What I found tedious about them (and I’ve read them all, some more than once) was, I think, the eventual subordination of character to plot.
I love Age of Sail novels in general, I enjoy all the technical descriptions and naval maneuvers and period dialogue, and I think the general thickness and richness of the Aubrey/Maturin universe is just great. I voraciously read all sorts of British fiction from Fielding and Smollett to Jane Austen and Trollope and Dickens, and I love O’Brian’s integration of his settings with that historical world.
But there’s only so long that all of that can manage to distract me from the depressing realization that the characters just thin out and become schticky and/or mechanical. Initially, because of the author’s deep knowledge of the period, they seem as though they’re going to be very interesting people because the author has stocked them with interesting backgrounds and information and experiences. But they end up as caricatures of the full-depth personas they held out hopes of being at the beginning.
Aubrey is always going to fight the same way, womanize the same way, geek out on his astronomy the same way. Stephen is going to be melancholic and loathe Napoleon, and even he has no real depth to keep those character traits alive. (I kept waiting through book after book for a character as complex as Stephen was supposed to be to undergo even the briefest shift of perspective: to feel even the most fleeting flash of admiration or sympathy for Napoleon in the course of all the vicissitudes in all the years of the conflict. Never happened.) And Diana is little more than a marionette who jumps in whatever direction the author requires in order to cause maximum pain and sympathy for Stephen; in the end, of course, even the author gives up on figuring out how to make her into any kind of integrated character and, well, you know what happens then.
Ultimately, to me, the books are using their high quality of writing, wit, atmosphere and historical depth—a level of quality that I think ranks with the greatest historical fiction in English literature—to disguise a more or less comic-book level of character development. And that’s why, as much as I’m fascinated by the books’ achievements and would love to adore them and reread them over and over, I can’t help being bored by them.
This is a highly negative way of viewing the books. Your use of words like “disguise” makes it all sound so underhanded. In the end however, what you are saying sounds to me like it can be abbreviated thusly:
O’Brian’s strong points are his high quality of writing, wit, atmosphere and historical depth. Character development is excellent to begin with but fades over the course of a twenty plus book series.
What a condemnation. If only more books could be condemned this way.
There there, I certainly don’t mean to “condemn” the books, just to explain why even someone who really appreciates their author’s skill and virtuosity and is enthusiastic about their subject and style might nonetheless end up finding them boring.
And no, I wouldn’t say that my opinion includes “character development is excellent to begin with”; it’s more like “character development has the initial potential to be excellent but never really happens satisfactorily”.
You’re absolutely right that all books have flaws and, considered in light of their overall impressive achievement, the problems with the O’Brian books are relatively minor. Unfortunately, the flaws still act as book-boner-killers for some readers, and prevent us from sustaining our interest or enjoyment in the books. I’m definitely not saying that readers who can fully enjoy the books shouldn’t be doing so; on the contrary, more power to you.
Except that you are I think quite exceptional in saying you’ve read through them all and are disappointed with overall development through the depth of the series. Most people who don’t like them seem to not like them from the get go, more or less. So while I’m not saying your criticisms are invalid, they don’t seem to be criticisms that would appear to account for such dislike for the books as is evidenced here.
I think the thing is that I’m REALLY STUBBORN when it comes to reading, or maybe “desperately addicted” would be more accurate. If I have a book that I feel I’m supposed to like, or that I strongly expected to like, or can see greatness in even though I don’t like it, then by golly, lack of enjoyment isn’t going to stop me from continuing to read it. (I’m also a pretty fast reader and can’t stand not having anything to read, so pretty much any book is worth reading if it’s the only book in the house or on the plane or what have you.)
If I had given up on the Aubrey/Maturin series when I first started feeling dissatisfied with it and somewhat repelled by it, I don’t think I would have made it all the way through Master and Commander. I’m glad I didn’t give up, mind you, because there’s a lot of superb writing and detail that I would have been sorry to miss. But it’s not really as though I was thoroughly enjoying the books at the beginning but found the later ones to fall off in quality or interest.
Mind you, I’m not trying to diss the series or say people shouldn’t like it. I was just offering my own experience as a possible explanation of why some people might just not enjoy the O’Brian books even though they go into it with very positive expectations and with a strong bias in favor of the subject and/or style.
After all, this thread is basically about the question “Why didn’t I like the Aubrey/Maturin novels?” I think even die-hard fans of the series have to admit that there can be valid answers to that question other than “I’m not capable of appreciating its magnificence” or “I just didn’t and there’s no accounting for taste” or even “I’m just a fussy nitpicker willing to condemn fantastic books for minor flaws”.
I fail to see why that statement, while true, is in anyway a compliment to CSF. Some of us want to enjoy the journey, not simply reach the end. If I’m thoroughly enjoying myself for that entire chapter, why WOULD I have wanted it to be only a page long?
Obviously a difference in style.
Let us not come to blows, gentlemen.
Muldoonthief, the bottle stands beside you, Sir!
Interesting that Hornblower has the fault of being tone deaf, and Aubrey of mixing his metaphors.
It took me a couple of tries to get into the flow and rhythm of O’Brian’s work, but when it did, I fell in love with it. I have the main 20, and have read them all multiple times.
Don’t feel bad if O’Brian’s writing doesn’t appeal to you. In terms of entertainment, I’m always the last to the party (if I make it at all), and an ungodly proportion of shows that most or all of my friends adore are utterly lost on me. De gustibus non est disputandum, etc., etc. I should have seen well in advance, for example, that my last relationship was doomed based on the fact that, by the time I finally got around to seeing it, I realized that I hated Breakfast at Tiffany’s. And that, while a fan of crooners in general, Sinatra just wasn’t my cuppa joe. But I digress.
I place myself firmly among those who declare the Aubrey/Maturin canon to be the greatest collective work of historical fiction ever written. There is hardly a page in the entire body of work that does not (IMHO) contain some priceless gem: an elegant turn of phrase, historical tidbit, naturalistic factoid, cultural insight, or bit of serendipitous wordplay. I have long since ceased to read O’Brian for the sake of his narratives, compelling as they are, and now regard each chapter as a serving of the most delectable banquet imaginable. I know of no other author who can cast that kind of spell over me.
Among his other qualities, I am fascinated by the genuine, heartfelt humanitarianism that shines through a series of stories that have, as their background, the brutality of war – O’Brian takes us all over the world and presents us with peoples and societies from the most primitive to the most modern, yet never loses sight of the brotherhood of mankind. From lofty admiral to the humblest foremast jack, from cosmopolitan intellectual to southsea cannibal, all nations, races, creeds, and colors are treated by the author as fully human, none inherently superior to the other. Though the characters themselves are, of course, bound to their own cultural prejudices, nobody is perfect, nor anyone manifestly evil. I find this to be a remarkable achievement.
I very much liked the movie, too. But it was very tightly edited around those selected moments, particularly action,* that were recognized (and sometimes reconceived) as playing best on screen, within the format of a single mainstream feature film.
In the books, indeed, there are many passages that do not further plot in any particular way. They’re just… paintings. Aubrey/Maturin fans like these–like to inhabit that world. There doesn’t need to be Something Happening all the time.
O’Brian, by contrast, doesn’t even write all the possible action scenes in his story line. I can’t recall now which book it is, but there’s a section where a certain ship engagement has been anticipated for many pages–the focus of all the principals’ concerns… and then the next chapter is after it is over.
I walked into Politics and Prose after finishing the last Hornblower and asked a bookseller what to read next. POB had died the week before and there was a large shrine of books. Took the first one home and finished in two days. Some of the others went even faster.
If you want more plot less rigging, the 6th through 9th have lots of intelligence plots and politics.
Lobscouse and Spotted Dog is another fan book fully of the tidbits that make fans “wish you joy, brother!”
The entire theme of all the books is the journey of 2 friends. If you’re looking for protagonists or character change over the books it will be along the lines of how the 2 friends view each other. Maturin will always feel the same about napoleon (as well he should). Jack will always feel the same about the royal navy and Nelson.
These 2 friends have a lifelong journey with each other and over the course of which their relationship changes dramatically. Obrian even spells this out specifically in one of the books when stephen reviews his diaries and comments directly upon it. (I may be conflating several scenes from several books but the point is the same.)
This relationship is the heart of the story. Obrian paints beautiful pictures (as other posters have noted) and gives us breathtaking views of scenes but the heart of the matter is these 2 friends and how they change.
Pretty much every other character are one dimensional backdrops that never develop. J&M do however and to miss this is to miss the whole thing.
This will be my final post on this subject. I took the advice of one of the posters that “Desolation Island” was one of O’Brian’s better books, and got it out of the library.
Well, I tried, i really tried. Got 44 pages into it and for 40 of them was rather enjoying it. Then suddenly it was like driving a car down a country lane and suddenly hitting a deep mud hole where you gradually are brought to a halt by the clinging mud. In this case it was something about Stephen riding in a carriage with somebody else who had had nothing to do with anything who was thinking about throwing up blood, or who was about to throw up blood, or something like that. Absolutely nothing to do with anything.
If O’Brian could just keep going like he starts the book, he would very likely be a very interesting author. But he always seems to go off on a boring tangent. Phooey!
Sir, I have tweaked a man’s nose for less!
Okay not really but I’ve always wanted to post that.
To each is own. I love the POB series. I think it is nuts to think that you could pick up Desolation Island and start the story there. Why would you want to start on chapter 6. ( I think it’s the 6th book, could be wrong, going on memory here)
I’ve read the series multiple times. I enjoy the time it takes to enjoy all the word paintings. I’ve read the Hornblower series as well. Not bad, but not as weighty as POB, and not as enjoyable for me.
