Customer Reviews

Sharpe's Trafalgar

5 star:		(21)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

In the hands of a lesser author, I'd be irritated with Richard Sharpe's ability to play a key role in seemingly every key British military action in the early 1800s. But thanks to Bernard Cornwell, I can dismiss petty contrivances and just enjoy the blasted books - and enjoy them I do.

(And I'm also reminded of the two soldiers in Ken Burns' magnificent Civil War TV history who kept journals and managed to be in over twenty critical battles . . . sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.)

Cornwell has written so many books that he does not feel the need for poetic titles. "Sharpe's Trafalgar" unsurprisingly puts Sharpe at, well, the Battle of Trafalgar. I know only a couple of Brits well, but from talking to them it's easy to see that Trafalgar is to Britain what Yorktown, Gettysburg, or D-Day are for the United States. There is nothing more stirring to national pride than a magnificent, critical military victory. So Cornwell can be forgiven if he jumps through a few odd hoops to have his favorite Army Ensign play a key role in the purely naval clash at Trafalgar.

Sharpe needs to get home from India to join his new regiment, the 95th Rifles. Obviously, Sharpe can't walk back to England from India, and this allows Cornwell to "play Patrick O'Brian." Sharpe learns the ins and outs of life on board a British naval vessel, including the close proximity of your fellow passengers, the problems of sailing with an uncooperative wind, and the perils at sea if your captain sells you out.

Sharpe also spends a lot of time romancing the glamorous Lady Grace, inconveniently married to a British lord, a general in the Army who is more politician than soldier. (This, by the way, means "villain" in Cornwell's universe, and he's a good foil for Sharpe.)

But the whole novel is really an excuse to get Sharpe to Trafalgar, where he meets Admiral Nelson and gets to wreak his unusual brand of havoc against the French navy. These latter chapters is where "Sharpe's Trafalgar" really soars, and it does so in both expected and surprising ways.

First, the obvious - Trafalgar's a battle, and nobody writes a better real-world battle scene than Cornwell. Sure, it's at sea, but that doesn't slow down an author of Cornwell's talent.

But what really makes the battle scenes at Trafalgar powerful is Cornwell's decision to give up portions of the narrative to Captain Chase, Sharpe's friend. I read and re-read several passages where Chase walks the decks of his beloved ship, hands clasped behind his back, as French muskets and cannon fire all around him. While keeping an air of nonchalance, Chase is terrified inside . . . and as such epitomizes the 19th-century British soldier. These are some of the best lines Cornwell has ever written.

I am early into the Sharpe series, and I expect I may find a later book that I enjoy more than "Sharpe's Trafalgar." If I do, that will be a happy day indeed.

Another outstanding addition to the classic Richard Sharpe series. With Sharpe departing India and sailing aboard an English warship, he soon becomes embroiled with a renegade, an unfaithful wife, a wealthy and jealous husband, a scattering of nautical characters worthy of Kent and Pope not to mention some terrific descriptions of life at sea aboard a King's ship. The author once again demonstrates his uncanny ability of placing our hero in some dangerous prediciments, with some splendid details about ship board hazards and some rousing sea battles and some rather torrid romantic interludes as well. A worthy addition to the collection, filled with adventure, thundering battle and splintered decks, romance and sudden death. I hope that Mr Cornwall considers doing a few books featuring a new naval hero, his writing style would capture that quite well. Once again, Sharpe marches on.

An homage to Patrick O'Brian's "Master and Commander", the series based on the British Navy of the same period. The fan of both will see numerous similarities.

Sharpe's new friend, Captain Joel Chase, is the spitting image of Jack Aubrey. He's a bluff, good-natured fighting captain whose men would follow him through the gates of Hell, and he personally feels the same way about Admiral Lord Nelson. Sound familiar? He rarely flogs erring sailors. He loves his coffee. He pays for extra powder and shot out of his own pocket so that his crew can practice gunnery. And he's loyal to friends like Sharpe, who comes to Chase's rescue during a Bombay brawl with a dishonest merchant who cheated them both.

There are other touches as well. Sharpe's struggle to climb the masts and perhaps avoid using the maintop's "lubber hole" refers to the same running gag about Stephen Maturin, Aubrey's friend and intrepid but without sealegs.

Sharpe, a soldier, doesn't really belong at Trafalgar. But Cornwell contrives a plausible way to get him there, as Sharpe returns to Britain in 1805 to join a rifles regiment. The India books were fun but, after we've seen all those city walls stormed, all those rajahs plundered, and all those hideous Oriental tortures meted out, it's time to move on. Putting Sharpe on a ship, with its backstays and quarterdecks and scuppers pouring blood during battle, is a fine change of pace.

Cornwell's battle detail is typically gripping. And in this book Sharpe finds a romance that, one senses, may be more fateful than those he's had in previous books.

I was somewhat disappointed in this book. I always look forward eagerly to another in the Sharpe series, but this one was not one of Cornwell's better efforts, in my opinion. Still worth reading for we diehard Sharpe fans, however.

Sharpe is on board ship and gets involved with a married woman. She and her husband are gentry but of course, she falls for Sharpe's good looks and rough demeanor. I found this a little hard to believe, especially taking place aboard ship with little opportunity for quiet and intimate meetings to develop the relationship. In the end, Sharpe has to handle the complications of keeping his affair a secret, and oh yes, the Battle of Trafalgar intervenes. Actually, the battle scene is handled well as is typical for Cornwell.

Possibly I was disappointed with this book because I was reading the Richard Woodman "Nathaniel Drinkwater" naval warfare series around the same time. Maybe the naval setting was not the best milieu for Sharpe's (and Cornwell's) abilities. If you haven't tried the Sharpe books, I highly recommend you pick up _Sharpe's Rifles_ without delay.

Sharpe's Trafalgar is a recent addition to the Sharpe saga although one of the earliest in chronology. While I had seen some of the Sharpe movies on TV, Sharpe's Trafalgar was my introduction to the books. As much of the action occurs at sea, it is has a quite different setting than the other works. Fortunately, the novel works well in the tradition of novels pioneered by C.S. Forester.

Sharpe's Trafalgar begins with Sharpe making friends with a Captain of a third rate Royal Navy ship. Rating refers to the number of guns as the captain and crew are first rate. Sharpe books passage back to India on a commercial vessel and after some chicanery participates in a sea chase around the Cape of Good Hope and up the Atlantic, arriving at Cape Trafalgar on October 21, 1806. On board there are intrigues but it all takes a back seat to the Battle of Trafalgar.

Cornwell has done a good job of writing a novel of wooden ships and iron men. Unlike the heroes of Forester, Woodman or Kent, his Sharpe has no official standing in the ship although we know that Sharpe won't miss out on any of the action when it comes. However, by establishing a friendship with the captain we are privy to much of the inner workings of the ship. Cornwell also provided a sketch of a typical ship so that a reader unschooled in naval literature will understand where everything is. The sailing details are minimal but I get bored with reading about the t'gallants being let out or the royals being reefed. If a reader found O'Brian impassible then Sharpe's Trafalgar might be a welcome introduction to the genre.

Cornwell also does a superb job of describing the Battle of Trafalgar. Unlike the most notable writers of the genre Cornwell does not describe a naval battle in elegant terms. Essentially naval warfare is like a vicious, bloody street fight in which the two fighters get in close and kick, gouge and bite until one falls. The kicking of the downed fighter only stops when it is sure he will no longer get up. Trafalgar is brutal savage butchery and Cornwell excels in blood and gore.

While Sharpe is the hero of the novel, not all of his actions are justifiable. Some of his actions are totally inappropriate and totally unacceptable even under the circumstances. Perhaps that's part of the interest in the series is that the hero doesn't always do the right thing. Paradoxically, I had the most sympathy for one of the villains when he gave his traditional- I'm gonna kill you and here's why- speech. The man made some good points. However, Sharpe's Trafalgar is a novel where the good guys wear white hats and the bad guys wear black, so to speak. Having a hero who does some unconscionable things and a villain who has some legitimate motivation for his evil, make it a little more interesting.

One thing that Cornwell communicates very well is Nelson's charisma. Sharpe's Trafalgar has the best presentation of Nelson of any novel of the era that I have read. Not only does he present Nelson's power to the reader but he also shows how the Royal Navy would follow him without question. The brief passages that include Nelson are almost inspiring and certainly very inspired.

Although Cornwell does not typically write in the hearts of oak genre, he could. Perhaps Sharpe won't go back to sea but let's hope that Cornwell's pen does.

Bernard Cornwell is a historian first and storywriter second, at both he is superb. Trafalgar is possibly the most famous naval battle in British history and it just so happens to fit in with the Sharpe timeline. Naturally as a historian Cornwell would want to put Sharpe in this position and am glad he did. I found this book to amazingly interesting. The account of the naval battle is both detailed and gripping. He recounts the events with such accuracy its amazing how he made it seem so interesting and not just a report from a history book.

The book has all the ingredients that make the Sharpe series so great, you just have to read it to love it.

I give this book 4 stars, and it's well deserved.

Yes, Cornwell has to jump through some literary and historical accuracy hoops to get Sharpe -- confirmed landlubber extrordinaire -- to Trafalgar, but, here, it just plain works. After a few preliminaries, Cornwell uses the heart of the book to tell the story of Trafalgar through the eyes of the redoubtable Ensign Sharpe. Yes, Sharpe gets more tail than your average movie star . . . and, yes, some traditional British cliches are present -- the nasty sneering aristocrat, and so forth, but Cornwell's sheer story-telling ability makes it one of the finest (along with Waterloo) Sharpe novels yet. The final hundred pages, even though the feature ships are fictional, tell the story of the great naval battle in more readable style -- while getting all the important details correct -- than any non-fiction book I've yet encountered. As the afterword teases, our hero must march again. If I can kick in my two cents, I'd suggest sending an aging Col. Sharpe to help the Greeks win their independence from the infidel Turks. All in all, a great read.

In chronological order, Sharpe's Trafalgar is the fourth book in the series. You could also think of it as an out-of-sequence book because it has little to do with the stories about Richard Sharpe as a soldier. In fact, unless you want to read a little about what it was like to be at the Battle of Trafalgar, you could skip this book and not miss anything important in the way of character development. Unlike the India books where Sharpe was continually fighting off deadly threats to his life, Sharpe is more concerned here with sneaking around with a married woman, a remote cousin of Sir Arthur Wellesley, Lady Grace Hale.

The Napoleonic Wars were fought in Europe. Naturally, Sharpe has to leave India if he is to appear to save the day in all of those amazing battles on the continent. Naturally, he's going to pass by Trafalgar. Why not write a book about the battle and have Sharpe stumble into it? That's clear the thought process behind this book.

As a result, you end up with a lot of plot "development" that is sort of filler before the main battle. Having never studied the sea battle, I found that the explanations were interesting and the story helped make the technology and strategy easier to understand. Had this been a novella that focused on the last third of this book, I probably would have graded the book as a five-star effort.

The ins and outs of avoiding being swindled by ship chandlers, East India ship captains, and common seamen didn't seem all that interesting to me. The romantic side of the book wasn't too credible to me and didn't add much to my enjoyment of the story. If you think Bernard Cornwell's novels about Sharpe lack enough of a love interest, then you'll probably like this book a lot better than I did.

The writing is quite good in comparing naval battles with the kind of fortress breaching that Sharpe engaged in during the three books in India. I don't recall reading another novel from this era that made those comparisons quite so explicit and interesting.

By contrast, some of the dialogue is particularly bad. In fact, Cornwell makes fun of his own dialogue by putting words into the mouths of characters who don't agree that every ship's captain is a "fine fellow."

The unforgettable part of the book is the characterization of Lord Nelson who led his sailors to such a remarkable victory that day.

Fire!

Readers following Sharpe's exploits in chronological order will by now be familiar with the formulaic nature of these books. There is a climactic battle, a new girl, a troublesome villain and Sharpe finally prevails on all fronts. It never fails to be exciting and is always a lot of fun. This book is no different. The challenge, though, was to place Sharpe, a soldier on land, at the great sea Battle of Trafalgar. Well, Sharpe is now going home to England after three books of Indian adventures, and sure enough, he finds himself on a ship involved in the battle. Along the way he also comes face to face with Nelson. The improbable series of coincidences apart, what makes the book noteworthy is the comparison of sea battle to land battles, as seen through the eyes of a soldier. The shipboard routine will be familiar to readers of the Aubrey-Maturin series by Patrick O'Brian and certainly this book reads like one of those. I am a big fan of O'Brian and being familiar with naval cannon from his books have always been puzzled by the puny cannon used by the land forces of the Sharpe novels. In this book the point is driven home that a single line-of-battle ship in Nelson's fleet carried more guns than entire land armies laying siege to forts in India, and these were much larger guns by far. This is all the more amazing to modern readers when we consider the frail wooden nature of these sailing ships. Here then, is an illustrative example of true naval power.

The book is historically accurate. Readers interested in an eyewitness account of the Battle of Trafalgar should try Tom Pocock's non-fiction `Trafalgar: An Eyewitness History' released in 2005 for the bicentennial of the battle.

Bernard Cornwell continues his incredible adventures of Richard Sharpe. With the series having explored nearly every aspect of the Napoleanic period in which the British were invovled, the author is running out of historical chronology in which to insert his main character.

Cornwell has been re-tracking Sharpe's career ever since he finished the Peninsular War and Waterloo. Its a credit to the author's genius that he manages to make it work, but the lengths at which he must go in order to do so are getting a little thin now. With this book Cornwell devles into Patrick O'Brien terrority with Royal Navy nautical lore. He seems to have the nautical jargon down pretty good, although this land-lubber wouldn't really know if he was off or not!

All the ingredients of the Sharp series are here. Some stawart companions, arrogant aristos who always want to bring Sharpe low, treacherous characters who are not what they appear, and a lovely lady of the blue blood who falls for Sharpe's manliness! We have seen this all many times before in the earlier series, but Cornwell still somehow makes it work! The plot moves along with the usual on the edge page-turner writing and after the slow build-up we explode onto the carnage and horror of Trafalgar where Sharpe gets to meet Nelson first hand and compare him to Wellsley!

The battle scenes are Cornwell's forte and the blood, sweat and tears of Trafalgar become vivd before the reader's eyes. The carnage among the Franco-Spanish fleet was truly horrible and even through the British suffered much less severely, the stress and strain of the battle was no less for them. Cornwell describes this very well, even though Sharpe's penchant for killing continues to stack the body count in his favor. In the wholes series Sharpe has probably killed close to several thousand people! A bit unbelieveable perhaps, but Cornwell's supurb action writing still manages to hold it all together. Next stop, Denmark and the 95th Rifles! After that, Sharpe series shouid get a much needed rest.