The Ancient Generations

He wished he had not used such confident, presumptuous words in writing to Blaine.  From very early times men had believed that it was unwise, even impious, to tempt fate: the ancient generations were not to be despised.  The confident system of his youth - universal reform, universal changes, universal happiness and freedom - had ended in something very like universal tyranny and oppression.  The ancient generations were not to be despised; and the seamen's firm belief that Friday was unlucky was perhaps less foolish than the philosophe's conviction that all the days of the week could be rendered happy by the application of an enlightened system of laws.

- Reflections of Dr Stephen Maturin in The Wine-Dark Sea by Patrick O'Brian

Rereading Patrick O'Brian's magnificent series of Aubrey-Maturin novels, which can also be described as a 7,000 page novel in 20 chapters, I came across this passage which struck me as appropriate given our world today.  Discovering the books in 1990, over the next 2-3 years I consumed the existing volumes (the series began in the early 1970s), and then anxiously awaited the yearly release of O'Brian's next chapter which continued until his death in 2000 at the age of 85.

Embarking on my reading project in May, I am nearing the end of The Wine-Dark Sea, the 16th in the series, and finding that doing so in a short time frame gives a different perspective than reading the novels over ten years, providing a better sense of continuity and immersion in the period of the Napoleonic Wars and of the characters and their relationships.

The books can be enjoyed from a historical perspective, as a chronicle of the British navy and its peculiar and specific culture during the first two decades of the 19th century, as a nautical adventure, an exploration of friendship, novels of manners with a kinship to Jane Austen, and above all for the beautiful writing.  O'Brian challenges the readers.  He writes as though he was living in the times, with no foreknowledge of the 20th century and is thus able to convey the mindset of his characters as they lived and thought then, devoid of many aspects of modern sensibility.  He also trusts his readers, often inferring events and motivations rather than describing them directly.

It is like being back with old friends and indeed, it is as a story of friendship that I most appreciate the novels.  Captain Jack Aubrey and Dr Stephen Maturin are very different.  Physically, Aubrey is tall, broad and heavy weighing more than 220 pounds, with long golden hair, and a big booming, gregarious and robust presence bearing the scars of many battles, while Maturin is smaller, much slighter (125 pounds), pale skin and pale blue eyes with short dark hair, and a quiet and observant presence.  Temperamentally, Aubrey reacts instinctively, helpless when not on a ship, but every bit the commander when sailing,  believing in the infallibility of the ways of the navy and of the deceased Admiral Nelson, firmly adhering to traditional English ways.  Maturin, of Catalan and Irish heritage and a Papist, a former revolutionary still filled with a desire for increasing human liberty, with an instinctive negative reaction to any authority, supporting the British as the lesser of the two evils compared to Bonaparte.  They are united by their love of music and their respect for each other.  Irritating each other and quarreling at times, despite occasional  rifts the friendship endures and deepens over time.  They care for each other because of what they are, rather than allowing friendship to be undermined by what they are not.

Rereading the book also reacquaints one with the host of other memorable characters, Tom Pullings, Bonden, Martin, Awkward Davies, Padeen, Joe Plaice, young one-armed midshipman Reade, the irascible Killick looking like a "lean, cantankerous and out of work ratcatcher" while, back on land, we have Aubrey's wife Sophie, Maturin's occasional wife Diana Villiers, and Sam Panda, Aubrey's son with a Bantu woman, conceived when Aubrey was at Capetown, and now a Papist priest, rendering his admiring father, unaware of Sam's existence for many years, a bit nonplussed and Maturin bemused, and Surprise itself, Aubrey's beloved vessel, as much a character as the rest.

I'll finish the novels sometime this fall and, God willing, reread them again in another ten years.

In the passage quoted above it is 1813.  Maturin, now working for British intelligence and reporting to Joseph Blaine, is in Peru seeking to spark an revolt for independence against Spain, a nominal British ally.  During the heady summer days of 1789, a younger idealistic Maturin had been in the streets of Paris, supporting the revolution.  Now disillusioned by the results and the triumph of the dictator Bonaparte he muses on what he has learned over the years.  It reminds me of Margaret Thatcher's quip that the American revolution gave us George Washington and the Constitution, while France's led to a dictator and "a pile of corpses".  And it is also a lesson for today.