Jack London was a very successful and prolific writer during his lifetime. Some of his books are remembered better than others. His enduring classic is Call of the Wild. You know, the one whose most recent movie adaptation tanked because they replaced Buck with CGI and even in this digitally oriented world everyone knows what a dog looks like.
The Mutiny of the Elsinore is not so well remembered, even though it's been filmed three times, the most recent being a British adaptation from 1937. This is a shame, because it's a fascinating book. It's London taking the genre of high seas adventure and essentially deconstructing it.
Which is to say there's not much in the way of threat or thrills from the outside world, from the sea itself. The crew are misfits, many of them mean and unpleasable, and they start tearing themselves apart at the first opportunity. London doesn't say that you have to be a damaged person to voluntarily become a sailor, but he seems to imply it.
The narrator is a novelist and bookworm looking for a break from humanity, likely an author self-portrait. And he falls in love with the one woman on the Elsinore, the captain's daughter. There's that much convention. But while he at one point raves about his Viking heritage to impress her, he has little effect on what goes on around him.
An oceangoing "hell is other people" is probably not to everyone's taste. And the whole genre certainly doesn't need to be that. But London's artistic gamble pays off well overall.
The Mutiny of the Elsinore is not so well remembered, even though it's been filmed three times, the most recent being a British adaptation from 1937. This is a shame, because it's a fascinating book. It's London taking the genre of high seas adventure and essentially deconstructing it.
Which is to say there's not much in the way of threat or thrills from the outside world, from the sea itself. The crew are misfits, many of them mean and unpleasable, and they start tearing themselves apart at the first opportunity. London doesn't say that you have to be a damaged person to voluntarily become a sailor, but he seems to imply it.
The narrator is a novelist and bookworm looking for a break from humanity, likely an author self-portrait. And he falls in love with the one woman on the Elsinore, the captain's daughter. There's that much convention. But while he at one point raves about his Viking heritage to impress her, he has little effect on what goes on around him.
An oceangoing "hell is other people" is probably not to everyone's taste. And the whole genre certainly doesn't need to be that. But London's artistic gamble pays off well overall.
2 comments:
as you know, we both love jack london. while i've never read 'the mutiny of the elsinore', i did reread 'the sea-wolf' a couple of years ago, a story which also features a 'coming of age' young man on a ship (this one a seal hunter) that also happens to have a young woman on board, not to mention wolf larson, as intimidating & cruel a ship captain villain as ever there was one. memorable, if just a slight bit over-the-top...
london's abbreviated writing style carries over very well to the present. he was something of a forerunner, actually. he was also able to quite effectively (at least in call of the wild & white fang) create some very powerful, but at the same time undertstated, emotional moments using this style. a truly efficient, distinctive author...
&, yeah, the less said about the recent cgi movie, the better. i, personally , have no interest in the recent scorsese movie 'the irishman' for pretty much the same reason. something like 'avatar'? or 'star wars'? fine. otherwise? why? why bother? what's the point, other than, i guess, to shove in my face the reminder that i'm watching a heavily technology-laden movie? this thing about confusing what we can do with what we should do continues to drag us all along into some pretty awful places...
anyway, if you're looking for another rousing tale of men at sea, you can't go wrong with very likely my own personal favorite, 'the narrative of arthur gordon pym of nantucket' i know i've mentioned it before, but it's just that completely deranged that it's well worth re-mentioning. it's a tale that'd shiver anyone's timber...
London was a bestselling author in his own lifetime, I know. You can see why. He was not shy about keeping his book packed with incident. None of his novels ever did for him what Moby Dick did for Melville, i.e. tank his career. But he also uses his position to challenge the reader sometimes, which I appreciate.
You make a good point about what's a worthwhile use of CGI in movies, and I've thought much the same thing for a while now. Creating an alien world, sure. Making sure the stuntman doesn't have to jump into an actual burning tower? Yeah, I can get behind that. But giving Robert De Niro a seamless but false patina of youth? Maybe you should have gone with a different actor.
I have read "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. Not for a long while right now, though, so in terms of what actually happens I'd have to go back and reread.
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