Non-fiction

Sailing with Flinders: The Journal of Seaman Samuel Smith – Peter Monteath (Hardback version one of 200 Copies)

First edition, readily available as a softcover but rare as a hardback due to the tight limitation. Numbered 154 of 200 copies thus.

Published by the super Corkwood Press, Adelaide in 2002. Professor Peter Monteath [descendant of Gidley King] of Adelaide University a well published historian. This book marries well with his “Encountering Terra Australis” of which Voyager usually has a copy.

Fine condition, xiv, 86 pages, maps in text numerous other illustrations, notes and bibliography.

Monteath edits the extant journal and provided his sizeable introduction. Apart from Flinders writings this is the only journal kept during the Voyage of the Investigator 1801-1803 during which Flinders circumnavigated Australia proving undisputedly its island form and filling in many parts of the then “Unknown Coast”. The writer of the journal [It was more like an exercise book] , Samuel Smith, was from Manchester and joined Flinders’ crew below decks as low a rank as could be got. Nevertheless, Flinders had a small tightly bound crew and Smith’s account makes for good and full reading.

An important historical account one of the tightly held hardbacks.

$80.00

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The Life of Jean-Francois de La Perouse – Where Fate Beckons – Ian Harman

First edition published by the ABC in 2006. Large octavo, 292 pages, nicely illustrated . A quality production printed in heavy paper. Neat name on end papers. A very good copy.

The book on La Perouse by John Dunmore a recognised world authority on La Perouse and many things Pacific.

From his teenage life at war, the American War, issues in the Indian Ocean and the Great tragic Voyage and “the Mystery”.

La Perouse by Dunmore

$40.00

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Van Diemen’s Land [History of Tasmania to 1838] – James Boyce

A new edition of James Boyce’s super book on Tasmania. Published in 2018, with a Forward by Richard Flanagan.

Octavo, 388 pages, with maps, plates, notes and references. very good condition. The winner of a number of prestigious awards.

Van Diemen’s Land a Colony formed out of transportation of convicts. How they survived and settled and adapted to the land. Conflicts with establishment and bushrangers. The fate of the aboriginal community.

James Boyce’s thoughtful perspective of the early years and the impact of colonialism

$40.00

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The Southern Cross – Australia’s 1974 Challenge for America’s cup – Hugh Whall

Bondy won the Cup for Australia in 1984 … it had been a long haul … this the book about the mighty effort made in 1974.

Published by Admiralty Publishing, Maryland, USA in 1974, a first edition.

Octavo, 172 pages, finished with the “Basic 12 metre formula”… learn it by heart. Nicely illustrated throughout from photographs taken along the way. Very nice copy.

The author a sailor of note, ex Fastnet, Sydney Hobart etc. From Rhode Island where he kept his hand in. Bondy … well we all know about Bondy.

A super book with good concentration on the design development and the desire to win at all costs.

The America’s Cup maybe the best thing invented in America..

$25.00

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The Happy Isles of Oceania (Paddling the Pacific) – Paul Theroux

Value for money, the best modern book by far on the western Pacific – Oceania by the talented Theroux.

Published by Hamish Hamilton, London in 1992 a first edition. Thick octavo, 541 pages with maps at the end for those that are unfamiliar.

Seemingly Theroux was encouraged to visit the Trobriand Islands by Malinowski’s “the Sexual Life of Savages” a ground breaking and “’writer’s taboo” breaking work from the esteemed anthropologist.

All of this is after the Land of the Long White Cloud and before the paddle to Fifi and Vanuatu, Tonga, Samoa, Marquesas. Then straying east to Easter Island and up and back a bit to Hawaii and “Paradise” … and some others in-between.

Theroux throws his lot into the Pacific.

$30.00

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The Travel Books [the Far East and Spain] – Somerset Maugham

A triple serving of Maugham … On a Chinese screen; The Gentleman in the Parlour and Don Fernando.

Thick octavo, 148, 170 and 146 pages of Maugham on the move. Published by Heinemann, London in 1955. A sign of age on the dust jacket edges, otherwise a very good copy especially given its age.

“The Gentleman in the Parlour” records a journey from Rangoon to Haipong … real Somerset Maugham territory and (as he says) is an exercise in style.

“On a Chinese Screen” is a reflection on his travels in China during 1920.

“Don Fernando”, almost self explanatory, is a Maugham Spanish classic. Whilst included under this “Travel” umbrella it is a historical account set in the times of Velasquez and El Greco … and obviously Don Fernando.

Somerset Maugham perhaps at his best in the East with a helping of Spain thrown in …

$30.00

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Sailing with Flinders: The Journal of Seaman Samuel Smith – Peter Monteath (Hardback version one of 200 Copies)

The Life of Jean-Francois de La Perouse – Where Fate Beckons – Ian Harman

Van Diemen’s Land [History of Tasmania to 1838] – James Boyce

The Southern Cross – Australia’s 1974 Challenge for America’s cup – Hugh Whall

The Happy Isles of Oceania (Paddling the Pacific) – Paul Theroux

The Travel Books [the Far East and Spain] – Somerset Maugham

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