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 Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 11:53 am Post subject: Gambles at Sea |
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WELCOME!
Gambles at Sea:
Horatio Hornblower
The Complete Adventures
DVD
| Quote: | This series is an excellent production based on C.S. Forster's wonderful books about the rise of a shy, homely midshipman in Nelson's navy, but it's Cardiff heartthrob Ioan Gruffud who puts the foam on top.
In the first episode entitled, The Duel, midshipman Hornblower inspects the crew and discovers a man whose face is lacerated following a night of vigorous rat-baiting. |
| Quote: | Hornblower: Styles, sir. What's the matter with your face?
Finch: Oooh, he gets bit---- (Matthews elbows Finch in the ribs).
Styles: Boils, sir. Awful bad.
Hornblower: Have you done anything about them?
Styles: Oh, yes, sir.
Hornblower: Well?
Styles: I've put plasters on them, sir.
Hornblower: Very well...What's funny, Oldroyd?
Oldroyd: Nothing, sir.
Hornblower: Mathews?
Mathews: Nothing, sir.
Hornblower: All right. Carry on. About your work, now.
Styles: Aye, aye, sir. |
But later on, below deck:
| Quote: | Oldroyd: Time, Styles! Aye. I have five [rats] dead. Pay all bets, evens or better.
Styles: Six.
Oldroyd: Five.
Several men: There, that one's dead!
Oldroyd: Oh, no, he ain't! Come on.
Styles: Look! Yes he is. Back's broken.
Hornblower: Who's in charge here?
Styles: We're not on watch, sir.
Hornblower: No, you're gambling. |
| Quote: | | Of course, Hornblower is somewhat hard-pressed to say much on the matter. He is himself a quietly astute card player and frequently visits the tables to supplement a reduced seamen's income during peacetimes. |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 11:59 am Post subject: |
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The Complete Short Stories of W. Somerset Maugham
Volume II (of 2)
The World Over
Hardcover
| Quote: | | I am not a bad sailor and when under stress of weather the game broke up I did not go below. We were in the habit of playing poker into the small hours, a mild game that could hurt nobody, but it had been blowing all day and with nightfall the wind strengthened to half a gale. One or two of our bunch admitted that they felt none too comfortable and one or two others played with unwonted detachment. But even if you are not sick dirty weather at sea is an unpleasant thing. I hate the fool who tells you he loves a storm amd tramping the deck lustily vows that it can never be too rough for him. When the woodwork groans and creaks, glasses crash to the floor and you lurch in your chair as against the side, I very much prefer dry land. I think no one was sorry when one of the players said he had had enough, and the last round of jack pots was agreed to without demur. I remained alone in the smoking-room, for I knew I should not easily get to sleep in that racket and I could not read in bed with any comfort when the North Pacific kept dashing itself against my portholes. I shuffled together the two packs we had been playing with and set out a complicated patience. (From Straight Flush at p. 149). |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 12:06 pm Post subject: |
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The Volcano Lover
A Romance
Paperback
By Susan Sontag
| Quote: | | Editor's Note: The art history lovers' guide to Nelson, British naval great, who did the dirty on both his wife and poor Emma Hamilton, who died an impoverished, addicted whore. |
| Quote: | The Cavaliere knew what she was up to when she played faro and hazard late into the night and began to count on her success, which made it grueling for him either to watch her or ignore her. He despised anything imploring in himself: on these evenings he usually retired early. The [b]hero remained by her side, whispered in her ear, beamed when she won, staked her to another game when she lost. [/b]How brilliantly she played, win or lose, thought the hero. No one would even have a chance against her were it not for an endearing frailty that sometimes made her a bit muddled. He had noticed she became tipsy after the second glass of brandy. How odd, he thought. If he drank two glasses of brandy, he was not affected. As indifferent to drink as he was to cards (the hero was almost as abstemious as the Cavaliere), he didn't understand that the rapidity with which she became drunk was a sign not of an unusual susceptibility but of advanced alcoholism.
She is a gifted player, but sometimes continues after a steady run of good fortune, risking her precious winnings, so as to keep him near. For she is never so muddled as to forget his electric presence beside her, or behind her, or across a room talking, gesturing, and, in fact, as aware of her as she is of him. (-- pgs. 236-237) |
More on the truly contemptible private Nelson:
Smithsonian
Magazine Subscription
Lord Nelson Hero...Cad!
A cache of recently discovered letters darkens the British naval warrior's honor and enhances that of his long-suffering wife, Frances
By Michael Ryan
February, 2004
| Quote: | | What made the hero such a scoundrel? "Fanny was devoted to her husband and extremely solicitous of his health and welfare, but ultimately not in the way he craved," says Pieter van der Merwe. "My theory is that Nelson remained in many respects a small boy from a large family who lost his mother very young and spent his life searching for a source of uncritical love. He was almost entirely disappointed in finding it in Fanny, but he found it in Emma." (Final paragraph at p. 75) |
The Volcano Lover
Audio Cassette Only!
| Quote: | | We were unable to find even a review of this audio book. We'll keep trying. It's such great historical fiction based on the story of one of Britain's greatest heroes that it's worth a deeper search. Recommended only to very advanced ESL students, though. Susan Sontag's text is simply baroque with period detail. Please check back soon for updates |
That Hamilton Woman
DVD
| Quote: | | Laurence Olivier (as he then was) and Vivien Leigh show the Yanks how onscreen romance ought to look. Black and white with plenty of sparks. |
Link to this entry
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 12:09 pm Post subject: |
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The Angel's Command
Hardcover
By Brian Jacques
| Quote: | Ned began tugging Ben toward the table, passing a message. "Let's see if we can't pick up a coin or two over yonder."
The crews of two pirate ships, the Diable Del Mar and La Petite Marie, were watching their captains gambling. Rocco Madrid, master of the Diablo, was winning, and Raphael Thuron, master of La Petite Marie, was losing, heavily. Rocco's sword, a fine blade of Toledo steel with a silver basketed handle, lay on the table. Behind it was an ever-growing pile of gold coins from many nations. The Spanish captain played idly with his long, grey-streaked black curls, smiling thinly as he watched Thuron. "Make your choice, amigo, where is the pea?"
Sighing heavily, Thuron looked from the dwindling pile of coins, which were stacked behind the blade of his cutlass on the opposite side of the table. He bit his lip and concentrated his gaze on the three walnut shells, while Rocco Madrid drummed his fingers on the tabletop.
"I am not hurrying you, amigo. Shall I take my siesta while you try to find our little friend the pea, eh?"
The Diablo's crew chuckled appreciatively at their captain's witty observation. The more gold Thuron lost, the slower and more deliberate he became.
The French captain spoke without looking up from the three nutshells. "Huh, the little pea might be your friend, but she's no friend o' mine, not after ten losses in a row!"
Rocco twirled his waxed moustache, enjoying his opponent's discomfiture. "Who knows, the little pea, she might change her mind and fall in love with you. Choose, amigo."
Thuron made a snap decision. He turned up the shell that lay in the centre of the three. It was empty, no pea lay under it. A cheer went up from the Diablo's crew, and groans from men of La Petite Marie. Thuron separated five stacks of gold coins from his meagre pile, swiping them toward the Spaniard with the back of his hand. (From the chapter, La Petite Marie, at pgs. 9-10) |
Lovable Liverpudlian Jacques leaves his famous rodents to their abbey holes this time for a journey along the ancient path of ill-fated sailors:
| Quote: | | The legend of the Flying Dutchman is known to all men who follow the seafaring trade. Captain Vanderdecken and his ghostly crew, bound by heaven's curse to sail the world's vast oceans and seas, for etermity! The curse was delivered by the angel of the Lord, who descended from the firmament to the very deck of the doomed vessel. Vanderdecken and his evil crew were bound, both living and dead, to an endless voyage. Only two were to escape the Flying Dutchman - a mute, ragged orphan boy, Ben, and his faithful dog, Ned. They were the only two aboard who were pure of heart, innocent of all wickedness. (From the opening page) |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 12:22 pm Post subject: |
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Malachy McCourt's History of Ireland
Hardcover
By Malachy McCourt
| Quote: | Now, the status of women in medieval Gaelic Ireland was hardly a grand one; they were defined by their relationship to men -- some man's daughter or some man's wife. They did, however, have certain rights that their counterparts in England and Europe did not, dealing with ownership of property. A married woman in Gaelic society retained her property - in most European cultures ownership was transferred to the husband - as well as retained her maiden name. This right of ownership would be the subject of some of Granuaile's greatest and serious battles.
...That Granuaile was her own person there is little doubt. She hadly fit the mold of the traditional Gaelic woman. She had a penchant for swearing, a reputation for being sexually adventurous, was known for her violent temper, and had an apparent fondness for gambling. She did not wrap herself in a pan-Gaelic/Irish flag - indeed that would been impossible for it was the very independence and disunited nature of the Gaelic order that brought about its downfall. Like all those around her, Granuaile acted solely to ensure her own survival and the survival of her family, as long as the two did not interfere. When one of her sons joined with her archenemy Bingham, she quickly made war against him! In fact, the tales that have come down through tradition aver that Granuaile was often "warring" while twice in official English records it is calculated that by 1593 she had been "warring" for more than forty years. (I truly love this woman's boldness. What her enemies called "piracy" and "treason" Granuaile described to Elizabeth I herself as her "maintenance by land and sea.") (From Chapter XI, Grace O'Malley - Granuaile, p. 120-122) |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 12:26 pm Post subject: |
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Contemporary Irish Poetry
An Anthology
Hardcover
Edited by Anthony Bradley
| Quote: | New Territory
Several things announed the fact to us:
The captain's Spanish tears
Falling like doubloons in the headstrong light,
And then of course the fuss --
The crew jostling and interspersing cheers
with wagers. Overnight
As we went down to our cabins, nursing the last
Of the grog, talking as usual of conquest,
Land hove into sight.
Frail compasses and trenchant consellations
Brought us as far as this,
And now air and water, fire and earth
Stand at their given stations
Out there, and are ready to replace
This single desperate width
Of ocean. Why do we hesitate? Water and air
And fire and earth and therefore life are here,
And therefore death.
Out of the dark man comes to life and into it
He goes and loves and dies,
(His element being the dark and not the light of day)
So the ambitious wit
Of poets and exploring ships have been his eyes -
Riding the dark for joy -
And so Isaiah of the sacred text is eagle-eyed because
By peering down the unlit centuries
He glimpsed the holy boy.
(Eavan Boland, pgs. 343-344) |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 12:32 pm Post subject: |
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New Yorker
Magazine Subscription
Goodbye, Columbus
When America won its independence, what became of the slaves who fled for theirs?
By Jill Lepore
| Quote: | Born on the Gambia River around 1740, not far from where he would one day die, Harry Washington (see Fleeing the Founding Father by Cassandra Pybus March 16/06) was sold into slavery sometime before 1763. Twelve years later, in November, 1775, he was grooming his master's horses in the stables at Mount Vernon when the royal governor of Virginia, Lord Dunmore, offered freedom to any slaves who would join His Majesty's troops in suppressing the American rebellion. That December, George Washington, commanding the Continental Army in Cambridge, received a report that Dunmore's proclamation had stirred the passions of his own slaves. "There is not a man of them but would leave us if they believed they could make the escape," a cousin of Washington's from Mount Vernon, adding bitterly, "Liberty is sweet." In August of 1776, just a month after delegates to the Continental Congress determined that in the course of human events it sometimes becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the bands that have connected them with another, Harry Washington declared his own independence by running away to fight with Dunmore's all-black British regiment, wearing a uniform embroidered with the motto, "Liberty to Slaves." Liberty may not have been as sweet as he'd hoped. For most of the war, he belonged to an unarmed company known as the Black Pioneers, who were more or less garbagemen, ordered to "Assist in Cleaning the Streets & Removing all Nuisances being thrown into the Streets." The Black Pioneers followed British troops under the command of Henry Clinton as they moved from New York to Philadelphia to Charleston, and, after the fall of Charleston, back to New York again, which is how Harry Washington came to be in the city in 1783, and keen to leave before General Washington repossessed it, and him.
No one knows how many former slaves had fled the United States by the end of the American Revolution. Not as many as wanted to, anyway. During the war, between eighty thousand and a hundred thousand (nearly one in five) left their homes, running from slavery to the freedom promised by the British, and betting on a British victory. They lost that bet. They died in battle, they died of disease, they ended up someplace else, they ended up back where they started, and worse off. (A fifteen-year-old girl captured while heading for Dunmore's regiment was greeted by her master with a whipping of eighty lashes, after which he poured hot embers into her wounds.)
... (It was at (George) Washington's insistence that the names of those who boarded British ships were recorded in the "Book of Negroes," so that owners might later file claims for compensation.) In Charleston, after the ships were full, British soldiers patrolled the wharves to keep back the black men, women, and children who were frantic to leave the country. A small number managed to duck under the redcoats' raised bayonets, jump off the wharves and swim out to the last longboats ferrying passengers to the British fleet, whose crowded ships included the aptly named Free Briton. Clinging to the sides of the longboats, they were not allowed on board but neither would they let go; in the end, their fingers were chopped off.
But those who did leave America also left American history. Or, rather, they have been left out of it ...(-- pgs. 74-75) |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 12:40 pm Post subject: |
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The Narrow Corner
Hardcover
By W. Somerset Maugham
| Quote: | | 'Well, we sailed all the way up the coast, inside the Bank, of course, fine weather and all that, nice breeze, and I said to the kid: "What about a game of cribbage?" Had to pass the time somehow, you know, and I knew 'e'd got a good bit of money. I didn't see why I shouldn't 'ave some of it. I've played cribbage all me life, and I thought I got a sort of thing on. I believe the devil's in them cards. D'you know, I 'aven't 'ad a winnin' day since we left Sydney. I've lost a matter of seventy pounds, I 'ave. And it's not as if 'e could play. It's the devil's own luck he's got.' (-- p. 67) |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 1:23 pm Post subject: |
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The Globe and Mail
Refugee pair were slaves at sea, board says
Held and badly abused for two years,
Ecuadoreans jumped ship in Vancouver
By Mark Hume
Aug. 4/06
| Quote: | As the subject of a bet on whether sharks would attack him, Paulo Romero Cedeno was stripped naked, washed in fish blood and thrown into the ocean.
There in the dark water, in the black of night, the young man heard the crew of the fishing vessel laughing at him. Then the captain snapped on a light and, after a few moments, dragged him aboard. He was later beaten by crew members wo'd lost money betting he would die.
His younger brother, Cristhian Romer Cedeno, was subject to the same game - as well as to rape. Both men were routinely beaten and forced to sleep on the open deck.
Such was life aboard the Dolphin Free, a deep-sea fishing vessel from Ecuador that roamed the high seas - visiting Samoa, Fiji, the Marshall Islands and Tahiti - with the two brothers held against their will for about two years in what the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada has described as a modern-day case of slavery at sea. (Excerpt from the story on Canada p. A7) |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 1:46 pm Post subject: |
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Night Train
By Martin Amis
Audio CD
Narrated by Linda Hamilton
| Quote: | | I had called Talkinghorn's office on March 8th, almost two weeks ago. How about this? The old prick was on a poker cruise in the Caribbean. So I had his secretary page him, and he came squawking in from the straight flush. Told the news and said I was following up on it. He said to make an appointment. I called his office again and got talking. It turned out that it isn't Talkinghorn who plays poker - it's his wife. He gets nice and tan on a lounger while she's crouching at a table in the saloon blowing the second home on the two pair. |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 1:55 pm Post subject: |
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Bootleg Series
Volume I
CD Audio
Bob Dylan
Listen at bobdylan.com.
and again by Bob's Muse:
Older But No Wiser
Clancy Brothers and Robbie O'Connell
CD Audio
| Quote: | Rambling, Gambling Willie
Come around you rovin' gamblers and a story I will tell
About the greatest gambler, you all should know him well.
His name was Will O' Conley and he gambled all his life,
He had twenty-seven children, yet he never had a wife.
And it's ride, Willie, ride,
Roll, Willie, roll,
Wherever you are a-gamblin' now, nobody really knows.
He gambled in the White House and in the railroad yards,
Wherever there was people, there was Willie and his cards.
He had a reputation as the gamblin'est man around,
Wives would keep their husbands home when Willie came to town.
And it's ride, Willie, ride,
Roll, Willie, roll,
Wherever you are a-gamblin' now, nobody really knows.
Sailin' down the Mississippi to a town called New Orleans,
They're still talkin' about their card game on that Jackson River Queen.
"I've come to win some money," Gamblin' Willie says,
When the game finally ended up, the whole damn boat was his.
And it's ride, Willie, ride,
Roll, Willie, roll,
Wherever you are a-gamblin' now, nobody really knows.
Up in the Rocky Mountains in a town called Cripple Creek,
There was an all-night poker game, lasted about a week.
Nine hundred miners had laid their money down,
When Willie finally left the room, he owned the whole damn town.
And it's ride, Willie, ride,
Roll, Willie, roll,
Wherever you are a-gamblin' now, nobody really knows.
But Willie had a heart of gold and this I know is true,
He supported all his children, and all their mothers too.
He wore no rings or fancy things, like other gamblers wore,
He spread his money far and wide, to help the sick and the poor.
And it's ride, Willie, ride,
Roll, Willie, roll,
Wherever you are a-gamblin' now, nobody really knows.
When you played your cards with Willie, you never really knew
Whether he was bluffin' or whether he was true.
He won a fortune from a man who folded in his chair.
The man, he left a diamond flush, Willie didn't even have a pair.
And it's ride, Willie, ride,
Roll, Willie, roll,
Wherever you are a-gamblin' now, nobody really knows.
It was late one evenin' during a poker game,
A man lost all his money, he said Willie was to blame.
He shot poor Willie through the head, which was a tragic fate,
When Willie's cards fell on the floor, they were aces backed with eights.
And it's ride, Willie, ride,
Roll, Willie, roll,
Wherever you are a-gamblin' now, nobody really knows.
So all you rovin' gamblers, wherever you might be,
The moral of this story is very plain to see.
Make your money while you can, before you have to stop,
For when you pull that dead man's hand, your gamblin' days are up.
And it's ride, Willie, ride,
Roll, Willie, roll,
Wherever you are a-gamblin' now, nobody really knows. |
Link to this entry
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 2:03 pm Post subject: |
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The Motorcycle Diaries
Directed by Walter Salles
DVD
| Quote: | | Twenty-four-year-old asthmatic medical student and soon-to-be revolutionary Ernesto Che Guevera with his 30-year-old biochemist buddy, Alberto Granada, motorcycle noisily through an often unforgiving and occasionally magnificent South America, meeting its indigenous people, the real stars of the show. A surprisingly low-key film that takes one of its more exciting turns with a game of Blackjack aboard ship as our heroes make their way alas! sans moto to a leper colony in Peru: |
| Quote: | (Players surround the table, shouting out bets)
Player: Eight soles.
Dearler: Ten soles.
Alberto: One sol.
Dealer: Sir, this for men, not school children.
Alberto: I didn't know that in Peru a man's balls are measured in soles.
Dealer: Very well, let's play.
(Not surprisingly, perhaps, our hero manages to hold his own and then some)
Dealer (to everyone): How much do I owe you?
Alberto: Gentlemen, once again, Blackjack!
Dealer: That's impossible! How much do I owe you?
Alberto: Thirty soles, (taking the money). See you later. Thank you. I'll be retiring. I think we know who's got the biggest balls at this table. |
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| Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2007 2:07 pm Post subject: |
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The Girl on the Boat
Hardcover
Autograph Edition
By Rum Plum Steelschack
| Quote: | Samuel Marlowe, muffled in a bathrobe, came back to the state-room from his tub. His manner had the offensive jauntiness of the man who has had a cold bath when he might just as well have had a hot one. He looked out of the porthole at the shimmering sea. He felt strong and happy and exuberant.
It was not merely the spiritual pride induced by a cold bath that was uplifting this young man. The fact was that, as he towelled his glowing back, he had suddenly come to the decision that this very day he would propose to Wilhelmina Bennet. Yes, he would put his fortune to the test, to win or lose it all. True, he had only known her for four days, but what of that? (From the chapter entitled, Sam Clicks, at p. 45 - and it's The Girl ON the Boat, Amazon!) |
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| Posted: Wed Nov 21, 2007 9:30 am Post subject: |
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Skin
and Other Stories
Hardcover
By Roald Dahl
| Quote: | The purser, small and fat and red, bent forward to listen. "What's the trouble, Mr. Botibol?"
"What I want to know is this." The man's face was anxious and the purser was watching it. "What I want to know is will the captain already have made his estimate on the day's run - you know for the auction pool? I mean before it began to get rough like this?"
The purser, who had prepared himself to receive a personal confidence, smiled and leaned back in his seat to relax his full belly. "I should say so - yes," he answered. He didn't bother to whisper his reply, although automatically he lowered his voice, as one does when answering a whisperer.
"About how long ago do you think he did it?"
"Some time this afternoon. He usually does it in the afternoon."
"About what time?"
"Oh, I don't know. Around four o'clock I should guess."
"Now tell me another thing. How does the captain decide which number it shall be? Does he take a lot of trouble over that?"
The purser looked at the anxious frowning face of Mr. Botibol and he smiled, knowing quite well what the man was driving at. "Well, you see, the captain has a little conference with the navigating officer, and they study the weather and a lot of other things, and then they make their estimate."
Mr. Botibol nodded, pondering this answer for a moment. Then he said, "Do you think the captain knew there was bad weather coming today?"
"I couldn't tell you," the purser replied. He was looking into the small black eyes of the other man, seeing the two single little specks of excitement dancing in their centers. "I really couldn't tell you, Mr. Botibol. I wouldn't know."
"If this gets any worse it might be worth buying some of the low numbers. What do you think?" The whispering was more urgent, more anxious now.
"Perhaps it will," the purser said. "I doubt whether the old man allowed for a really rough night. It was pretty calm this afternoon when he made his estimate."
The others at the table had become silent and were trying to hear, watching the purser with that intent, half-cocked, listening look that you can see at the racetrack when they are trying to overhear a trainer talking about his chance: the slightly open lips, the upstretched eyebrows, the head forward and cocked a little to one side - that desperately straining, self-hypnotized, listening look that comes to all of them when they are hearing something straight from the horse's mouth.
"Now suppose you were allowed to buy a number, which one would you choose today?" Mr. Botibol whispered.
"I don't know what the range is yet," the purser patiently answered. "They don't announce the range till the auction starts after dinner. And I'm really not very good at it anyway. I'm only the purser, you know." (From Dip in the Pool, at pgs. 131-133) |
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Last edited by editor on Tue Oct 13, 2009 1:08 pm; edited 3 times in total |
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editor
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Joined: 09 Nov 2003
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| Posted: Sat Dec 01, 2007 2:36 pm Post subject: |
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Empire of Blue Water
Captain Morgan's Great Pirate Army, the Epic Battle for the Americas, and the Catastrophe that Ended the Outlaws' Bloody Reign
Hardcover
By Stephan Talty
| Quote: | | "For work they mortally hate it," wrote (Woodes) Rogers. "Thus they live, poorly and indolently, seeming content, and pray for wrecks or pirates." But the pirates went beyond any Lotto winner or Bolivian miner who hits a rich vein: L'Ollonais's men were reported to have blown through 260,000 pieces of eight, or $13.5 million in today's dollars, in three short weeks after one of their expeditions, "having spent it all in things of little value, or at play either cards or dice." One buccaneer was said to have showered a whore with 500 pieces of eight in a single night. The men practically threw the money away with contempt. And when they weren't spending, they were giving the stuff away. "Among themselves, and to each other, these Pirates are extremely liberal and free," Esquemeling wrote, in an observation that was backed by other chroniclers of the pirate life. "If any one of them has lost all his goods, which often happens in their manner of life, they freely give him, and have him partake of what they have." (From Rich and Wicked, pgs. 138-139) |
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Last edited by editor on Tue Oct 13, 2009 12:14 pm; edited 5 times in total |
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