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Notahippie posted:You lucky bastard, getting to read the series fresh. Actually, that's an interesting point. Is it time to start the thread over? It's almost six years old and the OP's been marked with an R since about a month after it started (and only halfway through book 2!). Should we begin from the beginning or should we press on, crack on regardless?
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Nov 29, 2016 14:52
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hannibal posted:These are my favorite books ever but they do have some slow parts. There are some sections where POB wants to go into particulars of Royal Navy custom or English country life in a bit too much detail. Also if you read them straight through, remember that they came out years apart so I imagine he had to fluff things a bit to keep people up to date with the setting. That said, they do work incredibly well read back-to-back, in a few cases picking up right where the last one left off. That detail is sorely needed, in my opinion. A great deal was so different back then that it helps reinforce the not quite the sameness for me. That and I like to believe it is a deliberate nod to the idea that 95% of seagoing life was dull, or at least not filled with cannonballs but personal interactions between people.
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Dec 4, 2016 02:11
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CroatianAlzheimers posted:I started going through my Tull-read audiobooks again (for, like, the fifth time) and man, I forgot just how gross Mrs. Williams is. Ditto, and ditto (some, like Mauritius Command, I've easily been through a dozen times). Any part in particular you're referencing?
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Feb 6, 2017 16:25
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Decius posted:Stephen can be extremely ruthless. After Jack has seen what he did there, he goes out of his way to dissuade people, who want to go out with Stephen from it. One of the best scenes of Stephen losing his countenance is after the dinner in New South Wales in "The Nutmeg of Consolidation". It actually starts in Surprise, when Stephen fights his duel at the end. Jack tries everything he can (within social norms) to keep the duel from happening, because he knows that at least the other guy will get killed. He flat out says, "My man is deadly". This is all after he sees Stephen practicing sword dueling in Post Captain with the Marine lieutenant before shooting the pips out of a playing card at ten paces (no mean feat with a smoothbored pistol). Fire Safety Doug posted:Not sure if I'm imagining it, but on my latest re-read I felt that O'Brian really hits his stride humour-wise in The Surgeon's Mate. There's just so many subtly hilarious moments and exchanges. My favorite's from Ionian Mission: 'You and Martin may say what you like,' said Jack, but there are two ends to every pudding.' 'I should be the last to deny it,' said Stephen. 'If a pudding starts, clearly it must end; the human mind is incapable of grasping infinity, and an endless pudding passes our conception.' Professor Shark posted:Edit: also, Stephen's clinical dispatching of the French operatives towards the end of "Fortune" was pretty To be fair, even Stephen comments on the  -worthiness of it, or at least the results.
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Feb 16, 2017 13:55
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Arglebargle III posted:Oh my God the scene in Post-Captain when Diana invites Stephen into her bedroom to look at butterflies or whatever is so painful. We're seeing the scene through his internal monologue and he never seems to notice that she's propositioning him. Repeatedly. Their whole romance is so painful. She's throwing out hints left and right and clearly lonely and unhappy. Stephen is too involved in his own morose thoughts about the Diana in his head to notice that the actual Diana in front of him is practically throwing herself at him. Then he gets confused and wounded when she's mean to him the next time they meet. He's so conscious of the difference of Diana the mental construct and Diana the actual person in an abstract sense, because he's a sharp study of character in the abstract, but he never seems able to connect his own actions to Diana's behavior. ...gently caress. I always read that as Diana treating him like she said he was, a great friend but no more and Stephen respecting that (but obviously wishing for more). Now I'm rethinking that whole thing. Dammit. quote:What do you think the unnamed love affair in Ireland was? Stephen's clearly depressed in Master and Commander and occasionally his internal monologue will reference an attachment in Ireland that seems too painful for him to even think about. He also tells Sophie that long engagements never work out and outlines a series of tragedies inherent to long engagements (so he says) that seem suspiciously precise. Her name was Mona, and I've always taken it to be that she died. It wasn't unknown for people to die young, and if Stephen were her attending physician (which he'd of course do, or at least consult) her death would weigh especially heavy on him, just like the young man at the start of Desolation Island. quote:These books are so good. Hear him! Hear him!
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Jun 20, 2017 13:00
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:The real issue with Mauritius is that, from what I remember, the historical model for Jack in that campaign basically got All The Awards and retired for life right afterwards, so if O'Brian gave him realistic rewards, so would Jack. Rowley went on to become Admiral etc. and commanded some major area (the Med?) after the Napoleonic Wars. Dude definitely didn't retire. I always put it to the artist giving Jack the rewards he *ought* to have received, not necessarily what he actually *did*. Edit: Hell, maybe it's an allusion to what Rowley received but Jack didn't because of his father. I remember he should have gotten some kind of reward (knighting?) for the Waakzemheid but his dad was busy being a dick.
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Jun 23, 2017 15:33
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Molybdenum posted:Got a new job with lots of driving, I signed up for audible but I'm probably going to get through more than a book a month, what's the cheapest option for the Patrick Tull audiobooks if you buy them in one go or the like? See if your library has them on CD. Arglebargle III posted:I like that when O'Brien has decided to kill Harte, this nasty, incompetent, pathetic, grasping character he's built up over ten years, he has Jack discover that Harte uses some of his fortune to rescue Christian slaves every year. I'd forgotten about that. That's what I love about this series. I can't think of a single character that's one dimensional, even the completely unlikable pain in the rear end.
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Jul 10, 2017 12:51
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Professor Shark posted:It blows my mind that it didn't get a sequel, but I read that Crowe read the books after filming wrapped up and became a fan of the series. It'd be nice if they brought it back for another movie, but the original cast is getting to the age that it might not be feasible for them. What, you can't see them filming The Hundred Days at this point? I think they're almost at a perfect age for that.
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Jul 24, 2017 14:01
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