Electronic resource, 320 pages
English language
Published Jan. 4, 2008 by Penguin Group USA, Inc..
In 1819, the 238-ton Essex set sail from Nantucket on a routine voyage to hunt whales in the South Pacific with twenty crew members aboard. Fifteen months later, the Essex was rammed and sunk by an enraged sperm whale. The crew drifted for more than ninety days in three tiny whaleboats, succumbing to weather, hunger, disease, and ultimately turning to drastic measures in the fight for survival. Nathaniel Philbrick uses little-known documents-including a long-lost account written by the ship's cabin boy-and penetrating details about whaling and the Nantucket community to reveal the chilling events surrounding this epic maritime disaster.
A good, solid book full of history and literary reflection. He tends at times to over-poeticize his subject, but it doesn't outdo the sheer pleasure of the information.
