Robert E. Lee (Monsell)

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Description: Robert E. Lee (Monsell)

Genre: Classic fiction; Juvenile Fiction; Children's Books/Ages 9-12 Fiction; Children: Grades 3-4; Classics; Juvenile Fiction / General;

Average Review: 5 stars

Review: Captains Courageous: Kipling's American testament: Known and translated in all the world as a children's classic, Rudyard Kipling's "Captain Courageous" assumes today an unsuspected historical value. The book is surely outdated and difficult to read by the audience it has been for many years restricted to, however it has gained an "antiquarian" taste that true lovers of classical fiction greatly savor and should not be put on the shelf among the books of a long ago childhood. "Captains Courageous" is Kipling's only entirely "American" novel. Published in 1897 (the same year Joseph Conrad produced the maritime "The Nigger of the Narcissus"), the year Kipling abandoned America where he had lived with his wife and her family for some time, it had appeared on an American journal in episodes from November 1896 to May 1897 with a dedication to James Coneland doctor, Brattleboro Vermont. James Coneland was Kipling's friend that had introduced and accompanied him in the numerous visits to Gloucester Mass, on the schooners and out at sea and had helped him gain all the information that would make the book's backbone. The location of the story is on the Grand Banks and the title should have been "Harvey Cheyne, Banker" (the pun residing in "the banks" but also in "banker" as a boat fishing on the Great Banks) but it was changed in "Captains Courageous: A story of the Grand Banks", from the captains courageous mentioned in a `600 ballad "Marie Amberee". Many are the novel's themes that can be found, clearly stated in Kipling's diaries and letters. There is the disappearing of innocence in a society increasingly dominated by the getting of money, the rite of passage from childhood to adulthood, the lesson of the inevitability of physical death. The plot is well known: Harvey Cheyne a spoiled rich boy, heir of an American self-made tycoon with investment in railways and ships, falls of a liner on his way to Europe. He is rescued by the schooner "We're Here" where he finds discipline, friends and education, freedom and adventure that make him a man. When reunited with his parents he has grown up and is ready to assume his responsibilities in life. The novel is actually built in three time spans, the opening and the closure (Harvey's trip aboard and his going overboard and his reunion with his parents) that enclose the real story that is what is taking place on the schooner "We're Here". The two opening and closing episodes are surprising and in a certain sense unbelievable. Harvey's rich and idle life in unconceivable for the crew. The reader knowns Harvey is not lying, but Disko Troop feels insulted by the insolent young boy that after having been saved actually accuses him of theft. The closing episode of Harvey's reunion with his father has us meet this kind of super-tycoon that could only be the fruit of the American economic system. Cheyne's senior immense fortune and the way is has been made is as unbelievable and fantastic as Harvey's tales. The only reality between the fantasies is the story of Harvey's permanence of the "We're Here" (intended by Kipling to mean just what it says). Actually it is the permanence on the schooner that makes him worthy of being reunited with his father and to be part of the Cheyne dynasty. Cheyne senior with his means and influence integrates the men of the "We're Here" in his own economic system, where Dan (Harvey's brother in arms during the trip) is sent toward a brilliant nautical career on Cheyne's ships and the strange prophetical black cook is appointed as Harvey's servant. Kipling probably sent him to what he thought should be a black man's destiny in those times. "Captains Courageous" is altogether the story of the triumph of the America's hardworking and successful Calvinistic spirit. This is interpreted first by Disko Troop, the humble and brave captain of the "We're Here", and then by Cheyne senior that runs from the Pacific to the Atlantic Coast to get back his lost and found offspring. However, like in all of Kipling's best fiction the double rhythm sets up a crucial opposition that takes away the assertive value of ideologies and pedagogical intent, so "Captains Courageous" is practically the statement of the autonomy of a dream that lasts until the ship gets back to the land. On the schooner Harvey's past and future don't exist. The only existing experience is that of the voyage, searching for fish, during which he grows up not to become a tycoon but a captain courageous, brother of a small community of the little ship in the immense ocean, a ship of fools, where like in the epic Moby Dick the captain is a poor fisherman and rich and poor, wise men and fools, Irishman, preacher, Portugese and Blackman may live together. Even if lead by men the "We're Here" obeys nature's rules. Disko Troop must think like a fish. Accepting the sea's destiny Harvey acquires a new identity, on the "We're Here" he is removed from power's cruel struggle and economic's crushing logic. The salvation through water (baptism?) is evident throughout the book, from Harvey's fall into the sea to the final Memorial Day Ceremony when Harvey realizes he has taken the place of a young sailor who drowned "Otto Svenson, twenty years old". This is the only way Harvey can gain his social role as part of his dynasty (Cheyne = chain). Land wins over sea, even if the sea is necessary for Harvey's growth. The sea is also menaced by the modern steam boats, like the land is eaten up by Cheyne's trains. Harvey stays on land with his hostages, the black cook and Dan to interpret his future of richness. The "We're Here" instead leaves for a new adventure that this time will have no testimonies. Kipling still hopes not only that someplace there may exist a pre-capitalistic world but also a place for experiencing an innocence of heart. Until the "We're Here" can keep on leaving not all the world must identify with Cheyne senior's logic. Kipling's America was vast and multiracial and had many characteristics in common with India and its castes. The fascination with language that accompanied the Author throughout his life (think of "Kim") is also one of the themes of the story. The narration is constructed through a sequence of very cryptic dialogues that consent the explore the fisherman's world. At sea even though people speak different languages they understand each other perfectly, back at land they seem to speak in different idioms. Cheyne senior's functional down to earth words reduce all other languages to a babble. Even the titanic Disko almost stabbers his excuses for not having believed Harvey's story. The language has been deemed one of the problems of modern reading of the book, but when it is read outloud it gets easier to understand. A suggestion is to watch Victor Flemings movie "Captain's Courageous", where all the dialects seem to fuse and the issue of language comprehension disappears. I am sorry this review has turned into a small essay, but Kipling's "Captains Courageous" is still part of the perfect triad of boy's childhood "rite of passage" books together with Stevenson's "Treasure Island" and Twain's "Huckelberry Finn" written in the last decades of the Nineteenth Century. Sometimes adults rereading these milestones of their youth understand how their mythical thinking started.