Overview

The chronicle of an extraordinary expedition in pursuit of the great white shark, which brings to life other creatures of the deep and maritime characters and leaves in its wake a fear of and fascination with the dread fish. In 1969 Peter Matthiessen set out with the expedition led by Peter Gimbel, whose aim was to find and film underwater for the first time the most dangerous of all sea creatures - the great white shark. Acting as the expedition's chronicler and spare hand (both on the surface and below), Matthiessen accompanied the crew from the Carribean to the whaling grounds off the Durban coast, to various islands in the Indian Ocean, to Ceylon, and finally to success off the bleak south coast of Australia. Blue Meridian records the awesome experience of swimming in open water among hundreds of sharks, the beauties of strange seas and landscapes and the camaraderie, humour and tension of people who live in close proximity and risk their lives day by day.

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9781860460159

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Peter Matthiessen is a naturalist, explorer and writer. His works of fiction include At Play in the Fields of the Lord, Far Tortuga and the acclaimed 'Watson Trilogy'. His explorations have resulted in many fine works of non-fiction, among them Birds of Heaven, The Cloud Forest and The Tree where Man was Born. In November 2008, at age 81, he received his second National Book Award for Shadow Country, an 890-page revision of a trilogy of novels he released in the 1990s.

A trove of shark lore, a suspenseful adventure yarn, and a decent man's account of the way other decent men behave toward one another when they are under great pressure -- Geoffrey Wolff Newsweek Analytical, truthful and intimately personal... Throughout one learns considerably about the history of sharks, whales, professional divers, and other such creatures of the sea... Matthiessen is a most qualified observer of men and nature Natural History For its natural history, for its persistent courage and for its terrifying portrait of White Death, this book... will live in the memory of all who read it Atlantic Peter Matthiessen is beyond dispute the best nature writer working today -- Peter Farb

"""A trove of shark lore, a suspenseful adventure yarn, and a decent man's account of the way other decent men behave toward one another when they are under great pressure"" -- Geoffrey Wolff Newsweek ""Analytical, truthful and intimately personal... Throughout one learns considerably about the history of sharks, whales, professional divers, and other such creatures of the sea... Matthiessen is a most qualified observer of men and nature"" Natural History ""For its natural history, for its persistent courage and for its terrifying portrait of White Death, this book... will live in the memory of all who read it"" Atlantic ""Peter Matthiessen is beyond dispute the best nature writer working today"" -- Peter Farb"

Matthiessen was among the entourage when Peter Gimbel set out in 1968 to track down and film the awesome great white shark - the biggest, heaviest, meanest (it will attack anything and down a man in one or two bites) shark around. That was its appeal for Gimbel, who had already hobnobbed almost to the point of boredom with lesser breeds. But the great white is also very rare. . . . For most of the book the crew sails back and forth in South African waters, lights, cameras and aluminum submersion cages at the ready, and Matthiessen glides after with loads of preparatory shark and nature lore; but the white hides out and the interim account is one of technical difficulties, inclement weather, spluttering tempers, deepening friendships. That isn't to say there aren't extraordinary diversions, such as an unprotected swim among blues and tigers and hand-feeding a monster barracuda, or that the narrative filler isn't worthwhile (for example, angry digressions on whale killing and apartheid). It's simply that such diffuse attractions tend to cancel the excitement of the Great Wait and vice versa; and though the encounter is still chilling when it comes, many months and a million dollars later off southern Australia, some of the impact has been lost. It ends as an agreeable miscellany, pitched vaguely in the direction of Moby Dick and due to land with the reflective bedside reader, though the film's release may greatly improve its prospects. (Kirkus Reviews)

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Peter Matthiessen was a naturalist, explorer and writer. His works of fiction include At Play in the Fields of the Lord, Far Tortuga and the acclaimed 'Watson Trilogy'. His explorations resulted in many fine works of non-fiction, among them The Snow Leopard, The Cloud Forest and The Tree where Man was Born. He died in 2014, aged 86.

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