#the aubreyad

[johannestevans]

jack aubrey talking to stephen maturin is like. did you know i think sodomy should be legal? i would have kidnapped you on our first meeting. would you like to be on a ship with me? i could pick you up with one hand. what can i give you? how can i make you happy? a cool bird?

i love jack aubrey's perspective because this man is so severely autistic and it's glorious. he has no idea what he's feeling at any time. he has almost no mouth brain filter. to avoid confusion he will simply tell the VERY UNWISE truth, to a complete stranger

but luckily where jack aubrey has a moderate social disability, stephen maturin is 12 levels of actually and literally clinically insane. he is a danger to the general public, a radical, and luckily for jack he's just as obsessed with jack as jack is with him

jack never knows exactly what he's feeling until he's accidentally crushed his violin in his big hands: stephen maturin knows EXACTLY what he's feeling at all times and a lot of those feelings are just. superiority. lust (sex). lust (stimulants). hatred. lust (jack aubrey).

[bomberqueen17]

liveblogging the Aubreyad: a snippet from book 4

This is a long snippet that is totally incidental to the plot and does nothing but advance our knowledge of several characters, so of course I could not resist it. Mostly it is an excellent example of what a fucking troll Stephen is.

context: McAdam is the ship's surgeon on a vessel called Nereide, upon which Stephen is being transported to do some intelligence-work. McAdam is another Irishman, from Ulster, and a physician also, of high reputation but fallen on hard times-- his specialty is diseases of the mind, and he remains fascinated by psychological and psychiatric issues, but he himself is now deeply alcoholic to the point of frequent inability to function, though he maintains an unfortunate perspicacity in some matters that perhaps Stephen might wish he did not. He and Stephen do not really get along, and in fact the previous night he had upset Stephen severely. Stephen's good humor, severely tried by recent events, has been restored because he has just been summoned on deck by Nereide's solicitous captain, who is aware that Stephen is a passionate naturalist, to witness a mermaid, who was floating next to the ship as it passed.

McAdam looked singularly unappetizing in the morning light, ill-conditioned and surly: apprehensive too, for he had some confused recollection of harsh words having passed the night before. But, having beheld the mermaid, Stephen was in charity with all men, and he called out, "You missed the mermaid, my dear colleague; but perhaps, if we sit quietly here, we may see another." "I did not," said McAdam, "I saw the brute out of the quarter-gallery scuttle; and it was only a manatee." Stephen mused for a while, and then he said, "A dugong, surely. The dentition of the dugong is quite distinct from that of the manatee: the manatee, as I recall, has no incisors. Furthermore, the whole breadth of Africa separates their respective realms." "Manatee or dugong, 'tis all one," said McAdam. "As far as my studies are concerned, the brute is of consequence only in that it is the perfect illustration of the strength, the irresistible strength, of suggestion. Have you been listening to their gab, down there in the waist?" "Not I," said Stephen. There had been much talk among the men working just out of sight forward of the quarterdeck rail, cross, contentious talk; but the Nereide was always a surprisingly chatty ship, and apart from putting this outburst down to vexation at their late arrival, he had not attended to it. "They seem displeased, however," he added. "Of course they are displeased: everyone knows the ill-luck a mermaid brings. But that is not the point. Listen now, will you? That is John Matthews, a truthful, sober, well-judging man; and the other is old Lemon, was bred a lawyer's clerk, and understands evidence." Stephen listened, sorted out the voices, caught the thread of the argument: the dispute between Matthews and Lemon, the spokesmen of two rival factions, turned upon the question of whether the mermaid had held a comb in her hand or a glass. "They saw the flash of that wet flipper," said McAdam, and have translated it, with total Gospel-oath conviction, into one or other of these objects. Matthews offers to fight Lemon and any two of his followers over a chest in support of his belief.” “Men have gone to the stake for less," said Stephen: and walking forward to the rail he called down, "You are both of you out entirely: it was a hairbrush." Dead silence in the waist. The seamen looked at one another doubtfully, and moved quietly away among the boats on the booms with many a backward glance, thoroughly disturbed by this new element.

[sherlocks-freebitch]

*cocks pistol* Me and Stephen whenever anyone comes for Diana

[softly-and-suddenly]

I’ve folded to the pressure (from myself) and started reading Master and Commander. I’ve never seen the movie or anything so I went into it blind, and it slapped me in the face by instantaneously being one of the most charming books I’ve ever read.

The first thing that happens in the book is Jack Aubrey, a naval officer, is enjoying a concert so much that he starts tapping along to the beat. Some random guy next to him tells him to shut up and they almost get into an altercation over it. The next day, Jack gets made a captain and he is so over the moon about it that when he runs into that guy on the street, he apologizes and takes him to lunch. They become best friends within maybe an hour, and Jack asks him to join his crew as their surgeon after having known him less time than it takes to cook a turkey. It’s incredible. Patrick O’Brian you are a gentleman and a scholar

[cadmusfly]

Hi! Since you feel like an authority on Napoleonic era naval warfare, I have a question for you: do you have any good recs for paintings of British Navy ships from that era? My kid is obsessed with Hornblower and wants to learn to draw every type of ship he's commanded in the books, and since I know exactly 0 about British 19th century ships my googlings end up a little… lacking. So… any tips? :)

Hey! I’m very flattered but in no way am I an authority, that would be @ltwilliammowett who is an absolutely invaluable resource on the Age of Sail - but I can give you some recs!

First of all, this Wikipedia section on this page has a list of the various rates/types of ship during the Napoleonic Wars! I’ve only read the first few Hornblower book stuff, so I don’t know exactly which ships he’s associated with, but you can’t go wrong looking for references of sloops and frigates.

Then for paintings - historical artists, there’s Nicolas Pocock and Thomas Luny, you got J M W Turner, and for more modern artists, Geoff Hunt’s stuff is fantastic, Derek Gardner’s got cool stuff oo

Ooh nearly forgot Montague Dawson

I’ll throw this post into the Hornblower tag (and the Aubreyad tag as a fellow ship fandom) and see if anyone has any suggestions, but yeah, you and your kid sound awesome and I wish your kid the very best for his mission to catch all the prizes!

[k-she-rambles]

If you're intimidated by That Big Age of Sail Book Series, I'm reading it for the first time and it opens with two twenty-six year olds getting into a fistfight about who enjoys classical music most correctly

after which they become the kind of friends that would follow each other to the ends of the earth

[johannestevans]

Do u have any fiction, or recs for pirate media that involves the power dynamic of "normal" onship corperal pubishment

I wanna see people navigating getting beat

Hmm, The Terror obviously had it a bit, and there's a lot of it across the Aubreyad book series!

Not sure about pirate recs though, hopefully people will suggest in the replies!

[sherlocks-freebitch]

"I believe you are wrong in calling Sophie frigid. Certainly, when her mother is by, I think she would be a poor companion for a lively, eager man – indeed, Jack would never have got her into his bed at all if she had not run away in a ship, far from her mother’s eye. And then again I have it on the best authority that Jack is no artist in these matters. He can board and carry an enemy frigate with guns roaring and drums beating in a couple of minutes; but that is no way to give a girl much pleasure."

[midnightsnapdragon]

Forgive me for jumping onto your post, but if I may, I would argue that Stephen's closest counterpart in the Temeraire books is actually Tharkay! Temeraire has some of Stephen's exuberance regarding new experiences and the natural world, but Tharkay, like Stephen, is often described as sardonic and secretive; he too is a polyglot, an experienced traveller and a spy, who knows how people work and has grown cynical because of it. They reveal their personal motives and/or agendas only when it suits them or when they have no other choice (usually to the discomfort of their Forthright Blond Friend), and they rarely offer anything about themselves or their pasts of their own volition. Laurence and Temeraire are certainly the eponymous life companions of their series just as Jack and Stephen are of theirs, but their role as deuteragonists is where the similarities pretty much end.

That being said, Stephen as a gigantic murder lizard would have the time of his life dropping in on remote islands and unusual natural habitats in order to study the local flora and fauna, and he would have a million assistants to help him with the butterflies and insects his claws couldn't manage.

throwback to the time I was explaining the connection between the Aubreyad and Temeraire to a friend and they said oh yeah, Stephen Maturin should have a murder lizard, and I got to say no, no, you don't understand, Stephen Maturin is the murder lizard

[neosatsuma]

my favorite thing on earth is when he gets crabby about nautical nonsense he's my SPECIALEST little creature

[cadmusfly]

master and commander X blade runner

(bsky source)

[tatzelwyrm]

sorry we trapped your boyfriend in the year 1812. yeah he’ll have to do adventures for probably 3 years worth of 1812.

[thesconesyard]

@jamestranskirk

You mean this whole shelf on my bookcase? That I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve read through?

I’m SO glad to know someone else who likes them!!

I might or might not have just downloaded the entire aubreyad + the terror + a bunch of non-fiction books about seafaring and put them all in a big folder 👀

[heathcliffgirl1847]

[sherlocks-freebitch]

“This is a cocoa-ship, sir; though tea is countenanced.’‘

Coffee relaxes the fibres,’ called out the Thunderer’s surgeon in an authoritative voice. ‘I always recommend cocoa.’

‘Coffee?’ cried Captain Fellowes. ‘Would the gentleman like coffee? Featherstonehaugh, run along and see whether the wardroom or the gunroom has any.’

‘Coffee relaxes the fibres,’ said the surgeon again, rather louder. ‘That is a scientific fact.’

‘Perhaps the Doctor might like to have his fibres relaxed,’ said Captain Dundas. ‘I am sure I should, having stood to all night.’