720 It's been a long time since I read the first Hornblower book.

00:15:00.020 But, like, Sharp starts where he's not even a private, or it starts where he's a private.

00:15:05.060 Whereas this, we're straight into he's the master.

00:15:09.540 And that's the great thing.

00:15:10.460 Well, I think my master and commander is a good name, because there's this idea that

00:15:18.260 the captain of a ship, I mean, it's still the case now, but not as much as in the early

00:15:23.500 19th century, late 18th century.

00:15:26.880 You're like some sort of Roman legate.

00:15:30.640 Your word is law.

00:15:32.660 You'll never be more powerful than a captain on a ship.

00:15:35.920 You're like, it's almost like a god.

00:15:37.380 Your very gaze, a wave of the hand.

00:15:43.000 It's like life and death.

00:15:46.440 And, I mean, it doesn't really, it says that a few times, but it doesn't sort of really stress

00:15:52.440 it.

00:15:52.680 It doesn't go into pages and pages about that.

00:15:54.400 No.

00:15:54.720 But I think that's interesting.

00:15:56.900 That's good.

00:15:57.660 And that's another thing I would say about O'Brien's writing.

00:16:00.780 There's a reason why these are classics.

00:16:03.060 Oh, yeah.

00:16:03.340 And there's a reason why these are adored by their fans and why the film got made out

00:16:09.140 of it, because they're very, very well written.

00:16:12.080 It's very, very well written.

00:16:13.760 Whatever that magic is to paint a picture and to paint a story where it's just a light

00:16:22.240 touch here and just a flick of the paintbrush there, masterfully done.

00:16:29.680 Yeah, it really is.

00:16:31.300 I think most of all through the conversations is the conversations, those calms between the

00:16:36.980 storms.

00:16:38.420 Because one of the other things to say is that when I return to reading this in preparation,

00:16:44.440 those particular first three chapters, once he gets on the ship, it's very, very heavy.

00:16:51.180 It's just nautical phraseology porn.

00:16:54.980 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:16:55.420 All of it is just, and you're like, I don't know what this means.

00:16:58.620 I don't know what that is.

00:17:00.200 And O'Brien's obviously sensible of this too, because when Stephen comes aboard, Mr.

00:17:06.240 Mowat gives him the whole, oh, well, that's what, you know, that's a starboard.

00:17:09.500 That's a, you know.

00:17:10.460 And he just talks you through just an exposition dump of everything about what is the ship.

00:17:17.200 But that's the bit that's most hornblower-like for me, because that's what hornblower is,

00:17:21.860 loads, is age of sail porn.

00:17:24.820 Definitely, 100%.

00:17:26.060 And so, but you get that right at the beginning.

00:17:28.580 And it's a great literary device that the doctor, surgeon, doesn't, isn't familiar, hasn't

00:17:39.560 ever been on ship, certainly never been in the service.

00:17:42.060 No.

00:17:42.280 And so, doesn't know hardly anything about sailing.

00:17:45.420 And so, that's used, him asking questions, like, what's that?

00:17:49.060 Why do you, why is it called that?

00:17:50.360 How does that work?

00:17:51.840 And then it's explained to him, and thus us.

00:17:54.420 Yeah.

00:17:54.780 It's a great literary device.

00:17:56.600 One of my favourite parts of that conversation is where Stephen asks him, he says, look,

00:18:00.440 could you explain this to me all in plainer words?

00:18:03.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:18:03.740 And he's like, Mowat's like, no, these are the words.

00:18:08.880 Yeah.

00:18:09.280 There aren't any other words.

00:18:10.840 Like, these are the terms for the things.

00:18:12.580 It's like, learn them.

00:18:14.140 Yeah, yeah.

00:18:14.880 Yeah.

00:18:15.180 What else?

00:18:15.600 I don't know what else to tell you, bro.

00:18:17.640 Yeah.

00:18:18.040 No, it's great.

00:18:18.720 So, the film starts where he's, Captain Jack is a bit depressed because he hasn't got a

00:18:27.260 commission.

00:18:27.880 No.

00:18:28.100 And then he gets one, like, in the first chapter or two.

00:18:30.720 Yes.

00:18:30.980 He just gets orders.

00:18:32.600 Which also turns around because he and Stephen started on such frosty terms because of their

00:18:40.280 rudeness to one another at the concert.

00:18:43.480 Upon receiving his commission, Jack just decides to bury the hatchet.

00:18:48.060 Yeah.

00:18:48.220 And he's like, oh.

00:18:49.000 He's an affable fellow.

00:18:50.000 Yeah.

00:18:50.200 Let's just have dinner together.

00:18:52.040 And what you get here is, I think, Stephen wants purpose and meaning, and he's very, very

00:18:59.120 broken.

00:18:59.880 He's broke.

00:19:00.700 He has no money.

00:19:02.220 And Jack, obviously, one of the things that you see about Jack that separates him from his

00:19:08.540 film counterpart in this novel is that, of course, by the time that you get to a film,

00:19:14.400 Jack is already a very, very established captain.

00:19:16.660 Whereas with this, it's him figuring things out as he comes.

00:19:20.720 One of the things is about just trying not to be too over familiar with his juniors on

00:19:27.000 the ship.

00:19:27.580 You know, it's like stopping himself from holding his hand out to shake someone's hand

00:19:31.900 when he shouldn't, or just giving too much praise.

00:19:35.720 You know, just keeping that commanding distance.

00:19:39.440 And Stephen, you see more and more, he comes to depend on Stephen and rely on his friendship

00:19:46.720 because he's the one person that he can just be on there with, not directly under his command.

00:19:52.780 Almost as an equal, as a friend.

00:19:54.900 Yes.

00:19:55.720 As a friend first, in many ways.

00:19:58.040 There's a great line in there, I think, where he says something like, when he first goes

00:20:02.420 to see the ship, and then when he, like, everything seems okay, more or less, and he leaves again,

00:20:10.440 and he says something like, the whole ship collectively let out a sigh of relief when

00:20:15.480 he left the ship, when the captain had left.

00:20:17.960 Because they're all on, like, effectively, like, a dress parade.

00:20:22.440 It's not that.

00:20:22.860 But, you know, everything's got to be absolutely squared away, ship shape, and look, it's absolute

00:20:28.800 best, and all the men, their most rigid attention, and all that sort of thing.

00:20:32.680 And then when he leaves, they can all just sort of, ah, but he knows, having already gone

00:20:37.840 through the service, he knows that feeling.

00:20:41.100 Yes.

00:20:41.980 And he empathises with it.

00:20:45.060 Entirely.

00:20:45.460 And, yeah, he's a good captain, a good man, and, yeah, if anything, he has to stop himself

00:20:52.900 from being too, too, too nice, too familiar.

00:20:57.240 Yeah.

00:20:57.560 But he always strikes the balance perfectly, though.

00:21:00.820 Mm.

00:21:01.660 Because as well as being, as I've said a few times here, he's, like, a nice guy, he does,

00:21:07.000 he never sort of falls foul of that.

00:21:09.100 Mm.

00:21:09.940 He always, he always plays the situation perfectly.

00:21:15.100 Mm.

00:21:15.460 Um, yeah, yeah, so he gets orders, what, what happens next?

00:21:21.240 Because, yeah, Stephen's just a bit of a loose end.

00:21:24.040 Jack just needs a doctor.

00:21:25.860 Yes.

00:21:26.720 And he's, like, do you want to, yeah, although at first it says, he offers him it just as

00:21:31.280 a joke, as an aside, like, expecting Stephen to accept, and Stephen's, like, oh, actually,

00:21:35.960 doesn't explicitly say it, but he's, like, actually, I've got nothing going on in my life.

00:21:39.240 Yes.

00:21:40.440 Maybe I will do that.

00:21:41.660 Yeah, maybe that's the best thing for me right now.

00:21:43.760 Maybe it's, maybe it's fortunate that we met.

00:21:46.020 Yeah.

00:21:46.340 And, yeah, so Stephen comes aboard, and the first mission, I believe it is, because that's

00:21:51.720 what I was going to say, rather than just one single mission being the pot of this novel,

00:21:56.660 Jack receives lots and lots of different orders.

00:21:58.720 And so there are lots of things that go on, honestly, so many that it probably doesn't

00:22:03.320 even make sense to go through them all individually, but just rather talk about themes and just major

00:22:09.940 events.

00:22:10.560 Okay.

00:22:10.800 As the, as the story goes on, just because there are so many little missions and side

00:22:15.560 quests and things like, of that nature.

00:22:18.260 Yeah.

00:22:18.660 But the, the chief one, of course, is that he is to, there's a convoy that he has to protect.

00:22:28.900 And one of the first things as well is just to say that in preparing, well, let's talk

00:22:34.320 about some of the other crew members and then we'll, so James Dillon is probably the most

00:22:39.580 important one of this novel.

00:22:41.500 You've got, because he is pure Irish through and through, ultra paddy. 0.95

00:22:47.740 And one of the things that comes out is that he, Dillon and Steven already know each other.

00:22:55.220 Yeah.

00:22:55.720 Right.

00:22:56.560 Um, they don't know that that's not something they actually admit to Jack, um, to begin with.

00:23:02.360 And it comes.

00:23:04.200 And the reason for that is that they were both a part of the United Irishman movement, revolutionary

00:23:10.840 movement.

00:23:11.480 So this is the age of, um, the, the big question of home rule in Ireland.

00:23:18.760 So that is a fairly big theme.

00:23:21.080 Well, one of the bigger themes, I think beyond just sailing and fighting Frenchmen beyond 1.00

00:23:27.520 that theme is probably one of the biggest themes in this novel.

00:23:30.640 Definitely.

00:23:31.040 If anyone doesn't know, there was just this whole question for like a generation or more

00:23:35.600 in, in England, in Westminster of whether or not Ireland should have home rule or really

00:23:43.060 they should do, or it's sort of inevitable at some point, how are we going to actually

00:23:47.360 do that?

00:23:48.460 You know, like letting India have home rule or be independent.

00:23:51.480 It's like, it's going to happen.

00:23:53.580 We're not going to try and keep you under our boot forever, Mongol style. 1.00

00:23:58.380 So it's going to happen, but it's going to be a complicated, weird, difficult process.

00:24:04.540 So anyway, that was sort of the real politics at that time.

00:24:08.380 And so it's explored a bit, isn't it?

00:24:10.780 Yes.

00:24:11.160 In this.

00:24:11.740 And one of the things that I think that, um, it's not, obviously it does many things.

00:24:16.360 One, it just brings real political color to the time that the novel is set in, but also

00:24:22.520 it allows the novel to ask questions about, uh, loyalty to the institution, to the Navy,

00:24:31.020 to the Royal Navy, against your own personal individual beliefs and, you know, political

00:24:36.940 ideas that you might have.

00:24:39.100 And so, because Dylan doesn't want to like Jack.

00:24:42.700 Right.

00:24:43.240 Yeah.

00:24:43.800 Because Jack is an Englishman and represents everything that he's rebelling against.

00:24:48.080 And he and Stephen have this conversation with one another.

00:24:51.960 In fact, it's one of the ones that I, I bookmarked.

00:24:54.760 So I'll just quickly find it.

00:24:56.480 So they're having Dylan and, um, Stephen are having this conversation with one another.

00:25:02.360 And he says, without the revolution in France gone to pure loss, I was already chilled beyond

00:25:07.480 expression.

00:25:08.060 And now, with what I saw in 98 on both sides, meaning in Ireland, the wicked folly and the 1.00

00:25:14.460 wicked brute cruelty, I have had such a sickening of men in masses and of causes that I would

00:25:20.540 not cross this room to reform parliament or prevent the union or to bring about the millennium.

00:25:26.240 I speak only for myself.

00:25:28.100 Mind, it is my own truth alone.

00:25:31.060 But man as part of a movement or a crowd is indifferent to me.

00:25:35.000 He is inhuman and I have nothing to do with nations or nationalism.

00:25:40.400 The only feeling I have for what they are, are for men as individuals.

00:25:45.260 My loyalties, such as they are, are to private persons alone.

00:25:50.120 And Dylan asks him, well, patriotism will not do.

00:25:53.460 It says, my dear creature, I have done with all debate.

00:25:56.600 But you know, as well as I, patriotism is a word.

00:25:59.880 And the one that generally comes to mean either my country, right or wrong, which is infamous, 0.99

00:26:06.420 or my country is always right, which is imbecile. 0.99

00:26:10.460 And so this is Stephen's position, right, in the novel. 0.97

00:26:13.880 And the brilliance of having that be Stephen's position, of course, is that it enormously contradicts

00:26:19.920 Aubrey's position.

00:26:21.100 So they can argue and discuss it.

00:26:23.160 Right.

00:26:23.820 Sorry, go on.

00:26:24.300 No, which is just absolute patriotism.

00:26:26.920 Yeah.

00:26:27.380 Aubrey is a genuine patriot.

00:26:29.140 Yeah.

00:26:29.740 Who loves the Navy, loves the service, believes what it's fighting for.

00:26:33.640 Yeah.

00:26:33.880 And obviously adores England.

00:26:35.900 If you enjoyed this piece of premium content from the Lotus Eaters,

00:26:39.180 head to our website where you can find more.

PREVIEW： Chronicles #10 ｜ Master and Commander with Beau Dade

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