Patrick O\' Brian

Patrick O' Brian , born Richard Patrick Russ , the December 12th 1914 with London and deceased the January 2nd 2000, is a British writer which chose a Pseudonyme Irish.

Biography

Author of biographies and translator, it made himself famous in the Anglo-Saxon countries for the saga of the adventures of the captain Jack Aubrey and the doctor of navy Stephen Maturin. The novels of Patrick O' Brian abound in technical terms of the marine with veil of the time (1789-1815). The maritime combat are bloody, even for the winner.

He was tardily discovered in France, where he resided, with Collioure, since 1949.

Work

the adventures of Jack Aubrey , or Aubreyades , is a series of twenty historical novels. The action of these novels proceeds during the Napoleonean wars with for common point the friendship between the captain of the Royal Navy, Jack Aubrey, and the surgeon of edge, Stephen Maturin. Maturin is also doctor, naturalist and secret agent. The Romance 21e of the series, left unfinished by death O' Brian in 2000, is published at the end of 2004.

In 2003 leaves the film Master and to order: On the other side of the world , based on the books of this series, in particular Main on Board , the " Surprise" , the Letter Of Mark , and particularly On other side of the world . The role of Aubrey Jack is interpreted by Russell Crowe, and that of Stephen Maturin by Paul Bettany.

The character of Aubrey Jack

Its strong points:

It is an excellent captain, completely devoted to his country. He does not know the fear. He is liked and admired by his men, who obey to him the finger and the eye. He is famous to have chance and to make many catches, which brings back much money to its crew (and with itself).

Its weak points:

On the dry land, it is very easily made swindle. It cumulates the debts, without being extravagant.
It has a very good wife, Sophie, whom it loves tenderly, but which causes him many concern, by its jealousy or its incapacity to date its mails: the mail spends sometimes 6 months to arrive and it arrives in the disorder. The unhappy captain is obliged to try to reconstitute the chronological order of the letters which arrive to him.
His/her father, the Aubrey general, radical deputy, is a curse: its interventions in London are disastrous for the career of his/her son. Moreover, there is no relation father-wire between them.

The captain is frequently obliged to remind his friend Maturin, that the mission with which they are charged is more important than its enthralling scientific research on the animals (insects, birds or others).

The Aubrey captain is also an excellent swimmer, he does not hesitate to jump to the sea to save a simple sailor, even in the middle of the sharks.

On the successive vessels of the Aubrey captain, the corporal punishment is fewer than on the other British vessels. On the other hand, it requires an iron discipline of its men. Regularly, it makes firing practices to the gun on the open sea to involve its crew, the speed and the precision is vital for him. It also imposes that the boat is cleaned regularly.

He likes the word games, like the other sailors, which makes always perplexed his/her friend Maturin.

The character of Stephen Maturin

It is the most original character, he cumulates very different character traits:

it is an excellent doctor;

during the maritime combat, it looks after the many seriously injureds.
It makes surgical operations on the open sea, in particular some Trépanation S (obviously, it makes it when the sea is calm)

It is an impassioned naturalist: it is interested in the birds, the insects, it can spend all its day to observe them.

It is a bad cold-heart for him when the Audrey captain makes pass the boat right beside an island full with rare and enthralling animals without stopping (extreme example: the Islands Galápagos).
In full meal, it sometimes happens to him to prefer to look at the behavior of a Charançon beside the bread, rather than to listen to the impassioned conversation of his/her marine colleagues.

It is a frightening agent of the British secret services.

Of origin Catalan E (and Irish), it hates Napoleon which invaded most of Europe, of which Spain.
Catholic Irish, it has sometimes problems with the institutions of the English navy.

It passes part of its life at sea without anything to include/understand with the navy with veil and while being of a frightening awkwardness lorqu' it acts to go up in a boat. The crew knows these defects of their doctor: they are put at several to help it to go up in the boat; they make sure that its appropriate dress is correct when they arrive in a port.

the money has little importance for him. According to the various adventures, he is either a very rich man, or a simple alive doctor on his pay of soldier.

It has problems to sleep. It mâchonne of the sheets of Coke (see Cocaine). It uses Laudanum. It becomes depend on the one of its drugs and his/her colleagues must help it to separate themselves. There remains an excellent doctor.

Enemy of the ships slave trader British

The treats blacks was prohibited by the British law (on the other hand, Napoleon had restored slavery). It sometimes happens to the Aubrey captain to have to drive out the vessels British slave traders, sailing with a Flag of convenience. That brings some lawsuits to him to London.

When he sees the living conditions on the ships slave traders, the Aubrey captain with nausea, whereas the doctor Maturin is not inconvenienced him, he saw quite worse in hospitals. Obviously, the doctor tries to look after the black patients with the means it has.

Our two friends collect a couple of black twin children, on an island whose inhabitants were decimated by a disease. They are cherished by the crew, and very quickly learn English, that spoken by the simple sailors and that which is spoken by the officers.

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