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Arglebargle III posted:When O'Brian has medical men say, "he has a vicious habit of body"... what the gently caress are they talking about? Physical addiction to some substance, I'm pretty sure. Maybe just addiction in general.
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Jun 4, 2021 19:10
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| # ¿ May 8, 2024 23:44 |
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He's also very grudgingly impressed by the efficiency of the (iirc) Lively but remains dubious of the idea of letting common sailors perform actions based on their own understanding of what the proper action should be, calling it the epitome of Whiggishness and basically thinking that even though it's demonstrably the best crew he has ever seen, it's still wrong. Calling him a conservative seems pretty spot on.
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Jul 1, 2021 01:55
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Kylaer posted:I get that, that's airfoil physics. I understand how square-rigged sails can sail into the wind, because the spars get turned so that the whole sail is at an angle to the ship. But the geometry of the staysails confounds me. They're secured at three points that are all contained within the central longitudinal plane of the ship - one point to the mast in front of them, two to the mast behind them. How do they generate force in any direction other than "knock the ship over sideways?"
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Oct 12, 2022 19:29
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Going to third Jonathon Strange as probably being closer to what you are looking for in some respects. Beyond that, the Sharpe novels are worth reading but as soon as you start getting bored, stop, because they won't change or get better or do anything new. They're fun, but also repetitive. I don't know, imagine if Aubrey captures the Cacafuego and then at his court martial is reassigned to another sloop and next book, he takes that sloop and sinks a frigate and would be promoted except for that dastardly admiral Harte so next book he takes his sloop and loses his first ship but he sinks two so he gets another ship again. Then in the next book he captures a fort or something, which is oddly like a ship that doesn't sail anywhere. Then he he gets a really big ship and sinks some bigger ships. They'd still be fun, they just wouldn't be elevated the O'Brian does it.
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Jan 17, 2023 00:46
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I'm dying at Martin discovering that Maturin casually takes 1000 drops of laudanum during Reverse of the Medal, when the normal dose is 25. E: I'm using modern strength laudanum and general rough conversion factors but that's 500mg of oral morphine. That maps not terribly to 25 drops being 12.5mg, which is pretty drat close to a typical modern dose. Which means holy gently caress Maturin is ludicrously tolerant. I'm impressed he shits at all. Ravenfood fucked around with this message at 13:49 on Apr 16, 2023 |
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Apr 16, 2023 13:31
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Mary Renault is fantastic. Her writing is maybe slightly less meticulous (also she has far fewer contemporary works to draw inspiration from) but her characterization is stronger, imo.
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May 10, 2023 13:12
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So, today I went to the maritime museum of San diego which has the HMS Surprise there (the one used in the movie). A) cool as gently caress. B) I knew that ship was small but good god is it small. C) I couldn't get a sense of how small the gundeck actually would be in a proper 20-gun 6th rate. On the ship there, they basically have the guns on a raised platform about knee-height from the deck of the "gun deck", and the area open to visitors is just the gun deck and upper deck. Standing in the gundeck I easily had head clearance, but if the true deck height would have been at the level of the elevated gun platforms, it would have been maybe a 5 foot tall deck space at most. I know those ships were cramped as hell, but that honestly seems like it could cause issues with speed and ability to load cannon that stooped over. And, the books mention that tall people have issues with hitting their heads, not literally everyone all the time. On the other hand, that small deck space seemed like the guns were at the right height and the carriage seemed about right too, so it wasn't like they used a small carriage to make it fit. So, how tall was the Surprise's gun deck? E: they also said the rations for that era as listed in the full allotment would have been something like 4000 kcals/day.
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Jun 11, 2023 01:35
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Diana owns (I also felt similarly while reading Post Captain, and kept reading. Keep going! It's great)
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Sep 17, 2023 16:02
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Diana is great, but the first time she appears her scenes drag quite a bit and the book is a much different feel than the one before it. I love the character but the way she is introduced doesn't do her favors. I'm excited to reread Post Captain now.
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Sep 18, 2023 00:27
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I just finished the series for the first time. Goddamn that was good. Time to reread it all I guess!
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Sep 24, 2023 22:36
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screaden posted:So I just finished The Yellow Admiral and I have a question about Stranraer, did Stephen kill him? Either by the digitalis itself or knowing that his own surgeon, Sherman, would be unable to get Stranraer to reduce his dosage? Also I can't help but laugh every time Stephen gives anyone medication, because when it isn't some opioid or coca, it's a laxative or emetic. Even when he is giving them a placebo, he fills it with some kind of purgative so the sailors "know they have been truly physicked". So him having a working medical treatment was pretty neat to see!
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Dec 30, 2023 15:20
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| # ¿ May 8, 2024 23:44 |
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Kylaer posted:Holy poo poo
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Apr 28, 2024 17:57
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