Eight Bells and Top Masts : Diaries from a Tramp Steamer [Large Print] [Hardcover]

Christopher Lee (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2003

The time is the late 1950s. It is the end of an era. The end of the trade in which an old converted coal-burning ship with a Chinese crew and a handful of British officers would tramp from port to port, picking up cargo where it could, never knowing where it, and they, would be heading next. Christopher Lee, respected historian and author of the highly acclaimed BBC radio series, 'This Sceptred Isle', worked on these ships as a boy, growing up quickly as he tramped around the world. He worked with rough, strange and fascinating men and faithfully recorded all he saw and heard in diaries that form the basis for this riveting record.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'I loved it... it's beautifully written. It must be autobiographical because he knows sailing and the sea inside out and like you say it's a sort of lament for a lost era' 'He includes diary entries from the time, but they are wnderful. This sixteen-year-old biy has gone off with a song in his heart and the badge on his cap polished and he's terrifically naive...' '... magically evokes what life was like aboard a tramp steamer... has the delightful freshness and naivete of his boyish discovery of the world and its seamen and the discovery of vanishing British way of life' Key Reviews 'The book does come out as being a truthful one and I love books about ships and the sea, I'm a great fan of Patrick O'Brien and I used to read Conrad as a child. I loved it [Eight Bells and Top Masts] all. I loved all the descriptions' 'Viewing the times with wisdom and hindsight... particularly good on the rigid hierarchy of the seas' 'A funny, vivid, unsentimental, effortlessly informative book, highly recommended to seafarers both actual and imaginary' 'Lee's depiction of life on board ship is fascinating and often amusing, to be appreciated by armchair sailors everywhere' -- Mail on Sunday 20020421 --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Christopher Lee read history at Cambridge University and subsequently joined the BBC where he became defence correspondent. He is the author of the highly acclaimed BBC Radio series 'This Sceptred Isle'. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Ulverscroft Large Print; 1st edition (January 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0708948146
• ISBN-13: 978-0708948149
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,188,187 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars A young lad maturing.., October 11, 2011

By 

John the Reader "John" (Orlando, FL) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Eight Bells and Top Masts (Paperback)

I did not mean to read this book just yet - I am working through one of Simon Schama's tomes - but I opened it to see if I would like the author's "voice". The following afternoon I finished and shelved the book.

Within just a few paragraphs I was excitedly telling my wife, "This book is my story too! I could have written it myself". Well, perhaps, but not as well as Christopher Lee. As his story developed it drew away from my own similar experience, in the same time and on the same shores and seas. Lee had just the one trip - abruptly terminated in a Singapore hospital with acute appendicitis. He was flown home, and went to University, launching a new `trip' as a career journalist and becoming the foreign affairs correspondent for the BBC. My own sea-going continued a further seven years, as Christopher Lee became a history professor and author.

This story is the authors description of his fist, and it was to transpire, only, trip on "deep sea" articles aboard a `Tramp' - one of that once huge fleet of wandering traders whose time was fast approaching an end, with giant `Container' ships already looming above the blue horizons. It is built around his scribbled notes in school text-books, his memories and crafted with creative humour.

As a Kentish lad Lee worked the Thames barges around the estuaries and coastal towns in which we both grew up ... Whitstable, Sheerness and up to the London docks. He joins the Merchant navy to go `deep sea' and in joining his first ship, he describes crossing the Thames to the docks on a ferry filled with early morning Stevedores. On reading this I recalled those dreich morning crossings with those darkly flat-capped Dockies with their wet `Old Holbourn' fag ends, hacking out the smokers early-morning chorus of hawks and gasps! His words vividly brought back the weight and roughness of a kit-bag on the shoulder, and the excited but dreading anticipation of both ship and trip.

The author crafts a great tale, deeply involves the reader from the first page and leaves a void when the book is closed. Even if you never hankered to run away to sea you should enjoy this well told tale of ocean wandering and, of course, of a young lad maturing.