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To the Ends of the Earth #3
Fire Down Below: A Novel
The final book in a classic series that began with the Man Booker Prize-winning Rites of Passage
An instant maritime classic, and one of Golding's finest achievements, the trilogy was adapted into a major BBC/PBS Masterpiece miniseries staring Benedict Cumberbatch, Jared Harris and Sam Neill.
To the Ends of the Earth, William Golding's great sea trilogy, presents the extraordinary story of a warship's troubled journey to Australia in the early 1800s. Told through the pages of Edmund Talbot's journal--with equal measure of wit and disdain--it records the mounting tensions and growing misfortunes aboard the ancient ship.
To the Ends of the
1. Rites of Passage
2. Close Quarters
3. Fire Down Below
An instant maritime classic, and one of Golding's finest achievements, the trilogy was adapted into a major BBC/PBS Masterpiece miniseries staring Benedict Cumberbatch, Jared Harris and Sam Neill.
To the Ends of the Earth, William Golding's great sea trilogy, presents the extraordinary story of a warship's troubled journey to Australia in the early 1800s. Told through the pages of Edmund Talbot's journal--with equal measure of wit and disdain--it records the mounting tensions and growing misfortunes aboard the ancient ship.
To the Ends of the
1. Rites of Passage
2. Close Quarters
3. Fire Down Below
313 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1989
11 people are currently reading
1068 people want to read
About the author
William Golding
202 books4,612 followersSir William Gerald Golding was an Engish novelist, playwright, and poet. Best known for his debut novel Lord of the Flies (1954), he published another twelve volumes of fiction in his lifetime. In 1980, he was awarded the Booker Prize for Rites of Passage, the first novel in what became his sea trilogy, To the Ends of the Earth. He was awarded the 1983 Nobel Prize in Literature.
As a result of his contributions to literature, Golding was knighted in 1988. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. In 2008, The Times ranked Golding third on its list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".
As a result of his contributions to literature, Golding was knighted in 1988. He was a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. In 2008, The Times ranked Golding third on its list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 46 reviews
September 6, 2017
The third volume of 'To the Ends of the Earth' which should actually all be read as a single long book. This is the book in which Edmund Talbot's long voyage to Australia finally reaches its culmination. While the first volume served primarily as an introduction and a way to establish Talbot's initial character, the second volume presented him with several episodes which challenged his preconceptions of both himself and the world. This final volume gives Talbot the opportunity to take what he has learned and act on it, effecting real change within himself. It is, quite literally, a journey of self-discovery. Golding's genius lies in letting it all play out before our eyes, in what amounts to practically real time, with absolutely no editorial comment. The reader is left to herself to determine the meaning of Talbot's journey, both for himself and for the reader.
I actually read all three volumes as a single book, but have reviewed them separately here for the purposes of my 100 book challenge for the year. I would NOT recommend treating these as separate volumes. They truly do not stand alone but together form a complex, interesting, and yes, rather long, whole. If you enjoy books about warships, sailing ships (Patrick O'Brien's "Master and Commander" series, for example), or 19th century British society, you may well find this worth your while.
I actually read all three volumes as a single book, but have reviewed them separately here for the purposes of my 100 book challenge for the year. I would NOT recommend treating these as separate volumes. They truly do not stand alone but together form a complex, interesting, and yes, rather long, whole. If you enjoy books about warships, sailing ships (Patrick O'Brien's "Master and Commander" series, for example), or 19th century British society, you may well find this worth your while.
May 16, 2022
Fire Down Below is the final volume of William Golding’s Sea Trilogy, otherwise known as To the Ends of the Earth. In Fire Down Below, we find Edmund Talbot personally transformed, finding humility, love, and friendship before the interminable voyage finally ends in Australia. While overall the Sea Trilogy makes enjoyable and engaging reading, Fire Down Below provides an unfortunate, weak ending for the voyage and the trilogy: it’s more predictable and saccharine than the other two volumes. Reading Fire Down Below, it’s difficult to believe that this is the same William Golding who wrote Lord of the Flies. Despite these dissatisfactions, it’s definitely worth your time to read Fire Down Below and finish this epic voyage. 3.5 stars
January 16, 2020
Şahsım adına bir üçleme seriyi başından sonuna kadar okumanın ve doğru sıralama ile başlayıp bitirebilmiş olmanın haklı gururundayım 😅 başardım!
Şaka bir yana serinin diğer kitaplarında yorumlamadım nihayet bulsun toplamdaki fikrimi belirtmek daha doğru geldi.
Seri baştan sona çok güzel okurken bi yandan Bay Talbot yazarken siz de kamarasında bi yerlerde hissediyorsunuz kendinizi. Sanki gemi yolculuğunu beraber yapıyorsunuz baya hissi geçiyor, okuduğunuz an ve zamandan mekandan kopmak oldukça keyifli, nihayetinde kitap okumak biraz da kaçıştır bence.
Seride sevmediğim tek şey son kitabın çevirmeni değiştiği için midir bilemedim bi değişiklik oldu adını koyamadığım.
Sineklerin Tanrısı’nı sevmek bir rastlantı değilmiş dedirten serinin gereken üne sahip olmaması da baya üzücü.
Tavsiye ediyorum, keyifli okumalar!
Şaka bir yana serinin diğer kitaplarında yorumlamadım nihayet bulsun toplamdaki fikrimi belirtmek daha doğru geldi.
Seri baştan sona çok güzel okurken bi yandan Bay Talbot yazarken siz de kamarasında bi yerlerde hissediyorsunuz kendinizi. Sanki gemi yolculuğunu beraber yapıyorsunuz baya hissi geçiyor, okuduğunuz an ve zamandan mekandan kopmak oldukça keyifli, nihayetinde kitap okumak biraz da kaçıştır bence.
Seride sevmediğim tek şey son kitabın çevirmeni değiştiği için midir bilemedim bi değişiklik oldu adını koyamadığım.
Sineklerin Tanrısı’nı sevmek bir rastlantı değilmiş dedirten serinin gereken üne sahip olmaması da baya üzücü.
Tavsiye ediyorum, keyifli okumalar!
May 4, 2014
Fire Down below is the final part of William Golding’s trilogy set at sea in the early nineteenth century. Edmund Talbot is aboard. He is a passenger amongst others, on his way to Australia, a journey which was, at the time of the book’s setting, about the most dangerous activity, save fighting in the ongoing Napoleonic Wars, that an individual might contemplate. Talbot, however, is no mere human. He’s decidedly British upper crust, at least a cut above the riffraff one might meet in a public place and, what’s more, he is destined to achieve recognition because, when the voyage is complete he will arrive in the antipodes as an administrator, an anointed, appointed one in His Majesty’s service. But there’s a lot of sea to navigate before the work can begin and the status can be conferred.
Most of Fire Down Below is Talbot’s own, first person account of how the voyage, its encounters and tribulations turned out. He often seems quick to judge, often quicker to condemn and rarely questions his right to do either. The transparency of his opinion allows us to see the prejudice of his age with clarity and, on reflection, might encourage us to visualise the blinkered paradigm within which we ourselves interpret our own times. But, like any interested participant in any era, Talbot is also observant, especially when someone else points out the obvious.
And my, what these lower classes get up to! There’s a man who claims to be able to control nature using something he calls science. There’s a dying man who seems to be sympathetic to the goals of the French revolution, and he’s tended by a woman who might not even be his wife! There are ladies in dresses, fellow passengers, who sometimes condescend to make themselves seen, and there are sailors on board – perish the thought! – who often resort to the coarse, the crude and the boorish, besides the athletic, the accomplished and the competent, the cowardly and the heroic. Then, perhaps as now, it seems the only permissible domestic recognition of the achievements of the lower classes happens when they die in uniform. Perhaps like all men of his rank, Captain Anderson keeps everything in check, despite, it seems, the atrocious weather, storms, accidents, calm, frenzy and fractiousness.
No glib listing of events or themes can do justice to William Golding’s masterpiece. The title, Fire Down Below, can be interpreted in many ways and several of them are explored in the book. There’s the obvious naval association, of course, but then there’s also the stratification of social class, the murmurings of psychological doubt and, not least, the possibility also that it might indicate something in the trousers. The last in the author’s To The Ends Of The Earth trilogy, Fire Down Below not only evokes a vivid sense of its setting, it draws the reader into its world as a participant, not merely as an observer, and thus provides and almost visceral feeling of reality. So complete does this immersion in another time, culture and experience become that it may be sound advice to recommend these books be read at least twice, because the transition for the reader across two centuries of changed sensibilities and evolved language might be too much to grasp first time of asking.
Initially staid and apparently predictable, these characters come alive when allowed their own space, their own words and their own time. And this, surely, is William Golding’s great achievement in this trilogy, which Fire Down Below concludes. The reader, alongside some of those who made the journey to Australia, is transported, transplanted into a different culture, a different time with different sensibilities and assumptions and thus offered a different perspective on the familiar. The transportation is utterly convincing in its immediacy and detail and, by the end of Fire Down Below, we feel that we too have lived these travellers’ journeys.
Most of Fire Down Below is Talbot’s own, first person account of how the voyage, its encounters and tribulations turned out. He often seems quick to judge, often quicker to condemn and rarely questions his right to do either. The transparency of his opinion allows us to see the prejudice of his age with clarity and, on reflection, might encourage us to visualise the blinkered paradigm within which we ourselves interpret our own times. But, like any interested participant in any era, Talbot is also observant, especially when someone else points out the obvious.
And my, what these lower classes get up to! There’s a man who claims to be able to control nature using something he calls science. There’s a dying man who seems to be sympathetic to the goals of the French revolution, and he’s tended by a woman who might not even be his wife! There are ladies in dresses, fellow passengers, who sometimes condescend to make themselves seen, and there are sailors on board – perish the thought! – who often resort to the coarse, the crude and the boorish, besides the athletic, the accomplished and the competent, the cowardly and the heroic. Then, perhaps as now, it seems the only permissible domestic recognition of the achievements of the lower classes happens when they die in uniform. Perhaps like all men of his rank, Captain Anderson keeps everything in check, despite, it seems, the atrocious weather, storms, accidents, calm, frenzy and fractiousness.
No glib listing of events or themes can do justice to William Golding’s masterpiece. The title, Fire Down Below, can be interpreted in many ways and several of them are explored in the book. There’s the obvious naval association, of course, but then there’s also the stratification of social class, the murmurings of psychological doubt and, not least, the possibility also that it might indicate something in the trousers. The last in the author’s To The Ends Of The Earth trilogy, Fire Down Below not only evokes a vivid sense of its setting, it draws the reader into its world as a participant, not merely as an observer, and thus provides and almost visceral feeling of reality. So complete does this immersion in another time, culture and experience become that it may be sound advice to recommend these books be read at least twice, because the transition for the reader across two centuries of changed sensibilities and evolved language might be too much to grasp first time of asking.
Initially staid and apparently predictable, these characters come alive when allowed their own space, their own words and their own time. And this, surely, is William Golding’s great achievement in this trilogy, which Fire Down Below concludes. The reader, alongside some of those who made the journey to Australia, is transported, transplanted into a different culture, a different time with different sensibilities and assumptions and thus offered a different perspective on the familiar. The transportation is utterly convincing in its immediacy and detail and, by the end of Fire Down Below, we feel that we too have lived these travellers’ journeys.
July 7, 2022
The year is 1815, and a ship is sailing from England to New SouthWales with a cargo of colonists: failures, convicts, social visionaries and talented young men desirous of advancement. This is, obviously, a microcosm of society, a living, floating (and sometimes foundering) parable of the human condition.
Along its ceaseless voyage southward, it is plagued by disagreement among the passengers, ineffectiveness among the crew, suicides, aggression and stratagems, and natural disasters — culminating, in ‘Fire Down Below’, in a near-collision with an iceberg that is certainly one of the most productively apocalyptic passages in English sea fiction.
Further the ship is dominated — by the time of the third novel — by three representative characters: the morose, standoffish Capt. Anderson (the absence of God familiar to all Golding readers), the devout, solemn and sensible Lt.Summers, and his countertype, the brilliant romantic and suspiciously French Lt. Benet.
While these three effort to complete the disaster-prone voyage, their metaphysical jaunts and those of the other voyagers are observed and recorded, years after the event — by Edmund Fitz HenryTalbot, a young man of noble blood on his mother’s side who hopes the administration of the colony will be a stepping stone to a seat in Parliament, who is a desperate snob, a discouraging British chauvinist, a fruitless victim of Byronic ideas of romantic love and who also tends to trip over his own feet a lot — actually, he seems roughly always falling down, usually into someone.
The third novel of Golding’s Tarpaulin triology, following Rites of Passage and Close Quarters is packed with moments of tension, insight and dry humour. It provides an appropriate conclusion.
Along its ceaseless voyage southward, it is plagued by disagreement among the passengers, ineffectiveness among the crew, suicides, aggression and stratagems, and natural disasters — culminating, in ‘Fire Down Below’, in a near-collision with an iceberg that is certainly one of the most productively apocalyptic passages in English sea fiction.
Further the ship is dominated — by the time of the third novel — by three representative characters: the morose, standoffish Capt. Anderson (the absence of God familiar to all Golding readers), the devout, solemn and sensible Lt.Summers, and his countertype, the brilliant romantic and suspiciously French Lt. Benet.
While these three effort to complete the disaster-prone voyage, their metaphysical jaunts and those of the other voyagers are observed and recorded, years after the event — by Edmund Fitz HenryTalbot, a young man of noble blood on his mother’s side who hopes the administration of the colony will be a stepping stone to a seat in Parliament, who is a desperate snob, a discouraging British chauvinist, a fruitless victim of Byronic ideas of romantic love and who also tends to trip over his own feet a lot — actually, he seems roughly always falling down, usually into someone.
The third novel of Golding’s Tarpaulin triology, following Rites of Passage and Close Quarters is packed with moments of tension, insight and dry humour. It provides an appropriate conclusion.
May 5, 2016
At the end of the long voyage, the narrator Talbot starts to miss his fellow passengers and ship's crew. His sadness disappears when his love of his life arrives in Sydney and a happy ending occurs.
The three books made for a long read but one that bought realism to the longer sea journey, the dangers experienced, the reliance on the skill of the Captain and his officers and the changes in the relationships between passengers.
The British class system is well entrenched, the poor emigrants are never named nor, with a few exceptions, are the crew. The privileged of society are isolated from the great unwashed. Talbot is a snob, selfish, naive but a memorable character.
The book has it's humorous moments and left me with a greater appreciation of the trials and tribulations faced by the early settlers coming to Australia.
The three books made for a long read but one that bought realism to the longer sea journey, the dangers experienced, the reliance on the skill of the Captain and his officers and the changes in the relationships between passengers.
The British class system is well entrenched, the poor emigrants are never named nor, with a few exceptions, are the crew. The privileged of society are isolated from the great unwashed. Talbot is a snob, selfish, naive but a memorable character.
The book has it's humorous moments and left me with a greater appreciation of the trials and tribulations faced by the early settlers coming to Australia.
November 10, 2024
Con questo volume si conclude la trilogia marinaresca di Golding. Ritroviamo Talbot, Summers e tutti i personaggi che affollano questa disastrata nave nel suo peregrinare continuo, tra pericoli vari e accese diatribe e litigi.
Ho trovato questo terzo volume il più compiuto, forse proprio perché rimette ordine in tutto, o quasi, ciò che si legge nei due precedenti.
La psicologia dei personaggi viene sviscerata fino in fondo, mettendo in luce, attraverso il racconto di Talbot, io narrante dell’intera opera, tutte le incongruenze, le meschinità e la banalità dei vari attori di questa che è, volta a volta, farsa o tragedia. Lo stesso Talbot non ne esce benissimo, dimostrandosi più volte persona falsamente profonda ma in realtà piuttosto puerile.
L’unico personaggio con una profondità più vera sembra essere Summers, che peraltro dimostra con il suo comportamento di provare qualcosa di più dell’amicizia per Talbot (in alcuni momenti ha reazioni che si possono tranquillamente definire come gelosia e in altri un’apertura verso Talbot che fa pensare proprio a un sentimento di amore), cosa della quale Talbot proprio non coglie nulla nel modo più assoluto.
L’unico elemento che rimane inspiegato è proprio la fine di Summers, che mi ha lasciato perplesso, e anche un po’ deluso.
Vi è poi una parte finale, con la riapparizione di quella Miss Chumley di cui Talbot si era innamorato a prima vista - ulteriore esempio di comportamento superficiale -, giovane ragazza parimenti superficiale quanto Talbot (i loro dialoghi, tipicamente improntati allo stile dell’epoca - Goldng in questo è perfetto -, dimostrano una volta di più la vacuità dei due personaggi), che francamente mi è suonata un po’ fuori luogo.
Come ho detto, stilisticamente Golding è impeccabile, mimando perfettamente lo stile degli scritti dell’epoca e mettendo in scena una rappresentazione impietosa di una società tutta costruita sulle apparenze e su convenzioni sociali false e utilitaristiche.
Ho trovato questo terzo volume il più compiuto, forse proprio perché rimette ordine in tutto, o quasi, ciò che si legge nei due precedenti.
La psicologia dei personaggi viene sviscerata fino in fondo, mettendo in luce, attraverso il racconto di Talbot, io narrante dell’intera opera, tutte le incongruenze, le meschinità e la banalità dei vari attori di questa che è, volta a volta, farsa o tragedia. Lo stesso Talbot non ne esce benissimo, dimostrandosi più volte persona falsamente profonda ma in realtà piuttosto puerile.
L’unico personaggio con una profondità più vera sembra essere Summers, che peraltro dimostra con il suo comportamento di provare qualcosa di più dell’amicizia per Talbot (in alcuni momenti ha reazioni che si possono tranquillamente definire come gelosia e in altri un’apertura verso Talbot che fa pensare proprio a un sentimento di amore), cosa della quale Talbot proprio non coglie nulla nel modo più assoluto.
L’unico elemento che rimane inspiegato è proprio la fine di Summers, che mi ha lasciato perplesso, e anche un po’ deluso.
Vi è poi una parte finale, con la riapparizione di quella Miss Chumley di cui Talbot si era innamorato a prima vista - ulteriore esempio di comportamento superficiale -, giovane ragazza parimenti superficiale quanto Talbot (i loro dialoghi, tipicamente improntati allo stile dell’epoca - Goldng in questo è perfetto -, dimostrano una volta di più la vacuità dei due personaggi), che francamente mi è suonata un po’ fuori luogo.
Come ho detto, stilisticamente Golding è impeccabile, mimando perfettamente lo stile degli scritti dell’epoca e mettendo in scena una rappresentazione impietosa di una società tutta costruita sulle apparenze e su convenzioni sociali false e utilitaristiche.
August 9, 2023
İlk iki kitabın nefis belirsizliği içinde uzun süre aynı gemide yol alan farklı karakterlerdeki insanların umuda sarılma mücadelelerini, iniş çıkışlarını okumuştum. Final beklediğim gibi olsa da öncesi nisbeten ağır tempoluydu. Bu yüzden 3 yıldız verdim.
Eserde favori karakterim Charles Summers idi. Görev aşkı ve insanlığıyla Talbot kadar hatırlanacak bir karakterdi.
Seri bitmiş olsa da benim 2023’te 23 kitap İngiliz Edebiyatı mücadelem devam ediyor yazarın daha okuyacağım çok kitabı var. Bu yüzden şimdilik virgül.
Eserde favori karakterim Charles Summers idi. Görev aşkı ve insanlığıyla Talbot kadar hatırlanacak bir karakterdi.
Seri bitmiş olsa da benim 2023’te 23 kitap İngiliz Edebiyatı mücadelem devam ediyor yazarın daha okuyacağım çok kitabı var. Bu yüzden şimdilik virgül.
December 1, 2025
The final instalment of his To the Ends of the Earth trilogy, Fire Down Below starts out with a lot of banter, but gradually takes shape and has several seafaring disasters for us readers: death, sickness, a dislodged mast, a leaking ship and even an iceberg! Not everything is equally interesting, but Golding knows how to transport us into the early 19th century seafaring culture and adds a slice of convict-era Australia at the end as well.
February 12, 2019
Yani her uc kitapta da kendimi bir kaptirdim, birakamadim, o denizi yasadim onlarla beraber ama elim yuksek puanlamaya gitmiyor nedense. Belki sonra tekrar okumaliyim bilemiyorum.
February 19, 2021
A most excellent novel, deeply absorbing, but I have to say, in the world of great writers and sea stories, my heart belongs to Patrick O’Brian and the Aubrey & Maturin series!
December 28, 2014
This is the 3rd book of a trilogy and the gloss wore off a long time ago.
It's okay, well written, occasionally very well written but, on the whole, it just fails to hold your attention as a novel should do; and that holds true for the second volume too leading me to conclude that one volume was enough for this trilogy.
It's okay, well written, occasionally very well written but, on the whole, it just fails to hold your attention as a novel should do; and that holds true for the second volume too leading me to conclude that one volume was enough for this trilogy.
December 9, 2013
Great adventure story set in the claustrophobic space of a ship in the early 1800's as it travels through the sea to Sydney cove. The third in a trilogy of books as told by Edmund Talbot, it's entertaining with conflicts on board between various characters. As well as dangers facing the ship and the threat of a fire smouldering down below.
May 30, 2017
I never really got a firm grasp on this story. Though Edmund Talbot became less unlikable as I read the books, I never managed to care about him. This last book had a few interesting and even exiting pages, but the way it was told sometimes made it hard to follow.
July 31, 2016
Yes. The perfect ending to the trilogy. Who now writes like Golding? The satire, the social commentary, the perfect observations? Wonderful.
January 2, 2020
I told myself I would finish every Golding novel before the end of the year, and I just barely managed it. All I have left is his remaining nonfiction, his two radio plays (if I can find them), and maybe his book of poems.
This final volume continues in the vein of the second, as Talbot is buffeted about by the happenings on the ship. Mr. Prettiman takes a bigger role, Summers' and Talbot's friendship is developed and tested further, and Talbot emerges (slightly) wiser than when he entered the wooden world. I'm actually at a slight loss for words, almost everything I already said about the second book applies to this one too. Thankfully Golding avoids excessive repetition, but it's still a series of essentially random events, as Mrs. Prettiman tells Talbot. This is exemplified by the fate of Deverel,
Even with all the changes Talbot undergoes, and the widening of his perspective, his nature remains unchanged. We hear as little as in book one about the emigrants, and his attitude to the native Australians is even more dismissive. One can only wonder what the native man gazing at the English harbour might be thinking. Even on the ship, despite Talbot's wide-ranging contacts on the ship, we maintain the impression that we're only getting a tiny fraction of all the petty dramas that go on in the ship, and by extension everywhere.
I was immensely surprised to find further development of the wood/iron image I thought I identified in book two. After the introduction of the operation to use the contraction of iron to repair the shoe, I realised there were far more instances of plants being relevant than I recalled, though they still fail to fall into a neat dichotomy. Anderson's garden in his cabin is introduced quite early in book one, as is the hapless Willis' potted plant. Colley's amazement at the majesty of the masts ties in to Summers' belief in Nature as bringing men closer to God. The weeds growing on the hull are a major concern in book two, which is also where Talbot's story of the ship growing vines comes up, in relation to Gibbs (which one could tie in via the Dionysus connection to Colley/Summers' worship of God). The ship is of course almost entirely made of plant materials. Iron comes up only in the context of the story of the iron ship, the repair of the shoe, and the chaining of Deverel. Talbot is initially defensive of the concept of the iron ship in the face of Anderson's skepticism, but the position is reversed when Anderson supports Benét's repair and Talbot joins Summers in opposing it as dangerous. Benét and the unseen Coombs are both foreigners, while Talbot, Summers and Gibbs are solidly English. The repair greatly speeds the ship, while the weeds slow it. Summers' apparent lack of skill in comparison to Benét also doesn't speak too well for wood vs. iron, but he clearly has more heart despite Benét's professed admiration for poetry, which seems to be mostly self-aggrandizing in comparison to Summers' private piousness. Golding has used a plant before as an image of the spire in The Spire and of course there are the wooden boats in The Inheritors, plus the even less relevant iron ship in Pincher Martin, but these connections are too vague to say anything.
Golding's career spanned nearly 40 years of novel publishing, and it's kind of funny comparing his latter novels to his former. His first five books, while all very different in their ways, all shared a certain dark, heavy, sharp tone. With the exception of Darkness Visible, his later novels feel substantially lighter and airier, like he'd said what he wanted to say and then wanted to play around a bit. It's almost difficult to believe the same writer wrote The Spire and the ending of this book. I suppose this goes a long way to explaining his oft-repeated claim that he was not a pessimist or cynic. While I by and large didn't find his later work nearly as moving or arresting as his early work, I can confidently say Golding was a master artist, and will remain one of my favourite novelists for years and years to come.
This final volume continues in the vein of the second, as Talbot is buffeted about by the happenings on the ship. Mr. Prettiman takes a bigger role, Summers' and Talbot's friendship is developed and tested further, and Talbot emerges (slightly) wiser than when he entered the wooden world. I'm actually at a slight loss for words, almost everything I already said about the second book applies to this one too. Thankfully Golding avoids excessive repetition, but it's still a series of essentially random events, as Mrs. Prettiman tells Talbot. This is exemplified by the fate of Deverel,
Even with all the changes Talbot undergoes, and the widening of his perspective, his nature remains unchanged. We hear as little as in book one about the emigrants, and his attitude to the native Australians is even more dismissive. One can only wonder what the native man gazing at the English harbour might be thinking. Even on the ship, despite Talbot's wide-ranging contacts on the ship, we maintain the impression that we're only getting a tiny fraction of all the petty dramas that go on in the ship, and by extension everywhere.
I was immensely surprised to find further development of the wood/iron image I thought I identified in book two. After the introduction of the operation to use the contraction of iron to repair the shoe, I realised there were far more instances of plants being relevant than I recalled, though they still fail to fall into a neat dichotomy. Anderson's garden in his cabin is introduced quite early in book one, as is the hapless Willis' potted plant. Colley's amazement at the majesty of the masts ties in to Summers' belief in Nature as bringing men closer to God. The weeds growing on the hull are a major concern in book two, which is also where Talbot's story of the ship growing vines comes up, in relation to Gibbs (which one could tie in via the Dionysus connection to Colley/Summers' worship of God). The ship is of course almost entirely made of plant materials. Iron comes up only in the context of the story of the iron ship, the repair of the shoe, and the chaining of Deverel. Talbot is initially defensive of the concept of the iron ship in the face of Anderson's skepticism, but the position is reversed when Anderson supports Benét's repair and Talbot joins Summers in opposing it as dangerous. Benét and the unseen Coombs are both foreigners, while Talbot, Summers and Gibbs are solidly English. The repair greatly speeds the ship, while the weeds slow it. Summers' apparent lack of skill in comparison to Benét also doesn't speak too well for wood vs. iron, but he clearly has more heart despite Benét's professed admiration for poetry, which seems to be mostly self-aggrandizing in comparison to Summers' private piousness. Golding has used a plant before as an image of the spire in The Spire and of course there are the wooden boats in The Inheritors, plus the even less relevant iron ship in Pincher Martin, but these connections are too vague to say anything.
Golding's career spanned nearly 40 years of novel publishing, and it's kind of funny comparing his latter novels to his former. His first five books, while all very different in their ways, all shared a certain dark, heavy, sharp tone. With the exception of Darkness Visible, his later novels feel substantially lighter and airier, like he'd said what he wanted to say and then wanted to play around a bit. It's almost difficult to believe the same writer wrote The Spire and the ending of this book. I suppose this goes a long way to explaining his oft-repeated claim that he was not a pessimist or cynic. While I by and large didn't find his later work nearly as moving or arresting as his early work, I can confidently say Golding was a master artist, and will remain one of my favourite novelists for years and years to come.
October 8, 2022
The Ends of the Earth trilogy/triad has been a proper adventure. While it never quite recaptures the heady magnificence of casting off (Rites of Passage), the claustrophobic cabin spaces conjured by the subsequent titles (Close Quarters; and here Fire Down Below) maintained an admirable intensity of action and feeling.
The New York Times wrote disparagingly that this novel was a 'burnt out hulk', formed of nothing more than a discontinuous series of events (2 April 1989). Nevermind the NYT reviewer's non-sequitur (how can events make a hulk?), there is some truth that there are bursts of picaresque action that read as crowd-pleasers. As with previous novels, I felt Golding trying hard to please an audience. We hear these pleas through his cast. His characters comment on the implausibility of events, and Talbot talks about the lack of 'flow' in his (fictional) narrative... i.e. Golding's own narrative. The melodramatic encounter with the ice flow is substantiated to the reader, by being rubbished by a character who holds the early-19thC view that a Southern Continent (Antarctica) is an impossibility. Golding thus uses inverted reasoning to assure his readers of the credibility of the action, even while doing his best to pull out the stops (dropping blocks and vast cliffs of ice, swirling countercurrents etc...) to wow those in the cheap seats.
NYT's review gives short shrift to a very good book. Although I have read the three in order, I disagree with NYT that it requires the other two books to make sense. Some details would make less sense, but the story of a man establishing his own identity, and the gravitational distances between the egos that encircle one another on the ship, are sufficient to stand alone.
If I was choosing one it would be Rites of Passage, but this was nevertheless a reasonably satisfying conclusion.
The New York Times wrote disparagingly that this novel was a 'burnt out hulk', formed of nothing more than a discontinuous series of events (2 April 1989). Nevermind the NYT reviewer's non-sequitur (how can events make a hulk?), there is some truth that there are bursts of picaresque action that read as crowd-pleasers. As with previous novels, I felt Golding trying hard to please an audience. We hear these pleas through his cast. His characters comment on the implausibility of events, and Talbot talks about the lack of 'flow' in his (fictional) narrative... i.e. Golding's own narrative. The melodramatic encounter with the ice flow is substantiated to the reader, by being rubbished by a character who holds the early-19thC view that a Southern Continent (Antarctica) is an impossibility. Golding thus uses inverted reasoning to assure his readers of the credibility of the action, even while doing his best to pull out the stops (dropping blocks and vast cliffs of ice, swirling countercurrents etc...) to wow those in the cheap seats.
NYT's review gives short shrift to a very good book. Although I have read the three in order, I disagree with NYT that it requires the other two books to make sense. Some details would make less sense, but the story of a man establishing his own identity, and the gravitational distances between the egos that encircle one another on the ship, are sufficient to stand alone.
If I was choosing one it would be Rites of Passage, but this was nevertheless a reasonably satisfying conclusion.
March 15, 2026
I was puzzled on reading the first volume of this trilogy. What was it about? Why did it win the Booker Prize. It features an entitled aristocrat. Edmund Talbot on a voyage to Australia in the early nineteenth century. Sure, stuff happens. Talbot looks down on his fellow passengers, and seeks out those few he believes to be gentlemen. He despises the curate, Colley. But when Colley is bullied and humiliated. Talbot begins to change. It was this change that kept me reading the next two volumes.
In the succeeding volumes, more stuff happens. In the second book, the ship is becalmed, and encounters another vessel, and Talbot falls in love with a passenger on that ship. In the final book, the ship is exposed to multiple threats, including an iceberg in the Southern Ocean. But it’s not the plot stuff which is important. It’s the change in Talbot’s character. In the tiny world of the ship, riddled by tensions of personality and class, he learns to become human.
In the end, it’s not his limerence with Miss Chumley which is his true love, but his bond with the lieutenant Charles Summers. Summers is not a gentleman, but Talbot warms to his decency and kindness. He also learns to like and respect his fellow passenger, the grumpy radical Prettiman. By the end, he even knows some crewmen by name.
In some ways, this book is the reverse of Golding’s Lord of the Flies. It is not the monster within which is released by the isolation of the voyage but the angel.
In the succeeding volumes, more stuff happens. In the second book, the ship is becalmed, and encounters another vessel, and Talbot falls in love with a passenger on that ship. In the final book, the ship is exposed to multiple threats, including an iceberg in the Southern Ocean. But it’s not the plot stuff which is important. It’s the change in Talbot’s character. In the tiny world of the ship, riddled by tensions of personality and class, he learns to become human.
In the end, it’s not his limerence with Miss Chumley which is his true love, but his bond with the lieutenant Charles Summers. Summers is not a gentleman, but Talbot warms to his decency and kindness. He also learns to like and respect his fellow passenger, the grumpy radical Prettiman. By the end, he even knows some crewmen by name.
In some ways, this book is the reverse of Golding’s Lord of the Flies. It is not the monster within which is released by the isolation of the voyage but the angel.
September 24, 2018
Odds and ends to complete a story
“Fire Down Below” concludes the “To the Ends of the Earth” trilogy. In it we learn the fates of most of the characters and crew our young naïf Edmund Talbot has associated himself with over his extended voyage to a colonial posting in Australia. Sparing the high allegory of the first novel or the hazy teenage antics of the second, the third and concluding novel focuses on the evolution of Talbot’s character through his interactions with the officers and fellow passengers of the crippled hulk bearing them across the sea. The latter portion of the novel takes on the quality of hazy memory, and the story becomes an unlikely fantasy as the tricky knots of shipboard relationships resolve themselves. Talbot’s fate in particular led me to wonder if perhaps an earlier event had actually destroyed the ship and the rest of the novel the dream of a dying man. Either way, I get the sense that Golding felt compelled to round out the story, and the small moments and large terrors work together to create a ripping yarn of one man’s rites of passage.
“Fire Down Below” concludes the “To the Ends of the Earth” trilogy. In it we learn the fates of most of the characters and crew our young naïf Edmund Talbot has associated himself with over his extended voyage to a colonial posting in Australia. Sparing the high allegory of the first novel or the hazy teenage antics of the second, the third and concluding novel focuses on the evolution of Talbot’s character through his interactions with the officers and fellow passengers of the crippled hulk bearing them across the sea. The latter portion of the novel takes on the quality of hazy memory, and the story becomes an unlikely fantasy as the tricky knots of shipboard relationships resolve themselves. Talbot’s fate in particular led me to wonder if perhaps an earlier event had actually destroyed the ship and the rest of the novel the dream of a dying man. Either way, I get the sense that Golding felt compelled to round out the story, and the small moments and large terrors work together to create a ripping yarn of one man’s rites of passage.
November 22, 2023
Reading the first book in this trilogy I thoroughly disliked all the characters, but loved the brilliant wit and irony of Golding's writing. By the third book I was irritated by Golding's boring digressions, his pretentious literary allusions and his weak, saccharine story line, and I realised that what was keeping me gripped was actually my liking for the flawed yet maturing hero, Edmund Talbot. I thought book two was laying the ground work for a really amazing conclusion where some sort of revolution would occur in either the hierarchy of the ship's society, or perhaps in the heart of Talbot. It is true revolutionary waves lapped around the edges, thanks to the Prettimans and Benet and possibly even Summers, but Talbot was never metaphorically engulfed. The iceberg threatened and then floated away. A happily ever upper middle class after awaited our hero.
August 30, 2024
Just such a good series. There is much more action in this last part as the ship escapes peril after peril. Edmund has gone through his rite of passage from annoying twerp to brave and useful human being though still ironing out a few character flaws and continuing his journey of learning. In this is friendship with Lieutenant Sunmers grows but he steadily overcomes his prejudice against Lieutenant Benet, he learns respect for the social reformers and alm battle potential fires, huge seas, icebergs before coming safe to shore and an epilogue thar brings a final tragedy and Edmund's live interest from Close Quarters out of the woodwork in Australia (though the rationale of this Antipodean voyage being not entirely clear).
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 18, 2017
I actually read all three books in one volume, but since they won't be added separately to my 2017 Reading Challenge, I am adding them each manually, solely for that purpose. My actual review of the series is under the single volume, To the Ends of the Earth.
February 25, 2023
Golding is famed for his 'Lord of the Flies' but his Sea Trilogy is a greater achievement, putting you right in the action and perfectly recreating the trials of travelling by sea from England to Australia.
June 4, 2023
Neither as funny nor as serious as the first two instalments. There’s just not as much going on. I think this might be the simple sea story promised in Rites of Passage. There’s drama and peril and two anchors dropping in the same port. Narratively, it’s a satisfying conclusion.
February 4, 2024
Read it
This is a masterpiece. I recommend it to any of my acquaintances bold enough to embark on a journey of of the trials of a mixed up but likeable young fool, trying to find himself in a world of contradictions.
This is a masterpiece. I recommend it to any of my acquaintances bold enough to embark on a journey of of the trials of a mixed up but likeable young fool, trying to find himself in a world of contradictions.
March 29, 2024
A satisfying conclusion to the trilogy. The trilogy makes up a cohesive whole, while each part has its own arc and retains its own identity.
The accreted desperation here gives way to calmer moments of surprising sensitivity and reflection, which deepen the experience of the whole.
The accreted desperation here gives way to calmer moments of surprising sensitivity and reflection, which deepen the experience of the whole.
March 6, 2019
Ich wollte wissen, wie es ausgeht, hätte aber (wie so oft) besser nach dem ersten Band aufgehört.
October 19, 2019
Not too engrossing. Story of a troubled voyage from England to Australia and how the passengers and the crew react to different situations. Clever writing.
September 24, 2021
Interesting to see talbots voyage and the problems they overcame to get to Australia but the Novel just didn’t hold my attention and some parts were too drawn out
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