Titanic Triumph and Tragedy: Third Edition - Hardcover

Haas, Charles A.; Eaton, John P.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0857330241 ISBN 13: 9780857330246

Publisher: Haynes Publishing UK, 2011

Synopsis

In her brief life the Titanic, at the time of her launch the world’s largest man-made moving object, inspired huge excitement and speculation. Today, 100 years since she sank with the loss of more than 1,500 lives, public interest continues undimmed. This substantial book, long regarded as the definitive book on the subject, has been fully updated in a centenary edition that chronicles the latest chapters in this compelling story.

This new edition includes new information about the crew's forced detention for the U.S. Senate investigation, an entirely new chapter detailing recent Titanic expeditions (both authorized and unauthorized), exploration, legal challenges, the ship's artifacts and their exhibitions, significant new Titanic museums, new appendices, the most complete and accurate Titanic passenger list ever published and more than 100 new photographs.

About this title

About the Author

John Eaton was born, raised in Easton, Pennsylvania and educated at Lafayette College. He has written and lectured extensively on the Titanic and dived to the wreck two-and-a-half miles down. Based in the US, he was one of two  founders of the Titanic International Society (1989), a shipping history and research organization with members worldwide. He is a long time consultant and speaker for a number of Titanic related projects as well as apppearing on TV and radio as a featured guest.

Charles A. Haas was born in Queens, NY and has written and lectured extensively on the Titanic and dived to the wreck two-and-a-half miles down. Based in the US, he was one of two founders of the Titanic International Society (1989), a shipping history and research organization with members worldwide. He has been a consultant to many Titanic related documentaries and a guest lecturer at anumber of Titanic conventions.

Review

An update of the classic reference book first published in 1986, this new edition includes color photographs of the wreck and some pieces salvaged from it, an explanation of the complex legal wrangling over salvage rights, a chapter entitled “Titanic, Today and Tomorrow” with a time line of Titanic-related events since the second edition was published in 1997, and new appendixes. Eaton and Haas also write of their own voyage to the wreck site, an experience of which most Titanic authors cannot boast. The first edition’s subtitle was A Chronicle in Words and Pictures and, indeed, the pictures have always been a major strength of the work, showing more images of people and places related to the ship than any other book. VERDICT: A must-have for anyone interested in Titanic; worth updating to this new edition. - Library Journal, March 5, 2012

 Jack Eaton and Charlie Haas are among the most admired and affectionately regarded of all those who put themselves forward to publicly discourse about the RMS Titanic and all the storied history that sailed with her.

At the forefront of things Titanic for 25 years, these men have remarkably never been surpassed as sheer chroniclers and discoverers. From when they debuted on rendering documentary substance to the ship in 1986 - the first edition of Triumph and Tragedy was published in November that year – they have ever since scrupulously presented the record and then kept it either up to date or freshly informed, much of the time through their own research trips.There were plenty before who were prepared to play fast and loose with the facts (some who also published in 1986, and of course since), but the monumental slab that is this work has always stood as the finest incorporation of what actually happened, from first to last.Keeping it current is a feat in itself. The first edition went into reprint and was subsequently replaced by a second edition in 1994 that featured the authors’ own colour wreck photos. Several imprints of that edition followed, and now the third has taken its place. Re-badged under Haynes Publishing, having flown the flag of the subsidiary Patrick Stephens Ltd on previous launch, this version is sixty pages longer than the already-hefty second edition and contains 100 additional photographs.While the back page blurb claims ‘significant additional text,’ one of the strengths of T&T, as one tends to call it – indeed a very great strength - is that the prose seems to ghost its way between the photographs in the most unassuming manner. The text is there if you want it; nobody is shouting at you; and certainly no agenda is being imposed.The narrative, one detects, is deliberately spare, devoid of editorialising and confined to meticulously cataloguing detail – names, places, dates, incidents. The photographs on the same page are very frequently of those very names, places and incidents. Heaven. And we now have no fewer than 416 large-size pages to dwell upon – paradise indeed.If there is a scrapbook feel, in one sense of looking at it, it derives very often from the poor quality of 1912 newspaper photographs, none of which is rejected on the dubious grounds of ‘production values,’ the all too common catch-cry of many a pompous printing house, and which frequently grates with other authors writing of this period when delivered from on high and in almost contempt of history.The images are what they are, triumphantly un-photoshopped (to stoop to a colloquial verb form), and the interested reader is passionately glad that they are there at all. One heartily embraces the uneven quality of the illustrations and is jealous of the Parnassian heights that Eaton and Haas have reached that no sly scalpel would now even dare to seek to slice out a single grubby visage.T&T is the single-volume work one finds oneself turning to again and again to check a fact or get a sense of anything in particular – and this is especially the case with the passenger list (with all credit to Mike Findlay and Bob Bracken), easily accessed and alphabetical, which is still more time-efficient than wandering to any website, even this one.If the passenger list is an ever-robust high point of T&T, then a matching crew list in the same format seems called for in order to make the book thoroughly indispensable. But to mention this is to sigh that the Venus de Milo has no arms... and it may even be a lacuna that could be remedied in a fourth edition, if such is ever vouchsafed us.T&T has something extraordinary about it, and it seems to be this felicity – that its lavish nature is never intimidating but instead welcoming in the way of a treasure trove. It will gladden the heart of any 13-year-old boy, and turbo-drive their interest further, just as it delights the seasoned specialist who peers into the background of a photograph for further esoteric information, or whose eye lights on a new picture of the face of a witness, already familiar from inquiry transcripts.From collectibles to gravestones, concert programmes to views of other ships on the North Atlantic that night, this is the one publication that really does go closest to claiming to have it all.And now one imitates Eaton and Haas and ceases to write to length – the cognoscenti know the worth of T&T already, and it is weighed in the troy ounce. A triumph indeed in this expanded third edition.If ever shipwrecked, yet allowed by ministering angels of grace to save a single volume for the remaining years marooned upon a desert island, the discerning Titaniac could hardly do better than to ask for this one. Encyclopedia Titanica- December 8, 2011

We're just coming into 2012 and already we have a Titanic book on our desk, but it’s only to be expected as we reach the centenary of the 1912 sinking of the most famous passenger liner in history.

 But this is no ‘me too’ offer: this is the third edition of an already definitive work, newly published with more than 100 new photographs, significant additional text and the most accurate passenger list yet published.

If there is one Titanic volume to have, this is it. It’s a chunky read and the story and photos are wonderful. We particularly enjoyed the chapter relating to the British investigation that followed the tragedy – and it is all here in glorious detail.

There will be many programmes this year on Titanic but for the great-grandmother of the days of passenger liners – this is the volume to cherish. Old Glory- December 15, 2011

As we approach the centenary of this dreadful tragedy, a third edition of “Titanic: Triumph and Tragedy” by the above authors has been published. Their work has long been regarded as one of the most detailed and authoritative books on the loss of White Star’s Titanic. This is a beautifully produced book, lavishly illustrated, and fully updated to include dives to the wreck, dramatic courtroom conflicts and highly evocative new photographs. This would be an excellent addition to any maritime library. Highly recommended. Sea Breezes

About this edition

• Publisher: Haynes Publishing UK
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0857330241
• ISBN 13: 9780857330246
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 3
• Number of pages: 416