Delilah
A Novel About a U.S. Navy Destroyer and the Epic Struggles of Her Crew
Marcus Goodrich(Author)
The Lyons Press
Published on 1. September 2000
Book
Paperback/Softback
526 pages
978-1-58574-129-8 (ISBN)
Description
The twentieth-century classic that inspired a generation of nautical novels. Delilah is an old four-piper destroyer whose regular beat is one of the world's most exotic - and dangerous - bodies of water: the Sulu Sea. Set at the beginning of the American century just before the Great War, this novel tells the story of how the ship and her crew patrol the islands in the time of violent racial and religious unrest. In a series of exquisitely drawn stories, Marcus Goodrich gives the reader a tantalizing glimpse into the heart of each crewmember as the ship puts down Philippine insurrections, searches for a gunrunner's cave told of only in island folklore, and delivers medicine to western missionaries who would rather see the medicine destroyed than have it distributed to non-Christians. What emerges is a sensuous tapestry of the sailors' lives, which are bound inextricably to the fate of their strange family on the Delilah. Here is the return of one of the twentieth century's most important and widely translated novels of the sea.
Reviews / Votes
"Delilah is a remarkable work of art." - The New Yorker "So powerful, so uncompromising in its depiction of what happens in a fighting ship that I was stunned by its brilliance." - James Michener, from the Introduction "One of the great books of ships and the sea." - The New York Times"More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Guilford
United States
Publishing group
Rowman & Littlefield
Illustrations
Illustrations
Dimensions
Height: 229 mm
Width: 152 mm
Weight
567 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-58574-129-8 (9781585741298)
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Marcus Goodrich was a commissioned U.S. Navy officer during both world wats, wrote for many New York newspapers, and served as a correspondent for Time magazine. While writing for the Sunday edition of the New York Times in Paris, he became known as a bon vivant and storyteller within the Hemingway crowd. With the publication of Delilah, he instantly became a celebrity and met his future wife, Olivia de Havilland, while writing screenplays for the major film companies. He retired to Richmond, Virginia, and died in 1991. James Michener is the prolific author of such classics as Hawaii, Caribbean, and Texas. He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1948 for Tales of the South Pacific. Edward L. Beach is the author of Salt and Steel and Run Silent, Run Deep, which was made into a motion picture.