The sea is filled with more than fish and salt water. For centuries people have marveled at its mysteries. Explorers and scientists have searched out its secrets, yet it is still a vast unknown--more men have walked on the moon than have seen the deepest parts of the sea. Fascination with the sea is not limited to whalers, sailors, and surfers. People who have never seen salt water, as well as retired admirals and tattooed seamen, are still drawn by what English poet John Masefield called "Sea Fever."
The reasons for this fascination are varied. For some people, going to sea and returning safely, whether from a few hours in a 20-foot sloop or from fourteen days in a cruise ship, becomes a personal victory over an age-old enemy. The sea is dangerous; it is a killer. For thousands of people--merchant seamen, offshore drillers, and fishermen--the sea is merely a way to make a living. Some hate it every minute they are out of sight of land, but as soon as they get ashore, they hurry back to sea. Going to sea offers an escape from the tedium of dull routine between four walls and a chance to live in a completely different world which, in some ways, is the same as when the Phoenicians and Vikings went to sea.
The sea is filled with monotony, danger, and discomfort, but to some men and women it offers beauty as fresh as when the world was young, the opportunity to find deep understanding of others, great faith in the well-ordered scheme of all things natural, and time to work out personal philosophies. Most, of course, keep such thoughts to themselves; not many have the ability to put them into words. But over the years many have gone to sea and brought back riches worth more than pearls and ambergris; they have produced the literature of the sea--an immense library of adventure, history, romance, poetry, science, and philosophy.
The sea has also had great influence on such other creative disciplines as art, language, and music. Artists have spent their lives depicting the sea and the ships that sail it. Craftsmen have preserved for all time the grace and beauty of ships in intricate models. Plays and musical comedies have been based on nautical themes. An entire school of folk art was devoted to the carving of figureheads for ships. Scrimshaw, an art form based on carved whale teeth, was developed by sailors, as was marlinspike seamanship, the art of tying knots. Tattooing, a practice once considered more artistic than it is now, came from the sea. Much seagoing language has come ashore; many words and terms once used only by seafaring men are now used by everyone. Even architecture and advertising have at times been flavored with salt water.
Literature of the sea might be said to have commenced with the stories of Noah's ark, Jonah in the whale, and the adventures of Ulysses and of Sindbad the Sailor. Discussion here will be limited to American sources: even so, subjects run right through the alphabet, from admiralty law to zoology.
Almost invariably, literature of the sea is written by people who have gone to sea. Anyone can research a book on a nautical subject in the stacks of a library, but the good books about the sea have been written by sailors. A sailor, to fit this category, is someone who went to sea, whether he was seaman, skipper, or admiral. Some writers have been all three.
As America, from
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