Pirates & Privateers: Books for Adults~Art, Music, Poetry, & Stories

Cover Art: Last of the
Great Swashbucklers

The Last of the Great Swashbucklers: A Bio-Bibliography of Rafael Sabatini
by Jesse F. Knight and Stephen Darley
Oak Knoll Press, 2010, ISBN 978-1-58456-279-5, US $65.00

Although Captain Blood and Errol Flynn first introduced me to Rafael Sabatini’s work while in high school, I discovered many of his other titles while perusing the shelves of a bookstore during my college days. I bought all of them, and while I read each one, only a few remained favorites. Sabatini, however, became one of my preferred writers of historical fiction, for he had a gift of sweeping me off to the past where I experienced many swashbuckling adventures.

The Last of the Great Swashbucklers is both a biography and a bibliography of Sabatini’s novels. Knight, an ardent admirer of this author’s writing and founder of the Rafael Sabatini Society, writes the thirty-page biography that examines the Sabatini’s life from birth through death, as well as the various experiences that influence his writing. The biography is entertaining, captivating, and informative from beginning to end.

Stephen Darley has compiled a comprehensive list of Sabatini’s published books, both in the UK and USA. It is primarily aimed at bibliophiles, book dealers, and readers interested in the first editions of these forty-seven books. The bibliography is chronological, beginning with The Lovers of Yvonne in 1902 and ending with The Sword of Islam and Other Tales of Adventure in 2008. Each entry provides information on the title page, contents, binding, dust jacket, printing, and notes for each edition. Some include pictures of the cover art.

At the end of the main bibliography, “Books by Sabatini,” Darley includes:

Checklist of Selected US and UK Reprints
Checklist of Significant Books in Paperback
Checklist of Fiction and Non-Fiction Contributions to Books
Checklist of Periodicals or Books Concerning Rafael Sabatini
Checklist of Uncollected Short Stories in Magazines
Movies Made from Sabatini’s Books
Plays Written by Sabatini or Adapted from His Books
Identifying UK and US First Editions Published before 1921

The book also includes an index.

The Last of the Great Swashbucklers isn’t for everyone, but those who enjoy Sabatini’s swashbuckling adventures – some piratical, some not – and those who are serious collectors and students of his work, will find a treasure trove of information about both his life and his writings.

Read an excerpt and view pictures

Pirate Arrrt!
by Rob Mcleay
Ulysses Press, 2008, ISBN 978-1-56975-663-8, US $14.95

Subtitled “Learn to Draw Fantastic Pirates, Treasure Chests, Ships, Sea Monsters and More,” this book provides insight into drawing pirates, their enemies, extras, and the pirate world. Mcleay opens with directions on perspective, generating ideas, and basics that a potential artist needs in order to follow Pirate Arrrt! instructions. In chapter two, he covers facial expressions, heads, and character angles, while the next chapter focuses on the various crew members that populate a pirate ship. Among the enemies, you’ll find cannibals, members of the royal navy, magpies, sea monsters, zombie monkeys, and skeletons. The chapter on extras includes treasure chests, jewelry, weapons, faces and hair, hooks, eye patches, peg legs, and tattoos. The final chapter explores features of pirate havens, such as forts, dungeons, islands, and ports. While many drawings appear in black-&-white, two spreads of color depict finished pirate artwork.

This book is geared toward people with a serious interest in an art career rather than children or doodlers. It’s advertised as being for children, but the audience is more for young adult or adult because of the language and complexity of the designs. The reader needs to have some familiarity with drawing before opening this book, but those artists who do will find a chest full of treasure to help them draw delightful rogues and their world.

Pirate Fever!
by Eleyne Austen Sharp
Austen Sharp, 2007, ISBN 978-0-9652589-5-5, US $10.95

Subtitled “The Buccaneer’s Guide to Tales, Trails, and Treasure in North America,” this book is a compendium of pirate biographies, films and books on piracy, hosting a buccaneer bash, and ports of call. The author does warn that “While e’ery attempt has been made t’ ensure accurate information . . . dealin’ wi’ pirates means yer bloody likely t’ get some exaggerated tales, due t’ thar legendary consumption o’ rum.” She also provides readers with a glossary of contractions she uses throughout the text, for it has a definite piratical flavoring to it.

After a brief introduction to piracy, she presents sixteen of the more infamous rogues. Among these are Henry Avery, Samuel Bellamy, Cheng I Sao, Jean Laffite, Grace O’Malley, and Thomas Tew. The usual felons of the golden age are also included. “The Fever Spreads” includes lists of films and books, as well as the actors who have played famous swashbucklers, such as Captain Blood and Captain Jack Sparrow. There are also articles on pirates in cyberspace and shipwrecks and treasure. Often forgotten, but equally important, are those who entertain us – re-enactors, tour guides, DJs, ship modelers, singers, historians – and an interview with Ol’ Chumbucket and Cap’n Slappy who made September 19th famous.

“Buccaneer Bash” explains how to throw the best pirate party. One begins with the outfit and the language. Next come recipes for grog, hard tack, salmagundi, and Mother Bluebeard’s famous scurvy meat pie. For entertainment, Sharp provides the words to several sea shanties and some dreadful pirate jokes. The final section of the book provides regional information for American and Canadian piratical attractions, events, organizations, and treasure quests. Each grouping begins with real pirates of the region. Black-&-white photographs abound and a list of resources and an index complete the book.

Once you get the hang of pirate speak, this is an entertaining book. What sets it apart from others is the ingredients for a swashbuckling party and where to go for pirate fun. There are a few errors – such as Stede Bonnet’s death date (December, not 10 November 1718), William Kidd never confessed to any wrongdoing, a fair portion of Laffite’s biography, and Mary Read wed a soldier rather than a sailor – one must remember that Pirate Fever! is written in a somewhat tongue-in-cheek way to amuse and fascinate the reader. Nor is it a history book. Rather it is a fast-paced and rousing introduction to the golden age of piracy with information for anyone who wants to become a pirate or wants to learn where other pirates can be found.

Cover
Art: Pirate Ghosts & Phantom
Ships

Pirate Ghosts & Phantom Ships
by Thomas D’Agostino
Schiffer Publishing, 2008, ISBN 978-0-7643-2744-5, US $14.95

It’s said that pirates laugh in the face of death. They understand their lives tend to be short and merry. But what about after they die? Some, apparently, don’t find restful repose. They continue to haunt the places where they perpetrated their crimes, and the islands and coast of New England seem to be particular favorites for these eerie specters. Sometimes, though, it’s not the ghosts that appear, but rather apparitions of sailing ships lost at sea. This collection of stories introduces readers to legendary hauntings, such as the Screeching Lady of Marblehead, Don Pedro and Ocean Born Mary, the ghostly crew of Charles Haskell, and Samuel Bellamy and Maria Hallett.

Only a few of these tales will be known to most readers, which make them fresh and all the more eerie. Black-&-white photographs show where the sightings take place, and the fact that the author visited each one adds a touch of realism that makes you think twice about going yourself. Pirate Ghosts & Phantom Ships is perfect for reading and sharing on a dark and stormy night where a flash of light sends shivers up your spine or a loud clap makes you jump. Do you dare?

Pirate Haiku: Bilge-sucking Poems of Booty, Grog, and Wenches for Scurvy Sea Dogs
by Michael P. Spradlin
Adams Media, 2010, ISBN 978-1-4405-0983-4, US $9.95 / CAN $10.99

Long after a ship goes aground on a primitive island 300 miles from Japan, researchers comb the island for archaeological treasure. They find little of value until they stumble upon a buried box containing gold doubloons, a rusty cutlass, and a journal bound in leather. On further examination this last item belongs to a famous pirate known as One-Leg Sterling, who preyed during the “Golden Age of Buccaneers.” Such discoveries are rare indeed, but this is doubly so because he wrote all his entries in haiku!

These haiku are arranged into eight sections, each detailing some aspect of Sterling’s life and adventures.

Part One: A Pirate’s Life for Me
Part Two: Rum and Grog
Part Three: On the Spanish Main
Part Four: Wenches
Part Five: In the South Pacific
Part Six: Pirates V. Ninjas
Part Seven: Alone on an Island
Part Eight: Crack On, Mateys

The sections are self explanatory, except for the last, which recounts what happens to Sterling when those aboard Black Thunder, a pirate ship, rescue him from an uncharted island. The subtitle – Bilge-sucking Poems of Booty, Grog, and Wenches for Scurvy Sea Dogs – succinctly epitomizes the rest of the content, which is rich in historical pirate detail mixed with a few myths.

With a minimum of words, Spradlin deftly conveys what life was like for a pirate from his earliest days to his last. There is some humor, some raunchiness, but overall this is an entertaining, short read laced with just enough realism to make anyone interested in poetry and pirates realize they’ve unearthed a real treasure.

Special Note: Some content in this book makes it unsuitable for children, so adult pirates should read it before offering it to pirate apprentices.

Meet the author

Review Copyright ©2010 Cindy Vallar

Cover
Art: Pirates, Ghosts, and Coastal
Lore

Pirates, Ghosts, and Coastal Lore: The Best of Judge Whedbee
by Charles Harry Whedbee
John F. Blair, 2004, ISBN 0-89587-295-1, US $13.95

Before books, people told stories that were passed down from one generation to the next. Sometimes these tales were told around campfires at night, when the listener’s imagination conjured up pictures of ghosts and things that go bump in the night. Those with the gift of storytelling captivated their audience and imparted vivid portrayals that haunted long after the story ends. Judge Whedbee was such a storyteller.

This collection features thirteen of his memorable stories, tales of the Outer Banks of North Carolina he first heard as a child. The pirates include Blackbeard, Edward Low, Anne Bonny, and Mary Read. The ghosts feature Virginia Dare and the Lost Colonists of Roanoke Island, fishermen from Portsmith Town, a cemetery with a bleeding arch, and the daughter of a pirate who disappears on her wedding day. The other stories concern a porpoise turned pilot, a slave who fights for America’s freedom, a flaming ship, the sand dollar, and a Tuscarora brave who saves his enemy.

As you read these tales, it is as if Judge Whedbee stands before you telling them himself, painting eerie pictures of times long ago, of restless spirits forever caught between the world of the living and that of the dead. Entertaining, spooky, thought provoking, endearing. A delight for young and old alike.

Cover
Art: Pirates, Patriots, &
Princesses

Pirates, Patriots, and Princesses: The Art of Howard Pyle
edited by Jeff A. Menges
Dover, 2006, ISBN 0-486-44832-0, US $15.95 / CAN $23.95

Born to a Quaker family in Delaware in 1853, Howard Pyle became an accomplished artist whose works continue to inspire and astound. He also wrote and illustrated historical novels and stories. Eventually, he opened his own school of art, and some of his students achieved equal success. Some of his most revealing paintings are of pirates, whom he portrayed with realism and authenticity rarely achieved before. Howard Pyle’s Book of Pirates, first published in 1921 and still in print, was often the first book that introduced many children to buccaneers . Pyle drew many other pictures of historical subjects, medieval knights, and creatures from fantasy and myth.

This book, which provides a brief introduction to the artist and each group of paintings, gathers some of Pyle’s most famous and lesser-known works into one book. Jeff Menges is particularly adept at succinctly showing why Pyle is so skilled at drawing what he does. The text makes fascinating reading, but the pictures in this collection will entertain the reader for hours. This worthy addition to any piratical collection will soon become cherished like treasure itself.

Fans of pirate art will enjoy these works of art:

Walking the Plank, 1887
The Combatants Cut and Slashed with Savage Fury, 1894
How the Buccaneers Kept Christmas, 1899
Kidd on the Deck of the “Adventure Galley,” 1902
Extorting Tribute from the Citizens, 1905
The Buccaneer Was a Picturesque Fellow, 1905
So the Treasure Was Divided, 1905
An Attack on a Galleon, 1905
Captain Keitt, 1907
Marooned, 1887 and 1909

Review Copyright ©2006 Cindy Vallar

Writing Pirates: Vernacular Fiction and Oceans in Late Ming China
by Yuanfei Wang
University of Michigan, 2021, ISBN 978-0-472-03851-0, US $29.95
Also available in other formats

In 1827, the German writer Goethe coined the phrase “world literature.” One might think this referred to literature written in all countries; in reality, he had a narrower perspective: books translated into European languages and in which the characters sailed from European ports to visit other locales.

This narrow Western view also pertains to colonial expansion. During the Ming dynasty, many Chinese emigrate and establish communities elsewhere in Asia. Such diasporas aren’t state-sponsored as they are in the West. Key to such expansion is the ocean, for conveyance to other locations often involves the maritime world. Trade is a key component of that during this time period, despite the Ming government’s occasional sea bans prohibiting foreign trade. When these occur, legitimate merchant traders turn to piracy and smuggling to conduct business.

The author combines these two themes – piracy and colonialism – to study Ming literature published for the general public as opposed to more formal writings meant for the educated class. Her purpose is to show that these 16th- and 17th-century offerings provide fresh perspectives and new ways of looking at Chinese literature and the Chinese way of life. This period is one of upheaval and terror, but it also produces a wide offering of unofficial histories, vernacular fiction, and regional depictions of confrontations at sea and Chinese communities in places like Siam, Japan, and Korea.

The book is divided into three parts: Southeast Asia, Japan, and Jiangnan, China. Each of these has two chapters that examine how the writers depict Chinese culture and race within those regions and among the pirates found there. Literary passages are provided in both English and Chinese. Color illustrations are found throughout the book. There are also footnotes and an index. At the end of her conclusion, the author poses questions geared toward future studies.

One of this book’s strengths is the author’s understanding of piracy. She makes it clear from the start that words and images most readers use to identify pirates do not equate to those found in Asian waters. At the same time, she shows common threads to demonstrate parallels between Western and Eastern literature. Her approach is twofold: to emphasize the importance of history and to show how depictions of that history change over time.

Writing Pirates is an interesting and eye-opening look at an often-studied historical period but from a different perspective. Although some familiarity with Asian piracy may be helpful, it’s not essential. While Writing Pirates is a bountiful and valuable treasure for any academic library where literature and piracy are popular fields of study, this book has a limited audience because it is a scholarly work. Since it is a study of vernacular literature, Writing Pirates would gain a wider and equally appreciative audience if there were also a version written for the general public.