In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrick

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In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrick

                “The Essex disaster is not a tale of adventure. It is a tragedy that happens to be one of the greatest true stories ever told.”



                It’s been at least a decade since I’ve read Moby Dick by Herman Melville. I remember being in high school and being absolutely captivated by the story. For the life of me I can’t remember when I found out that it was based off of a true story, but the moment I saw the preview for the movie adaptation of In the Heart of the Sea, I knew I had to read it. Now finally, years later, I have. It’s a somber book and as the quote above states, it isn’t a tale of adventure even though that may have been how it began. It did end up a tragedy, a tale of survival with very little hope, where men resulted to eating their crew members to survive.
                Philbrick does an incredible job telling the story of the whaleship Essex, the men on the crew and the huge sperm whale that would cause their demise. George Pollard Jr. was the captain of the vessel. It was his first time as captain of the Essex where he was once first mate. Now the first mate was Owen Chase, whose outgoing personality would lead to him making many of the decisions throughout the course of the voyage. And also, Thomas Nickerson, a cabin boy on his first whaling expedition. These men are the focus of this narrative. Their narratives were the ones written down in one form or another and widely available after the events took place. Philbrick draws on all of their recollections throughout and with this firsthand information and much more research into the history of whaling and the island Nantucket, he describes the events that led to the Essex’s departure and what happened after.
                I was captivated throughout this book. Actually, I was a lot of things throughout this book like angry, disgusted, terrified, sad but more than anything I was devoid of hope. I don’t agree with whaling and it sucks that all of this was predicated on greed and the complete disregard of another life form for profit. There were plenty of moments throughout where I was appalled at how the whaling was conducted. But I still was aghast at what happened to the crew. Described within the pages of this book is a desperate situation I could never imagine living through. The fact that anyone survived this with their sanity intact is beyond me. Philbrick did an amazing job with building this world and exploring the motivations of the crew. One of the things I must commend Philbrick on is that he didn’t shy away from the racial aspect of what happened after the ship sank. As you learn throughout the novel, quite a few questionable occurrences happened that other authors might have chosen to shy away from and Philbrick doesn’t. He shows them flaws and all.
                Overall I highly recommend this book. It is really well written, informative and the story is paced out well. As a reader you are lost in this horrifying situation, on the whaling boats with the crew, making horrifying decisions in an effort to survive. I give this book 4.5 out of 5 stars.

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