I know it's a sad thing to a man to be leaving a girl and running off to sea. Haven't I left hundreds of them--and all beautiful? But here's another cup to you, boy. Wine is better to a woman than all the sweet pastes of France, and a man drinking it. Wine makes every woman lovely. Ah! If the homely ones would only put out a little font of wine in the doors of their houses like holy water to a church, there would be more marriage in towns. A man would never know the lack they had for looks. But have another cup of the grand wine, sad boy, and it may be a princess, and you leaving her behind you.When I first embarked upon this book, I imagined I was reading some children's tale of pirates and romance, but the depth of the words and how they lie quickly made me reconsider. The reader, whoever you may be, would do very well to remember that Steinbeck does not always tell the truth. Indeed, beware of what he says. Never give him easy access to your mind, and never imagine he fancies himself a truth-teller.
He is still a little boy and wants the moon. I suppose he is rather unhappy about it. Those who say children are happy forget their childhood. I wonder how long he can stave off manhood.
I am changed. The Henry Morgan you knew is not the Sir Henry Morgan who sentences you to death. I do not kill ferociously any more, but coldly, and because I have to.
It may be especially pertinent to this story, but Steinbeck plays on all the lies in human nature when he paints us the picture of Henry Morgan, Buccaneer. As usual Steinbeck rises to great poetic moments which are worthwhile whatever the story, but the story here is good too. The great unsettled heart of Captain Morgan hangs in the air like a heavy balloon, puffed by the wind. It wanders and wanders, but never lands.
And also in keeping with what other works of his I have been privilaged to read, Steinbeck startles you with dark thoughts and darker characters. These characters skip happily up to you out of the sunshine as beautiful little children but when their faces become clear evil grins and mottled scars are all you see. In this way, I guess Steinbeck paints portraits as true to life as ever they can be. And truly you will get the sense as you slip through these excellently composed pages that you are listening to a great dirge, a magnificent funeral air for some drowning humanity.
Humanity is the one word I would apply to anything written by Steinbeck. He may strike you at first as a mystic but he is a humanist before all else, only sometimes he deifies it and so begins to sound like a mystic. Henry Morgan will tear your heartstrings out despite his evil nature and will leave you like the foam of a passing wave, to drift and float upon a raging sea. 8/10
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