The Story of the Voyage: Sea-Narratives in Eighteenth-Century England (Cambridge Studies in Eighteenth-Century English Literature and Thought, Series Number 24) - Hardcover

"Edwards comments are enlightening and discerning, and the extent of the research its preparation must have involved is evident. One gathers that he may well have examined personally a majority of the two-thousand travel-narratives that he estimates were published in the century." W. Kaye Lamb, B.C. Historical News

This is the first full study of one of the most popular and extensive forms of eighteenth-century literature, the voyage narrative. It illustrates the wide variety of published and unpublished material in this field, from self-satisfied official accounts to the little-known narratives of victims of the press-gang. It includes a survey of writings about the Pacific - including Cook's voyages and Bligh and The Bounty; there is a major new study of William Dampier, studies of writings about the slave-trade, and accounts of seamen and passengers, including Fielding and Mary Wollstonecraft. This is a book about writing, rather than exploration and adventure, dealing with the devious routes from the actuality of experience to the production of self-serving narratives. These are narratives of energy, vitality and interest, set within the context of British competitive sea-going imperialism.