Doubleday Books
The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder
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#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - From the author of Killers of the Flower Moon, a page-turning story of shipwreck, survival, and savagery, culminating in a court martial that reveals a shocking truth. The powerful narrative reveals the deeper meaning of the events on The Wager, showing that it was not only the captain and crew who ended up on trial, but the very idea of empire.
A Best Book of the Year: The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, TIME, Smithsonian, NPR, Vulture, Kirkus Reviews
"Riveting...Reads like a thriller, tackling a multilayered history--and imperialism--with gusto." --Time
"A tour de force of narrative nonfiction." --The Wall Street Journal
On January 28, 1742, a ramshackle vessel of patched-together wood and cloth washed up on the coast of Brazil. Inside were thirty emaciated men, barely alive, and they had an extraordinary tale to tell. They were survivors of His Majesty's Ship the Wager, a British vessel that had left England in 1740 on a secret mission during an imperial war with Spain. While the Wager had been chasing a Spanish treasure-filled galleon known as "the prize of all the oceans," it had wrecked on a desolate island off the coast of Patagonia. The men, after being marooned for months and facing starvation, built the flimsy craft and sailed for more than a hundred days, traversing nearly 3,000 miles of storm-wracked seas. They were greeted as heroes.
But then ... six months later, another, even more decrepit craft landed on the coast of Chile. This boat contained just three castaways, and they told a very different story. The thirty sailors who landed in Brazil were not heroes - they were mutineers. The first group responded with countercharges of their own, of a tyrannical and murderous senior officer and his henchmen. It became clear that while stranded on the island the crew had fallen into anarchy, with warring factions fighting for dominion over the barren wilderness. As accusations of treachery and murder flew, the Admiralty convened a court martial to determine who was telling the truth. The stakes were life-and-death--for whomever the court found guilty could hang.
The Wager is a grand tale of human behavior at the extremes told by one of our greatest nonfiction writers. Grann's recreation of the hidden world on a British warship rivals the work of Patrick O'Brian, his portrayal of the castaways' desperate straits stands up to the classics of survival writing such as The Endurance, and his account of the court martial has the savvy of a Scott Turow thriller. As always with Grann's work, the incredible twists of the narrative hold the reader spellbound.
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Book Details
ISBN:
9780385534260
EAN:
0385534264
Binding:
Hardcover
Pages:
352
Authors:
David Grann
Publisher:
Doubleday Books
Published Date: 2023-18-04
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The limits of human endurance and hunger combine here in an informative way. It does compare to Endurance, except the subject here is the human drama that unfolds. I liked the quick reference to a psychological study showing how quickly human civilizing influences vanish as soon as extended periods of pain and starvation occur. Their daily struggle for food and shelter on the island the the descending behavior all around...is fascinating. This is a great human drama and the seas of the Horn are truly scary to read about. Once again I find myself appalled at how long it took the British Navy to find a cure for scurvy, after all, how can you KNOW ahead of time that 50+% of the crews are doomed the minute they leave home. My gosh, even Falcon Scott does not seem to know about this, in 1903 and again in 1911. Anyway the dramatic story here (and constant crew member death from exhaustion) are turned into a tempest in a teapot by the British Navy's quick-seal application. The writing is often good even if I had to read the intro over four times. The Drake Passage part was (wonderfully) frightening to read about. I kind of think the author'sExihibit A on "how humans can't seem to get along" is a powerful message. Human nature at its utter worst....'read all about it' !!
Entirely entertaining, thoroughly researched (it seems) and the author offered a view of different perspectives about the politics of the British Empire at that time, the indigenous people of that part of the world. I wondered the whole time how people could endure under these conditions. Well done!PS: If anybody wants to learn more about Tierra Del Fuego and its original inhabitants I recommend reading Lucas Bridges' Uttermost Part of the Earth.
Once I started this book I couldn’t stop. A very eye opening read that opened my eyes of the dangers of the seas. I highly recommend it
I have read other David Grann novels and thought it could be interesting. It was beyond my expectations. This tale is about a lot more than what happened to the ship. It makes you reflect on what you would do to survive and how nations bend men to do their bidding at all costs.
The way the author relate the accounts based on each castaway account without prejudices. Leaving it to the readers to make their own conclusions. The vivid descriptions as uncomfortable they are allows the reader understand the misery and desperation of the castaways. A great reading for anyone that love history and sea adventures.
