Beat to Quarters. [Hardcover]

C. S. Forester (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Sun Dial Press (1943)
• ASIN: B000JJPA3O
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (55 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #511,581 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

C. S. Forester (1899-1966) wrote several novels with military and naval themes, including The African Queen, The Barbary Pirates, The General, The Good Shepherd, The Gun, The Last Nine Days of the "Bismarck," and Rifleman Dodd. But Forester is best known as the creator of Horatio Hornblower, a British naval genius of the Napoleonic era, whose exploits and adventures on the high seas Forester chronicled in a series of eleven acclaimed historical novels. Over the years Hornblower has proved to be one of the most beloved and enduring fictional heroes in English literature, his popularity rivaled only by Sherlock Holmes.

Born Cecil Louis Troughton Smith in Cairo, Egypt, Forester grew up in London. At the start of World War II he traveled on behalf of the British government to America, where he produced propaganda encouraging the United States to remain on Britain's side. After the War, Forester remained in America and made Berkeley, California, his home.

The character of Horatio Hornblower was born after Forester was called to Hollywood to write a pirate film. While the script was being drafted, another studio released Captain Blood, starring Errol Flynn, based on the same historical incidents about which Forester was writing. Rather than seek another movie project, and to avoid an impending paternity suit, Forester jumped aboard a freighter bound for England. By the end of the voyage he had outlined Beat to the Quarters, which introduced the now legendary character Hornblower, Bush, and Lady Barbara.

Forester died in 1966 while working on Hornblower During the Crisis.

Back Bay's editions of the Hornblower novels are numbered according to the chronology of Hornblower's life and career, not according to the sequence in which they were written. The series is comprised of the following titles:


Mr. Midshipman Hornblower
Lieutenant Hornblower
Hornblower and the Hotspur
Hornblower During the Crisis
Hornblower and the Atropos
Beat to Quarters
Ship of the Line
Flying Colours
Commodore Hornblower
Lord Hornblower
Admiral Hornblower in the West Indies

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

112 of 117 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Start with this one., August 3, 2000

By 

bruce horner - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hornblower : Beat to Quarters (Paperback)

If you're new to the Hornblower series, start with this one. Then read Ship of the Line, then Flying Colors. The three are practically a triptych, whereas the others all feel like they have space between them. Also, since Forester actually wrote Beat To Quarters first, there's in 'introductory' quality to it that no other book in the series has. The series compares favorably with the Aubrey/Maturin series I think. Odd that they were both cut short by the deaths of their respective authors.

In short, start with this and the next two as a trilogy, then proceed in any order you want.

56 of 60 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I ignored an actual battle to read this..., May 27, 2002

By 

bensmomma "bensmomma" (Ann Arbor, Michigan) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Hornblower : Beat to Quarters (Paperback)

...or, to be more precise, I sat within yards of a major Civil War re-enactment so engrossed in this book that I managed to ignore artillery and musket fire. I am a big fan of the Aubrey/Maturin series by Patrick O'Brian, but previously looked down my nose at Hornblower, I think because I knew it solely from TV and movies. This book never slows down for a minute--not just battles but ship repair and revictualling seem gripping in the hands of Forester.

Based on the films, I was not expecting Hornblower to show much internal life--he always seems to be superhuman on screen, but in the book he must struggle with his softer nature to develop his imperious style. Likewise I expected nothing interesting in the way of female characters, but it was a happy surprise to find Lady Barbara Wellesley on board ship.

If you will forgive a few O'Brian/Forrester comparisons: O'Brian is funnier. Forrester's battle scenes are a bit easier for me to follow. Hornblower is a more interesting or at least complex character than Aubrey, but O'Brian has the advantage of Maturin, who not only adds character but allows for dialogue rather than the perennial internal monologues Hornblower has with himself because he has no one of rank to talk to.

I hope that more seasoned readers of the series will agree with this appeal to newer readers: Even if you have read neither author, this book is a good place to start.

25 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars In my opinion the best Hornblower book written., August 9, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Hornblower : Beat to Quarters (Paperback)

I first read BEAT TO QUARTERS when I borrowed it from a public library in 1940. It is now 1998 and the third copy of the book is in my book case, the other two copies, being paper-backs, having been read until worn out.

I might add that, in my opinion, any aspiring writer would do well to read Forester, not to copy his style, but to realise that any good author can entertain, but only the great can enthrall; and only the greatest can make you "see" a character (even a minor one) in only two short lines of print.

His death robbed the reading world of one of its most readable authors.