REVIEWS Transforming the World Stobart: The Rediscovery of America's Maritime Heritage, John Stobart with RobertP. Davis (E. P. Dutton , NY, 1985 , 208pp, illus (60 full color, 50 sketches, drawings & maps) , $100hb). Admirers and collectors of the works of John Stobart will be delighted to learn that a comprehensive and annotated collection of his paintings and drawings has now been published in this sumptuous biography of one of America 's foremost painter historians. This is indeed a splendid volume and well deserves a place on the shelves of maritime historians, collectors of Americana and art lovers. The artist's development is traced with examples of his early drawings and paintings (including a selfportrait) from his youth in England to the present, when he emerges as possibly the greatest living exponent--on canvas--of American coastal and inland ports of the nineteenth century.
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Working sketch of the steamboat Francis Torrance, of the Monongahela and Ohio River Transportation Company.
Some of the paintings have undoubtedly been inspired by the noted work of Atkinson Grimshaw , an English painter best known for his nocturnal longshore studies of British ports during the last century. Stobart has elaborated on these developing his own unique idiom with colorful interpretations of Boston, New York, Charleston and some lesser known inland waterfronts and other maritime activities. The oft-quoted expression " the artist's vision transforms the world" is most appropriate when evaluating Stobart's work since it is almost impossible- at least for this writer-to imagine these ports as they once were without visualizing them in terms of a Stobart painting. The enduring value is assured by the meticulous and exhaustive research with which these subjects have been reconstructed. My only reservation about the book is the choice of painting for the jacket. This painting is unfortunately not indicative of Stobart' s best work since the vessel's topsails are too square and do not conform to her published sail plan. A more suitable painting might have been one of his many superb whaling, arctic or clipSEA HISTORY, SUMMER 1986
per subjects. This is a minor point and does not detract from my overall impression of the book, which is surely to be valued and treasured as a testimony to the genius of John Stobart. OSWALD BREIT
Os Brett went to sea at a young age and is an accomplished marine artist in his own right. Australian by birth, he lives in levittown, New York.
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Sheer Contentment The Magic of the Swatchways, Maurice Griffiths (Sheridan Hse ., Dobbs Ferry, NY, 1986 repr. (1932), 235pp, illus, $13.95pb). In this marvellous book, Maurice Griffiths, a British yacht broker, designer and long-time editor of Yachting Monthly chronicles his various passages in the late 1920s around the rivers and creeks of the Thames estuary-the swatchways. From the outset, Griffiths makes plain his preference for gunkholing. "People who go for world voyages in small yachts for pleasure are mad, '' he states . But the demands of swatch way sailing are no less rigorous in their way than those of the ocean passage, and Griffiths' escapades provide ample evidence of the seamanship necessary to navigate these unmarked and ever-changing channels of the Thames delta . Imagine skippering a 12-ton, 34ft cutter with a 41/zft draft in shoal water less than 3ft deep at high tide . It is this arithmetical discrepancy, the volatility of North Sea weather and Griffith's own eloquence that make the Magic of the Swatchways so compelling: ... when the Cork light vessel had turned to the young flood the seas became steeper, and Afrina punched her powerful bows through their green faces so that they tu.mbled over the rail forward, closing over the bitts and capstatt as though trying to grasp the ship and hold her down. But always her black bows rose again and the infuriated water, foaming with rage, was bundled out through the lee-scuppers . In addition to putting the reader at the helm, Griffiths does a lovely job of capturing the spell of the Thames estuary and environs before the coming of cigarette boats and water skiers. With the aid of a detailed two-page map, even the reader who has sailed no farther afield than Nantucket Sound can appreciate the sanctuary of Harwich Harbour or the calm of an uncrowded anchorage in the River Orwell , and to dread the sinister conjunction of an offshore breeze with an ebb tide over the Platters or the Dengie Flats .
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SCHOONERS AND SCHOONER BARGES (Illustrated) - 9x12 Hardbound, 160 pp.
By Paul C. Morris Over 150 photographs and artwork by author. A phase of maritime history that has gone unnoticed by nautical historians. Beginning at the turn of the century it was a most important aspect of ou r maritime economy, competition between coastal schooners and schooner barges was keen and filled with many exciting aspects; shipwreck was common. This book contains much valuable reference material with respect to the schooner barges. their builders and the companies who owned them .
$25 including postage jMass. resid ents add $1 .25 sa les tax)
Schooners and Schooner Barges Nantucket Nautical Publishers 5 New Mill Street Nantucket, MA 02554
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