Two Years Before the Mast
Assigned by 1 of the 9 reading lists, catalogue entry only
- Written
- 1840
- Language
- English
- Length
- Long · 400 pp300 to 700 pages
- Difficulty
- Approachable1 of 5 for a first-year reader
We recommendTwo Years Before the MastPenguin Classics, 1986Thomas Philbrick's edition, with the concluding chapter Dana added in 1869.
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The journal of a Harvard undergraduate who, his eyes weakened by measles, shipped as a common sailor on the brig Pilgrim in 1834 for a voyage round Cape Horn to California, where the ship gathered hides along a coast then Mexican and nearly empty. Dana describes the work of the ship, a flogging by the captain, the hide trade at San Diego and Santa Barbara, and the return round the Horn in winter aboard the Alert. He wrote it to give a voice to seamen and to reform their treatment.
No reading guide yet
The catalogue entry above is complete: the dates, the form, the themes and every program that assigns Two Years Before the Mast are verified against each program's published list.
What is missing is the part that takes real work: the summary, the key passages, and a recommended translation. The edition named below is the one most programs assign, so the buy links are useful already.
