Two in a Boat : A Marital Voyage - Hardcover

Gwyneth Lewis

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 000712063X ISBN 13: 9780007120635

Publisher: Fourth Estate, 2005

Synopsis

In her forties and recovering from a long battle against depression and alcoholism, Welsh poet Gwyneth Lewis decided to trade in her landlubber life - a nice house in Cardiff and a sensible job at the BBC - for life aboard a small yacht with her husband Leighton, a former bosun with the Merchant Navy and now in his mid-sixties. "We bought our first sailing boat by accident! She was a twenty-three-foot Intro class racer called Nitro, had a yellow hull and was totally unsuitable for beginners, so we bought her and started to learn how to sail in the Bristol Channel. Not long afterwards we were talking about renting out the house and sailing around the world." After buying a yacht - Jameeleh - and teaching themselves to sail it (a process not without its fair share of disasters, from psychotic seas off St. Govan's Head to broken ribs off Ballycotton), Gwyneth and Leighton set out to cross the Atlantic. Unfortunately Gwyneth's incessant seasickness and Leighton's daily deterioration into a moody Captain Bastard were not the only catastrophes with which they had to contend. This strange, stirring and often hilarious account of their voyage is as much a beginner's guide to sailing as it is a portrait of a marriage under the pressure of depression, both medical and meteorological. Gwyneth Lewis's training as a poet and film-maker lends her prose a wonderfully visual quality, and her contagious optimism in the face of inconceivable adversity - not much more could possibly have gone wrong - makes this unique book both touchingly witty and incredibly wise.

About this title

About the Author:

Gwyneth Lewis is an award-winning poet whose work has drawn widespread acclaim. She has been shortlisted for the Forward Prize and was named one of the Next Generation British poets in 2004. Her most recent book, Sunbathing in the Rain, is an upbeat and practical look at depression. She is still married and lives in Cardiff.

From Publishers Weekly:

In a charming memoir with as much turmoil as a rough sea, Lewis recounts her attempt to morph from a "messy depressive, often overwhelmed by my own emotions" to someone "unbowed by internal or external storms." After emerging from a year of clinical depression, Lewis, a Welsh poet, visited a tarot card reader, who told her she wasn't living life "to the full," and advised her, "you should buy a boat." In less than a month, Lewis, in her 40s, and her husband, 23 years her senior and formerly in the merchant navy, bought a boat and prepared to leave their home and jobs in Cardiff (a port on the Bristol Channel) to embark on a lengthy voyage. Excited by the idea of a change in scenery, the two set off for Brazil. The trip, naturally, wasn't easy: debilitating seasickness, engine problems, unscrupulous mechanics, a resurgence of Lewis's depression, not-so-scenic ports of call and extreme weather conditions were all exacerbated by their deteriorating relationship. Lewis leans on allegory, which can wear thin, but her poetic talent shines through with lines like "Cold air French kisses the warm, which loses its identity for it." Photos., illus. (Apr. 1)
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About this edition

• Publisher: Fourth Estate
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 000712063X
• ISBN 13: 9780007120635
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 295