A gathering of the best maritime fiction from the last two hundred years: tales of shipwrecks and storms at sea, of creatures from the deep, of voyages that test human limits on the wild and limitless waters.

Classic adventures stories by Joseph Conrad, Rudyard Kipling, Stephen Crane, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Jack London mix with marvelously imaginative tales by Isak Dinesen, Patricia Highsmith, and J. G. Ballard. Robert Olen Butler explores the memories of a Titanic victim who has become part of the sea that swallowed him; Ray Bradbury’s “The Fog Horn” summons something primeval and lonely from the ocean depths; John Updike’s vacationing lovers retrace the route of Homer’s Odyssey on a cruise ship. From Edgar Allan Poe’s dramatic “A Descent into the Maelstrom” to Ernest Hemingway’s chilling “After the Storm” to Mark Helprin’s heartbreaking “Sail Shining in White,” the stories here are as wide-ranging and entrancing as the sea itself.
DANGERS OF THE DEEP

Ray Bradbury
The Fog Horn

Rudyard Kipling
A Matter of Fact

Edgar Allan Poe
A Descent into the Maelström

Robert Louis Stevenson
The Merry Men

Ernest Hemingway
After the Storm

Saki
The Treasure-Ship


VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY

Doris Lessing
Through the Tunnel

John Updike
Cruise

Kurt Vonnegut
The Cruise of The Jolly Roger

Patricia Highsmith
One for the Islands


SURVIVAL AT SEA

Stephen Crane
The Open Boat

Jack London
The House of Mapuhi

Joseph Conrad
Youth

Robert Olen Butler
Titanic Victim Speaks through Waterbed


THE CALL OF THE SEA

Isak Dinesen
The Young Man with the Carnation

Herman Melville
John Marr

J.G. Ballard
Now Wakes the Sea

Mark Helprin
Sail Shining in White

Acknowledgements

About

A gathering of the best maritime fiction from the last two hundred years: tales of shipwrecks and storms at sea, of creatures from the deep, of voyages that test human limits on the wild and limitless waters.

Classic adventures stories by Joseph Conrad, Rudyard Kipling, Stephen Crane, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Jack London mix with marvelously imaginative tales by Isak Dinesen, Patricia Highsmith, and J. G. Ballard. Robert Olen Butler explores the memories of a Titanic victim who has become part of the sea that swallowed him; Ray Bradbury’s “The Fog Horn” summons something primeval and lonely from the ocean depths; John Updike’s vacationing lovers retrace the route of Homer’s Odyssey on a cruise ship. From Edgar Allan Poe’s dramatic “A Descent into the Maelstrom” to Ernest Hemingway’s chilling “After the Storm” to Mark Helprin’s heartbreaking “Sail Shining in White,” the stories here are as wide-ranging and entrancing as the sea itself.

Table of Contents

DANGERS OF THE DEEP

Ray Bradbury
The Fog Horn

Rudyard Kipling
A Matter of Fact

Edgar Allan Poe
A Descent into the Maelström

Robert Louis Stevenson
The Merry Men

Ernest Hemingway
After the Storm

Saki
The Treasure-Ship


VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY

Doris Lessing
Through the Tunnel

John Updike
Cruise

Kurt Vonnegut
The Cruise of The Jolly Roger

Patricia Highsmith
One for the Islands


SURVIVAL AT SEA

Stephen Crane
The Open Boat

Jack London
The House of Mapuhi

Joseph Conrad
Youth

Robert Olen Butler
Titanic Victim Speaks through Waterbed


THE CALL OF THE SEA

Isak Dinesen
The Young Man with the Carnation

Herman Melville
John Marr

J.G. Ballard
Now Wakes the Sea

Mark Helprin
Sail Shining in White

Acknowledgements

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