The Far Land
200 Years of Murder, Mania and Mutiny in the South Pacific
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- R$ 114,90
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- R$ 114,90
Descrição da editora
'The Far Land swells in the cause and effect of actions of passion. Brandon Presser's fascinating narrative of the relentless consequences of the Bounty mutineers asks: were they brave or damned? They lived so very troubled ever after. You can't make this stuff up!' TOM HANKS
'The Far Land hits a lot of my pleasure centers: remote islands, then-and-now non-fiction, historical mysteries and forthright travelogues. The first night I started reading, I dreamed about Pitcairn Island.' MAGGIE SHIPSTEAD, 2021 Booker Prize shortlisted and 2022 Women's Prize for Fiction shortlisted author of Great Circle
A THRILLING TALE OF POWER, OBSESSION AND BETRAYAL AT THE EDGE OF THE WORLD
In 1808, an American merchant ship happened upon an uncharted island in the South Pacific and unwittingly solved the biggest nautical mystery of the era: the whereabouts of a band of fugitives who, after seizing their vessel, had disappeared into the night with their Tahitian companions.
Seven generations later, the island is still inhabited by descendants of the original mutineers, marooned like modern castaways.
In 2018, Brandon Presser went to live among its families; two clans bound by circumstance and secrets. There, he pieced together Pitcairn's full story: an operatic saga that holds all visitors in its mortal clutch - even the author.
Told through vivid historical and personal narrative, The Far Land goes beyond the infamous mutiny on the Bounty, offering an unprecedented glimpse at life on the fringes of civilization, and how, perhaps, it's not so different from our own.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Travel writer Presser debuts with a fascinating account of what happened after the HMS Bounty mutineers and their Tahitian companions settled on the remote South Pacific island of Pitcairn in 1790. Interwoven with this dramatic history is Presser's chronicle of his 2018 visit to Pitcairn to meet the island's 48 inhabitants, most of them descendants of the mutineers. Drawn to Pitcairn in part because its "punishing verticality" made it so inaccessible, the fugitives kept their whereabouts hidden for 18 years. Presser focuses on their efforts to establish a settlement and the frightening ways their colony devolved through infighting, drunken rages, and a revolt by the Polynesians, who were treated like slaves. By the fourth year on Pitcairn, most of the Bounty mutineers were dead, Presser notes. Arriving in 2018 via the island's only link to the outside world—a cargo ship that visits four times a year—Presser finds two warring clans bound together by the island's "widespread legacy of sexual misconduct." Though he occasionally veers into melodrama, Presser expertly intertwines the historical and contemporary elements of the story and brings Pitcairn's unusual culture to vibrant life. Readers will have a tough time putting this one down.
