Really wicked links follow: it’s easier to put them in a comment than get the fancy-shmancy link button to work in the regular post.
how to waste time
by CJ | Jun 5, 2010 | Journal | 52 comments
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I Love Bleach! Thank you for sharing Hakuouki Shinsengumi Kitan. I watched an episode this morning and I’m hooked. It’s been awhile since I’ve found a new anime. Not since Bleach, actually.
According to what C.S. Forester wrote, when a Royal Navy warship was in home port, wives were permitted aboard to be with their husbands. However, they had to share the same hammock space as their husband. Many of the women aboard were not actually married, but the Navy’s stance was, if she say’s she’s his wife, she’s his wife.
Since the seamen’s sleeping space was on the gun deck, at times, one of the women might go into labor and give birth between the guns. Hence the term “Son of a gun”.
Medical technology in those days was poor, the surgeon usually no more than a butcher, and usually not that good even at that trade. The wounded and sick were kept in the lowest deck – the orlop – and it was dark, hot, stuffy, and you just never could say whether a particular wounded man would recover or not. Nowadays, we have blood typing, screening, anesthesia, diagnostic tools that can do what one of those surgeons wouldn’t even have imagined. But for all of that, a spherical piece of iron weighing 32 pounds and hurtling at you at over 900 feet per second will put all of that as useless.
As I recall, there was 18 inches hammock space per crewman—in shifts. Most of the ladies would not possibly fit within that space. I have a feeling that the various decks of His Majesty’s Ship were awash in petticoats and indecorous acts until the arrival of the ship’s higher officers made all these things disappear. I have always envisioned the boatswain’s pipe salute having the specific purpose of sending the visitors and salesmen over the larboard side like a living tide as the captain arrived on the starboard.
“Mr. Bosun, why is the ship heeling over at anchor?”
“Ah sir, that’s probably the vermin departing from your August Presence over the far side of the ship.”
*large rustlings as a tide of unauthorized people flee over the gunwales*
Heyer fans and Napoleonic wars fans should not miss The Spanish Bride, based on the true story of Juana Smith, rescued from marauding soldiers during the sack of a city after a siege and married by Captain Harry Smith. She subsequently accompanied her husband throughout the rest of the Peninsular Campaign.
Vanity Fair is one of the great Waterloo novels; An Infamous Army by Miss Heyer is interesting because most if not all of Wellington is based upon his dispatches.
I loved Infamous Army, as well as Spanish Bride. I was delighted to learn that Juana and Harry were TRUE. I haven’t gotten very far into My Lord John. It is heavy going compared to Cotillion, and so on. I have several Heyers on my Kindle, so feel I have some insurance against being far away from my shelves with no books to hand. Heyer reminds me in a back door way of O’Brian (and of course O’Brian reminds me in turn of Foreigner etc).
Alas, I am now in Rome for a few days on a business trip, and I have lost my Iphone with the kindle app, didn’t bring my kindle, and HAVE NOTHING TO READ!! the horror, the horror.
@kokipy: Did you convert the epub format to Mobi on Calibre? Or, to ask my question another way – Does Sourcebooks (with the Heyer ebooks available) use epub with or without DRM.
Lord John is a scholarly book, not a regency romance. She had a vast research library on the period. Her website is: http://www.georgette-heyer.com .
If I were to try one of the Trollope’s out on Gutenberg (and doesn’t that sound like I am looking for a “date”?), which would people recommend as a good starting point to see if I like him?
I gave Barchester Towers an initial read, first half dozen pages, and I can at least report I wanted to keep reading.
I read them many years ago and have them on my Kindle along with the Pallisers.
Gutenberg and internet archive both have a read on line option, which is pretty handy
for taking a look at things you are not sure you want to grab a copy for later.
If you like complex period stuff, since the thread is about wasting time, try Thomas
Carlyle 22 volumes Frederick the Great of Prussia, the 2 volume Wilhelmina of Bayreuth
memoir about him (he was baby brother). Next the published diplomatic material that
caused the pre-emptive strike on Austria (7 years war). The piece de resistance to
end it is Fredericks instructions to his generals and his orders for lower officers.
The last is just as good as Niccolos take on diplomacy, but it is done by a master
of the art of warfare.
Carlyle is heavy going because of his literary method, but it is a fascinating look
at an amazing character who had some of the main players in early enlightenment
thought around his dinner table. So if you can’t waste time with these 26 Volumes
you’ll have to wait for the TV version…GRIN
Just for fun check out TanithLee.com for the photo of her poolboy pirate capn.
@tulrose: no, I just bought the Heyers from Amazon’s kindle store. They are republishing new editions of her books, and I expect the kindle versions were part of that initiative.
I second CJ’s commendation of Barchester Towers. It is the first of a series set in Trollope’s fictional county of Barchester. There is another series with some of the same characters set at times in Barchester called the Palliser novels, which have to do with politics. And if you like them, it is then fun to read the books of Angela Thirkell, a great niece or something of Kiplings if I recall correctly, who wrote about 35 comedies of manners set in 20th century Barsetshire county, using as her many of her characters descendents of Trollope’s people.
Ah, yes, why is a lavatory on a naval ship called “the head”? Because in the days of wooden ships and iron men, you sat on a seat hanging over the side at the bow of the ship. Hence, you were at the “head” of the ship, and anything you “dropped” overboard had best be on the leeward side of the ship, or the first lieutenant would have you cleaning up the side. Not a fun proposition in a ship 213 feet long, with a pitching, rolling, and yawing motion, plus the sea state could be hazardous, too.
CJ, you are correct, each seaman had 18 inches of hammock space. The midshipmen had roughly the same, with the other warrant officers, such as the surgeon, the carpenter, sailmaker, cooper, purser, etc., having their berths in the gunroom, the lieutenants having separate berths in the wardroom, and the captain having his cabin at the stern, unless there was a flag officer aboard, in which case, the captain would usually take over the first lieutenant’s berth, and it would “roll downhill”, so to speak.
Days late to this discussion, but I can’t let posts on anime go by without putting in my two cents. 🙂
Not yet mentioned: Loveless, Deathnote, and for something laugh-out-loud funny, Ghost Stories, but only in English. (The Japanese version is boring and pedestrian, but the English voice actors and writers had a *LOT* of fun.) And personally, I really liked Mythical Detective Loki Ragnarok, especially at the end, when I realized every episode had been linked thematically to the overall story arc.
And I hope to GOD I’m near the end of the freakin’ Bount series in Bleach. I’m bored out of my mind. I’m guessing the next four discs (The Assault) are part of the Bount series (alas), but after that the discs are labeled The Arrancar, so I hope we’re going to get back to the real story soon…
The Bount arc is slow and, yes, boring, and every time we rerun the series we do a lot of solitaire-playing through those. The Arrancar arc is very good at the start, but this is where they overran the writer’s speed, and ended up breaking off the arc and re-starting—which is a crying shame, because it was equal to the orginial Rukia-rescue arc, until they began padding episodes with rerun, and other tricks to try to slow down Finally they broke off and went off on other stories, some of which are quite good; but it’s my understanding they did get back to the Arrancar…I hope. We haven’t had time to catch up, but I’d like to..
Sigh. Well, at least I’ve been forewarned this time. I started the Bount series thinking, “You know, I don’t remember reading any of this. Is this filler?” I had no idea it was going to go on for S-O-O-O L-O-O-O-O-N-G. Maybe I should have just skipped it. (I think I might recommend that to others, actually. Just skip the whole Bount thing.)
I suppose since the series is still being written (thank you online fansubbers!) it may still be awhile before they can wrap up the anime. It does look like we’re nearing the end of the manga, though, so here’s hoping!! And the manga storyline right now is pretty darn awesome too. 🙂
It’s really a shame that this keeps happening to anime, where they catch up the manga and have to strike off on their own. It happened with Hellsing, it happened with Inuyasha, it happened with Rurouni Kenshin. Kenshin was dragged down into the mud, which was a real shame since the final manga story arc was amazing and would have made a fantastic anime, but the fillers had destroyed the series and no one would touch it anymore. Loveless was smart and just stopped when they caught up. I’m hoping one day they finish it, once the manga is done. They finally finished Inuyasha, after a two-year (?) hiatus waiting for the manga to finish.
I gotta stop now. I can go on and on and on about anime and manga. I’m a relatively recent convert so it’s still all new and shiny to me.