Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

Unavailable
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex
Unavailable
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex
Unavailable
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex
Audiobook10 hours

In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex

Written by Nathaniel Philbrick

Narrated by Scott Brick

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

4.5/5

()

Currently unavailable

Currently unavailable

About this audiobook

From the author of the forthcoming book, Valiant Ambition, the riveting and critically acclaimed bestseller, soon to be a major motion picture starring Chris Hemsworth, directed by Ron Howard, premiering on December 11, 2015

Chris Hemsworth, Cillian Murphy, Ben Whishaw, and Brendan Gleeson will star in a new film based on this National Book Award-winning account of the true events behind Moby Dick.

In 1820, the whaleship Essex was rammed and sunk by an angry sperm whale, leaving the desperate crew to drift for more than ninety days in three tiny boats. Nathaniel Philbrick uses little-known documents and vivid details about the Nantucket whaling tradition to reveal the chilling facts of this infamous maritime disaster. In the Heart of the Sea-and now, its epic adaptation for the screen-will forever place the Essex tragedy in the American historical canon.


From the Trade Paperback edition.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateJan 1, 2001
ISBN9780786556670
Unavailable
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex
Author

Nathaniel Philbrick

Nathaniel Philbrick is a historian and broadcaster who has writen extensively about sailing. He is Director of the Egan Institute of Maritime Studies on Nantucket Island, and a research fellow at the Nantucket Historical Association. He was a consultant on the movie ‘Moby Dick’. He has lived on Nantucket with his wife and two children since 1986.

More audiobooks from Nathaniel Philbrick

Related to In the Heart of the Sea

Related audiobooks

United States History For You

View More

Related articles

Reviews for In the Heart of the Sea

Rating: 4.28125 out of 5 stars
4.5/5

96 ratings75 reviews

What did you think?

Tap to rate

Review must be at least 10 words

  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A well written account of the almost 3 month and 2,500 mile journey of the crew of the Essex in their attempt to reach Chile in whale boats after being stove by a large sperm whale. This is the basis for Moby-Dick. Learned alot and became very appreciateive of the food on my plate and the firm ground beneath my feet. I also now want to go to Nantucket.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The book has a thorough description of life on Nantucket, whaling at that time, and the story of the Essex before, during, and after the destruction of the ship and the endurance of the survivors. The audio version was 10 hours long with one and a half hours of that being Notes! That gives an idea of the research Philbrick did. The story is a tough one, but it is well told and kept me very interested.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Great book. Makes me want to read moby dick now.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A great rousing seafaring adventure, but more importantly a poignant reminder of the impact of human activity on the earth, especially since the advent of the industrial era.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A great rousing seafaring adventure, but more importantly a poignant reminder of the impact of human activity on the earth, especially since the advent of the industrial era.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I'm a big fan of Melville's whale tale, but this original true story is even more riveting. Let's just leave it by saying "Pick your sailing and boating partners with great care."
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    ALWAYS GREAT. Rereading for a quiz bowl at the whalin museum on nantucket.

    One of my favorite historical non fictions. Compellingly written - he does a great job at putting everything in context, historically or other wise.

    The task of whaling itself was such an incredible feat.

    Writing this on four hours of sleep.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex well deserved the National Book Award. Herman Melville knew some of the men who survived the Essex and used the sinking of their ship by an enraged sperm whale as the basis for what is considered the greatest of American novels, Moby Dick. The sinking of the Essex was as well known in the 19th century as 9/11 is today.

    Philbrick uses a cool narrative voice to lay out a meticulously researched story that covers whaling, the town of Nantucket and the early exploration of the great ocean we call the Pacific.

    It is a story that is unremittingly grim yet heroic in the greatest sense of the word. It rivals Captain Bligh great survival story as an extraordinary story of men against the sea in the most difficult and trying conditions possible.

    Bligh was at sea for about 48 days, the survivors of the Essex were on the water for 93 days in boats much smaller and with no centerboard and limited navigational equipment, yet they managed to travel 6000 kilometers and arrive safely (22 men set sail on the Essex and 8 survived to ultimately be rescued after the sinking) off the coast of South America.

    If you like sea stories, or are a fan of Moby Dick or just enjoy 19th American history I think you will enjoy this well written, meticulously researched and thoroughly engaging book.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I watched the movie first and have always been interested in whales. After falling in love with the movie, as soon as I found out about the book I had to read it. I was not disappointed. It is gut-wrenching, honest, brutal, and beautifully educational without drenching the reader in big words and complicated concepts. It highlights how dangerous, exhilarating, exciting, and grossly underappreciated whaling was as well as the monetary importance it had to Nantucket and US economy in general. Pollard, Chase, Joy and Nickerson are astounding in their own ways, Pollard possibly more interesting than the others in my eye. Would recommend to anyone. (less)
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I devoured this book. I loved it. Mr. Philbrick does a fine job bringing these mostly forgotten intrepid whalers' to life.

    The story is capitivating and moves at a fast clip. I almost found it too short. The livelihood of these men and their journeys are incredibly interesting, and I found myself wanting to know more. Mr. Philbrick does sprinkle in background info on the trade throughout which is welcomed and added to the story immensely.

    One can't help feeling sorrow for the hunted whales and for the trials and tribulations of the crew. These were brave men and they held it together. Pollard's and Chase's stories definitely rank up there with any story testing a human's capability to survive in hellish conditons.

    Well done Mr. Philbrick. This is one I won't forget.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Excellent. Don't mess with whales.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    In the Heart of the Sea: the tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrook is a book that's been out for some time. I discovered it in my library shelves when recommending survival stories to a teacher. I remember ordering the book many years ago, but it's one (like so many others) that I never quite got around to reading. Until now, and I couldn't put it down. This is the story of the Whaleship Essex from nearly the dawn of American History. Just a handful of decades after the American Revolution, the Whaleship Essex left Nantucket Island, just south of Boston, on what could be a two year or more voyage searching for whales and the precious oil their bodies contain. The voyage would become the stuff of legend, and nightmares, and a tale that would one day inspire Herman Melville to write Moby Dick. After rounding Cape Horn in south America and heading west from the Galapagos islands, a massive sperm whale attacked the Essex, sinking it while all but two crew members were out in smaller whaling boats hunting whales. The Essex sank within minutes, leaving the crew thousands of miles from land with nothing but three small boats and very few provisions.Author Nathaniel Philbrook has accessed the few surviving first-hand accounts, as well as numerous other documents from the era, to tell a riveting story not only of what happened at sea but of life on the close-knit island of Nantucket. Philbrook also puts into perspective why whaling was so important in the era, and how quickly things changed in the decades following the Essex's demise.The cover of the book says that this book won the National Book Award, and it was well-deserved. This is most definitely a non-fiction book that I'll add to my roster when doing book talks to high school students (at least those where I can mention non-fiction titles). Highly recommended
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    The author tells the story that inspired Moby Dick; however, it is not told well. It appears the author did not want to leave out a single tidbit he turned up in his research. Especially at the beginning, the paragraphs read like a series of index cards with disparate scraps of information. Despite the obviously extensive research, the narrative does not seem reliable. For example, on page 22, the following is presented as fact: "On this island of perpetual motion, job-seeking seamen were expected to whittle. It was the way a man whittled that let people know what kind of berth he expected. A whaleman with at least one voyage under his belt knew enough to draw his knife always away from him. This signaled that he was looking for a boatsteerer's berth. Boatsteerers, on the other hand, whittled in the opposite direction, toward themselves; this indicated that they believed they were ready to become a mate." It appears the author (and where was the editor?) was ready to swallow any fish story. The writing itself is dreadful. In regard to the freshly outfitted and provisioned ship just before it was leaving on its voyage: "By the evening of Wednesday, August 11, all save for Captain Pollard were safely aboard the Essex." (p.27). Besides the clunky repetition in "save" and "safely", those words are just not right--why would they not be safe prior to the commencement of the journey? The word choice is particularly wrong (lazy?) in the context of a book where the men will certainly not be "safe" at other crucial points in their expedition. On the whole, I would recommend skipping this book, and reading Moby Dick instead.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Listened to the unabridged version of this using my new audible.com membership.

    True story of the incident on which Herman Melville based Moby Dick. The story of the Essex which was rammed and sunk by a Sperm Whale in the south Pacific, and how the survivors attempted to make their way back to civilization. Unbelievable what human beings are capable of in extreme necessity.

    I won't give away the details for those that aren't familiar with the story.

    Philbrick is an excellent writer, and he has done his research here, filling in a lot more detail than a less attentive write might have.

    Highly Recommended!!!

    I understand Ron Howard is making a movie of this which I look forward to now that I have read/listened to the book!
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    An excellent book - well-researched non-fiction, but written in an entertaining, grab-your-attention manner.
    In it, my ancestral cousins from Nantucket get their boat stove in by a whale, make some very ill-informed and unwise decisions, and spend a lot of time sailing around the ocean, resorting to cannibalism, and dying. Fun!
    It's the incident that Herman Melville (not a relative of mine) based 'Moby Dick' on.
    When I was little, I read a great many books on whaling and such (family history and all), but this book, I felt, really helped give a more up-to-date and accurate perspective on it.
    Recommended for anyone with an interest in the subject.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Sinking of the Whaleship Essex...

    In the Heart of the Sea is a true story about the Essex, a Nantucket whaling ship and its tragic encounter with an angry, revenge-seeking sperm whale. Since the movie was recently being released, my friend Eva and I decided to do a buddy read together. I'll admit I was impressed with the amount of research, details and extraneous information the author included about whaling, Quakers, Nantucket, shipwrecks, you name it. However the first quarter of the story was bogged down with so many facts and recitations that the story itself floundered and it became a little dull and boring. After the actual sinking of the ship though, the story did a complete turn around and I was engrossed until the end. I think because the author focused more on regaling us with the story of the ship and the crew and their dreadful time surviving at sea instead of inundating us with historical facts. If you have an interest in whaling or the Essex whaleship, I would recommend reading this book. There is just a ton of fascinating information. You'll be surprised at not only how long and how far the crew had to travel in an open whaleboat but what they had to do survive while they were lost at sea. It's a pretty horrific story. It will definitely make you think twice about going on your next cruise or fishing expedition. I personally will be land bound for a while, if not forever.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Magnificent narration of the fate of the Whaleship Essex after a whale had rammed its side, destroyed it, and what happened to the survivors. This tragedy was the basis for the climax of Herman Melville's [Moby Dick]. Very readable.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    There are experiments going on such as the Mars500 project where a number of people have been sealed into a mock-up of a spaceship for 520 days - to finish November 2011. From reading this book it sounds as if all the experiments necessary have already been done by the whaling ships in the 1800s. I hope the Mars500 project does not have this book on their reading list, but they should each be given a free copy as soon as they are out. The whaling ships were in some ways more cut off than spaceships and certainly went to sea for comparable lengths of time, in worse conditions.

    This tale is a heart rending account of what happened after the sinking of the ship by the whale, but also an account of what men endured even when things did not go wrong. Leaves me feeling luckier than ever to be living here and now - and I recommend the book to everyone, not just spacemen.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A great book about whaling. It was awhile since I read this, but one thing that has stuck in my mind is there thoughts on cannibalism. They were afraid to go to the Hawaiian Islands, because they were thinking that the Hawaiians were cannibals. But this fear kept them for certain safety and they ended up eating each other. Woweee!!!1
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The true story that inspired Melville's [Moby Dick]. I was fascinated by the tale of these whalers who managed to survive the loss of their ship. It does bog down a bit in the middle (but then, they were drifting at sea, or on a deserted island), but it's a great story. Almost makes me want to read [Moby Dick].
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Fascinating history that became the story that help spawn Melville's Moby Dick.

    I wanted to get this read before I saw the movie.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Evidently, the story of the Essex was once well known. It was the inspiration for Melville's Moby Dick and a version could be found in McGuffey's readers. I have to admit I had not heard of it. The Whale ship Essex was rammed and sunk by a Sperm Whale in the middle of the North Pacific in 1820. This is the story of that ship's last voyage, its sinking, and the tragic tail of the survivors as they made they way back to civilication. Most died along the way. Tragic yet compelling, a great adventure story from another century.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Interesting story about the American whaling ship the Essex that was rammed by a whale at sea. The author gave a detailed account of before, during and after the whaling ship was rammed at sea. I enjoyed the authors analytical description of the why, what and where of the tragedy. Very well done.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    This is the true story of the Whaleship Essex, sunk by an angry sperm whale in the middle of the Pacific, leaving its crew stranded at open sea in tiny whaleboats.

    It was just utterly fascinating, this book had me googling sperm whales, googling the Pacific and Henderson Island - I was so memorised by it all. Stuck in the middle of an ocean in a leaky boat, thousands of miles from land is the stuff of my worst nightmares. The story is just so incredible. I am really excited to learn that a movie based on the story of the Essex is being released this December. That movie is going to be EPIC.

    With hindsight, there were so many opportunities the crew of the Essex could have taken to avoid the disaster of spending months out at sea and slowly dying in tiny boats. It is really painful to read Philbrick describe all the 'what ifs' -the crew were truly victims of circumstance and victims of their existence within that particular time.

    I just have to say though, after reading that the whalers used to spear the baby whales to lure the adults with their dying cries, I really was rooting for the whale. Karma is a BITCH lads...
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    In the Heart of the Sea tells the story of the sinking of the whaleship Essex, the inspiration for Moby Dick. The book is way more interesting than I thought it would be. Setting sail from Nantucket, the ship journeyed around the tip of South America, to newly discovered whaling grounds in the Pacific. Using the diaries of the survivors as sources, Philbrick tells the story of the journey from setting sail, through the successful harvesting of a few whales, to the sinking of the ship and the crew's struggle for survival. Philbrick deals with themes of race, leadership, and human nature.

    The conditions the crew suffered through after the wreck are absolutely horrific. Sailing in three small boats for months, rationed to a cup of water and between 250-500 calories a day, I don't know how any of them found the strength to survive. The effects of severe dehydration and starvation are hard to imagine. It is hard to know exactly what happened as much of the story is based on first hand accounts that cannot be verified, but the crew seemed to have a remarkable level of devotion to one another. (That is strange to say since they did resort to cannibalism.)

    Eight of the 21 crew members ended up being rescued, and what surprised me most, is that they all went back to sea. (Or at least most of them did, I can't remember now.)
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Great book! Sorry I took so long to read it. Took one star off because it's a little bogged down in the first few chapters by the history of whaling and Nantucket, which I understand is kind of needed. Once the action starts though, it really doesn't stop. I'm a sucker for survival tales anyway. Can't wait for the movie to come out.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A fascinating story, all the more because it's true. The author does a marvelous job of providing background and context, pulling in related incidents and comparing them. It makes for fine reading. While non-fiction sometimes suffers from minimal character development, Philbrick manages to use the history he has found to bring these men to life, so you care about them and their stories. While this is a story about a disaster at sea, it's actually a story about what makes human beings persevere in the face of hopeless odds. Loved it.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Without the Essex, there would have been no Pequod. Without Captain Pollard (or perhaps it was First Mate Chase), there would have been no Captain Ahab. Without the great whale that smashed the Essex, there would have been no Moby-Dick.Nathaniel Philbrick tells the thrilling story of the tragedy of the whaleship Essex in 1819 and its connection to Herman Melville's great novel (1851) in his book “In the Heart of the Sea” (2000). Along the way he tells his readers much about the whaling industry at that point in history and about the town of Nantucket, then one of the most prosperous communities in North America. It was from Nantucket that the Essex and most other whaling vessels sailed, usually for years at a time.The story of the Essex, although all but forgotten before Philbrick resurrected it, was well known in the middle of the 19th century. Melville couldn't have helped hearing about it. Yet there was one place, the author says, where the story was rarely told, and that was Nantucket. Residents there were not embarrassed by the loss of the ship (that happened frequently), or the fact that so few survivors made it back alive or even that those survivors survived only by eating their less fortunate shipmates (that wasn't all that rare either). Rather, to their credit, the people of Nantucket were ashamed of the fact that the first men to be eaten were black.The black whalers were not singled out for consumption before they died, but they did die before their white shipmates, whether because of a poorer diet aboard the ship (the best food was reserved for officers and the men from Nantucket) or less fat content in their bodies. Nantucket had always prided itself on its opposition to slavery and its treatment of black people. There were several black men aboard the Essex, as on most whaling ships. So eating blacks first did not send the message the people of that town wanted to hear.George Pollard, the captain of the Essex, was in command of his first ship. Unfortunately, he was never truly in command, usually yielding to the wishes of his other officers when they had a different opinion. This trait proved deadly after the whale deliberately crashed into the ship. Pollard wanted the three boats carrying survivors to head west, with the wind behind them, to Tahiti, which was relatively close. His officers, ironically as it turned out, feared being eaten by cannibals and favored sailing east toward South America. Pollard agreed, and the resulting journey took three months and cost most of them their lives.Melville used the story of the Essex but, to his credit, reinvented it. “Moby-Dick” is a fictional masterpiece. The Essex story as told by Philbrick proves a masterpiece of the nonfiction variety.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    In 1820 the whaleship Essex was rammed twice by a sperm whale. Such an attack had never been recorded at this time and the men of the Essex had to try their best to survive on three small whaleboats while in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. This story was the inspiration for the final attack in Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick and was a topic of conversation and curiosity for decades after the sinking. Philbrick does an excellent job putting the reader right in the ship along with the whalers. We learn about the whaling industry and Nantucket particularly, all while he is relating the story of the Essex. There are several moments throughout the book where the reader just wants to take the captain or the mate by the shoulders and shake them, like why are you making such horrible decisions? So often they were doing the right thing, and yet they changed their minds and men died because of it. The story is an intense one, as all stories of survival against extreme odds are. Anyone interested in stories of peril at sea or survival stories in general will find something to enjoy here. Also, fans of Moby-Dick will likely enjoy learning the true story behind the classic novel.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    In the Heart of the Sea is a stunning true story that inspired one of my most respected novels, Moby-Dick. But where Moby-Dick climaxes, with the destruction of the ship by the enraged white whale, the whale ship Essex's tragedy had only begun. Author Nathaniel Philbrick does an excellent job dissecting Nantucket and its hardy inhabitants, explaining the culture of whaling, and delving into the psyche of the stranded officers and crew. Wrecked thousands of miles from port, these men braved the open ocean in battered, leaky whaleboats on starvation rations. Where it really got intense, though, was when the cannibalism started. Eating shipmates who died is one thing (and awful enough), but the unthinkable scenario in one boat where the men drew lots for who would be killed to be eaten by the others — my mind just blanks at the horror of such an extremity. I try to imagine the experience and just can't. This was a truly gripping and unforgettable read. I look forward to seeing the recent film, though I'm sure they made some big changes. We'll see. Makes me want to pick up Mutiny on Board the H.M.S. Bounty.