Other editions of book Two Years Before the Mast: A Personal Narrative of Life at Sea

Excerpt from Two Years Before the Mast: A Personal NarrativeAfter twenty-eight years, the copyright of this book verted to me. In presenting the first author's edition to the public, I have been encouraged to add an account of a visit to the old scenes, made twenty-four years after, together with no tions of the subsequent story and fate of the vessels, and of some of the persons with whom the reader is made acquainted.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Two Years Before the Mast is a memoir by the American author Richard Henry Dana Jr., published in 1840, having been written after a two-year sea voyage from Boston to California on a merchant ship starting in 1834. A film adaptation under the same name was released in 1946.BackgroundWhile an undergraduate at Harvard College, Dana had an attack of the measles which affected his vision. Thinking it might help his sight, Dana left Harvard to enlist as a common sailor on a voyage around Cape Horn on the brig Pilgrim. He returned to Massachusetts two years later, aboard the Alert (which left California sooner than the Pilgrim).He kept a diary throughout the voyage, and, after returning, he wrote a recognized American classic, Two Years Before the Mast, published in 1840

Richard Henry Dana dropped out of school and became an ordinary deckhand on the brig Pilgrim. The perilous journey from Boston, begun in 1834, took the ailing yet determined youth past Cape Horn and around the Americas, concluding in the Mexican territory California. This expedition inspired Two Years before the Mast, a first-hand account of "the life of a common sailor" a work that combines history, philosophy, and personal experience.

An unparalleled account of merchant men at sea in the early 19th centuryThis is a well known book with a familiar title. Its contents are probably less known to many. It is the account of one young man's experiences serving on board a sailing brig-the Penelope-bound for California, between the years1834-36.What makes it exceptional is not that it is the literary effort of a common seamen of the time-though they are rare enough-but that it is quite the opposite. Dana came from a well-established middle class American family whose patriarchs had practised law since early colonial days. Dana too was highly educated and destined-if by tradition rather than temperament-for the same path. Sickness struck him down while a Harvard student and a 'kill or cure' experience was deemed to be his only chance of salvation. So it was that an articulate and literate man was able to leave posterity an account of the life of ordinary seamen in the great days of sail that has few peers. A classic book for all those fascinated by the sea and seamanship in days gone by.

n 1834, Richard Henry Dana, Jr., was just nineteen years old when he abandoned his life as a Harvard student to enlist as a seaman. Here is the awe-inspiring account of his travels from Boston, around Cape Horn, and to the California coast — an astonishing personal narrative brimming with unforgettable views of an arduous voyage. Vivid descriptions of fierce storms, close encounters with whales, bone-wrenching labor, and the ship's cruel captain mingle with discoveries of magical beauty and fascinating historical detail, including a rare portrait of California before the gold rush. Originally written to expose "the life of a common sailor at sea as it really is," Dana's Two YearsBefore the Mast quickly became an American classic of maritime adventure. Crackling with realism, it remains one of the most eloquent and insightful depictions of life at sea in the early nineteenth century.