The Surgeon's Mate is the seventh historical novel in the Aubrey–Maturin series written by Patrick O'Brian, first published in 1980. The story is set during the War of 1812 and the Napoleonic Wars.

Buoyed by victory over an American ship, Aubrey, Maturin and Diana Villiers speed to England on a mail packet that is chased for the papers in Maturin's hands, and possibly for Diana herself. The papers, including a copy of the official report of victory over an American ship, thus arrive in England before the originals, as the packet sailed to outrun the American chasers. Aubrey then commands HMS Ariel for a mission on the Danish coast, which ultimately leads him and Maturin once again to being prisoners of war.

This novel was part of the reissue of the series, with copies not always available in the original order written. This was a challenge to readers and reviewers of that time (1990–92), who did not fit this novel into its place in the sequence, suggesting each novel can be read on its own. It was praised as part of "O'Brian's superb series on the early-19th-century adventures" of Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin,

Reviews

While one reviewer finds this novel a story of both Aubrey and Maturin, another sees it primarily as a story of Maturin, with light shed on his dark world of intelligence and spies.

Kirkus Reviews find the story literate and amusing, and "polished, historically accurate, and intensely pleasurable tales" from the era of the Napoleonic Wars. The many actions in the plot are noted: "This time out, Captain Jack Aubrey and ship's surgeon Stephen Maturin limp home from America for a brief rest before sailing to the Baltic to subvert the occupying Catalan troops—and then to the Bay of Biscay to run aground&nbsp;... The Baltic mission is successful, but the subsequent flight from Scandinavia runs into the rocks off the French coast. The officers are taken prisoner". The plot aspect of note is that "Aubrey, Maturin and Diana Villiers (Maturin's fickle and enigmatic love) are passengers on a packet ship from Nova Scotia to England when two American privateers give chase. They are hunting Maturin".</blockquote>

Publication history

  • 1980 Collins hardback first edition
  • 1992 W W Norton paperback
  • Recorded Books Unabridged Audio edition narrated by Patrick Tull ()
  • 2011, USA, W W Norton & Company (), Pub date 5 December 2011, e-book

The books in this series by Patrick O'Brian were re-issued in the US by W. W. Norton & Co. in 1992, after a re-discovery of the author and this series by Norton, finding a new audience for the entire series. Norton issued The Surgeon's Mate twelve years after its initial publication, as a paperback in 1992. Ironically, it was a US publisher, J. B. Lippincott & Co., who asked O'Brian to write the first book in the series, Master and Commander published in 1969. Collins picked it up in the UK, and continued to publish each novel as O'Brian completed another story. Beginning with The Nutmeg of Consolation in 1991, the novels were released at about the same time in the USA (by W W Norton) and the UK (by HarperCollins, the name of Collins after a merger).

Kirkus Reviews mentions the arrival of books out of order to a reviewer's desk: "The dashing Aubrey/Maturin naval tales (among others, The Ionian Mission--see above) continue to come out in intervals from England, where they are hugely and deservedly popular. Published some years ago in the UK, they've been arriving out of order, so readers find themselves sorting out prequels from sequels. But shipping arrangements do no damage to these polished, historically accurate, and intensely pleasurable tales of the Royal Navy in the Napoleonic era." Following novels were released at the same time by the UK and US publishers. Collins asked Geoff Hunt in 1988 to do the cover art for the twelve books published by then, with The Letter of Marque being the first book to have Hunt's work on the first edition. He continued to paint the covers for future books; the covers were used on both USA and UK editions. Reissues of earlier novels used the Geoff Hunt covers.

Adaptations

In 2014, in honour of the 100th anniversary of the birth of author Patrick O'Brian, BBC Radio 4 aired a 10-part adaptation of The Surgeon's Mate, with Benedict Cumberbatch as narrator. The series was first aired in 2004.

References

  • Maps for The Surgeon's Mate