Book Review-‘Chasing the ‘Bounty’: The voyages of the ‘Pandora’ and the ‘Matavy’’ by D. A. Maxton (ed.)

Abstract

The story of the Bounty and its problematic ‘green grocery trip’ between 1787 and 1790, has long fascinated authors and historians. Over time, the truth behind the story has sadly become bogged down by a mixture of myth and fiction. The sheer number of plays, films, documentaries, radio programmes, books and news articles are almost beyond counting after 230 years. Although five film adaptations, made between 1916 and 1984, have heavily coloured the views of most modern audiences, the change of approach started many years earlier.  As someone who has grown up living with the story of the breadfruit, Vice-Admiral William Bligh FRS and the events and history of the people in his life, this reviewer has long been fascinated by the truth behind the legend. Indeed, my father, Stephen Walters, has also long studied the subject, and built up one of the largest private collections of Bligh and Bounty artefacts and publications in the world…

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Filed under: Mutiny & Discipline | Other (Eighteenth C) | Pacific
Subjects include: Manpower & Life at Sea | Ship Handling & Seamanship