|
|
(Larger Image)
|
The Outlaw Sea: A World of Freedom, Chaos, and Crime
by William Langewiesche
Product Group: Book
Publisher: North Point Press (2004-05-12)
ISBN: 0865475814
EAN: 9780865475816
Dewey Decimal #: 387.544
Hardcover: 256 pages
Edition: 1st
SKU: 9AB1-071-7-0808
Condition: As New As New
Comments: AS NEW condition. May show MINIMAL shelfwear. *International Buyers Welcome!* (except for prohibitively heavy items, as noted) - Satisfied customers in over 40 countries! We ship quickly and guarantee satisfaction. Your purchase helps support a U. Chicago student
|
Editorial Reviews
|
Product Description
Riveting stories of our last frontier and the acts of God and man upon it
Even if we live within sight of the sea, it is easy to forget that our world is an ocean world. The open ocean--that vast expanse of international waters--begins just a few miles out and spreads across three-fourths of the globe. It is a place of storms and danger, both natural and manmade. And at a time when every last patch of land is claimed by one government or another, it is a place that remains radically free.
With typically understated lyricism, William Langewiesche explores this ocean world and the enterprises--licit and illicit--that flourish in the privacy afforded by its horizons. Forty-three thousand gargantuan ships ply the open ocean, carrying nearly all the raw materials and products on which our lives are built. Many are owned or managed by one-ship companies so ghostly that they exist only on paper. They are the embodiment of modern global capital and the most independent objects on earth--many of them without allegiances of any kind, changing identity and nationality at will. Here is free enterprise at it freest, opportunity taken to extremes. But its efficiencies are accompanied by global problems--shipwrecks and pollution, the hard lives and deaths of the crews, and the growth of two perfectly adapted pathogens: a modern and sophisticated strain of piracy and its close cousin, the maritime form of the new stateless terrorism.
This is the outlaw sea--perennially defiant and untamable--that Langewiesche brings startlingly into view. The ocean is our world, he reminds us, and it is wild.
|
Customer Reviews
|
The Ocean's Way
Rating  (5)
Date: 2008-09-10
The Outlaw Sea is about the immensity of the sea and the essential lawlessness of commercial shipping. There is far more ocean than there is land. "International Waters" are just that - not part of any country.
The book consists of four main sections. The first is about freighters in general, the law of the sea and the story of the Kristal, a 550-ft all-purpose tanker, registered in Malta, owned in Italy and crewed by Croatians, Pakistanis and Spaniards. The ship had grown decrepit, but the owners kept on sailing it. It broke into two sections off the coast of Spain, dumping a cargo of molasses and drowning a third of its crew.
The second is about pirates who captured a freighter. It shows how dangerous the shipping lanes are even today, and how hard it is to catch the criminals.
The third part is about the loss of a huge Estonian car ferry, in the Baltic on its way to Sweden. Storm waves broke open the car deck. Passengers played in the bars until the ship began to sag to starboard. There are stories of death and survival. A lot of it is about the investigation of the loss, and international politics.
The last part is about ship-breaking, focusing on a beach in India. The author watched a ship deliberately driven onto the beach, then cut to pieces by low-paid workers. The author describes the work of Greenpeace and others to promote skip-breaking that is not so bad for the environment, or so unhealthy for the workers.
The book is well-written throughout. There's plenty of detail, but it never gets boring.
|
|
disappointing
Rating  (2)
Date: 2008-04-04
Description of this book did not live up to the actual writing. not very memorable
|
|
Engrossing view of modern issues of the sea
Rating  (4)
Date: 2008-04-03
The sea covers most of the world's surface area. Most people have a passing knowledge of the sea's history, of pirates and hidden treasure. Langewiesche's book brings up the modern issues the sea presents to the world and the different countries that border it.
The overarching theme of the book is that no matter what humans do, the sea cannot be tamed. Langewiesche's book is divided into different vignettes that inform the reader of the many different issues of the sea. All are impeccably researched and written. The most interesting to me was the final section on shipbreaking. I had no idea of the work and loss of human life involved in reducing a ship to scrap.
This is a great book to give to anyone who wants to know more about how the sea figures into our modern existence.
|
|
Staying Off Cruise Boats
Rating (4)
Date: 2008-01-05
Sea stories have long been among my favorite subjects. The Outlaw Sea was a title I ran across by happenstance, and I'm very glad of this. It is a very interesting book, and presents a well-documented set of facts. After reading this, I do not see myself riding any cruise boats. I'm going by airplane!
|
|
Wow I want a floating Army
Rating (5)
Date: 2007-05-27
0 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I cant wait for the great wars of the sea. This book was a great read about the current state of the sea. Can't help but make me think its the place for me. Sound like a fun game of cat and mouse. I wounder what its like to be a repo man of the sea.
|
|
Questions about any of our books? Would you like us to send you additional photographs? You are invited to contact us!
rwnye@masstraderbooks.com
(231) 670-6424
|
|
|
|