The Aubrey–Maturin series, also known as the Aubreyad, is a sequence of 20 historical novels by Patrick O'Brian, set during the Napoleonic Wars and centering on the friendship between Captain Jack Aubrey of the Royal Navy and his ship's surgeon Stephen Maturin, who is also a physician, naturalist and secret agent. The 21st novel of the series, left unfinished by O'Brian's death in 2000, was published in late 2004.

The 2003 film Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World is based on books in this series, notably Master and Commander, HMS Surprise, The Letter of Marque and The Far Side of the World. The role of Jack Aubrey was played by Russell Crowe, and Stephen Maturin was played by Paul Bettany.

Characters

The series portrays the rise of Jack Aubrey from Lieutenant to Admiral in the Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. Many of his exploits and reverses are based on the chequered career of Thomas Cochrane.

Aubrey's friend Stephen Maturin is an Irish-Catalan physician, naturalist and spy. In his role as a naturalist he is based on Sir Joseph Banks. A recurring theme is his long pursuit of the beautiful but unreliable Diana Villiers.

Humour

A lot of the humour in the series come from the two principal characters' malapropisms. Aubrey is a genius at sea and with practical matters but has large gaps in his understanding of everything else, and should never be allowed within twelve fathoms of a metaphor. Maturin, by contrast, is extremely erudite but his occasional attempts to use naval slang, or explain the working of a ship to someone are always doomed.. Thus we have Aubrey's attempting to to use the occasional word of French and describing a patois as a putain and Maturin saying "if the Admiral proves inquisitive, I may toss him off with a round turn" (the correct phrase is to bring someone up with a round turn).

See also

• Frederick Marryat, 19th century a pioneer of the nautical novel, and a real-life successful naval officer in the time of the Aubrey–Maturin series.
• C. S. Forester, 20th century novelist whose Horatio Hornblower series in many ways prefigured O'Brian's sea tales.
• Thomas Cochrane, dashing and controversial captain in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars whose exploits and reverses inspired many events in the fictional careers of both Jack Aubrey and Horatio Hornblower.

External links

• Harper-Collins Aubrey-Maturin site
• The Gunroom, a web site and e-mail list devoted to the series. Many excellent resources may be found here.