Commodore Hornblower

by C. S. Forester

Overview

These thrilling tales of high-seas adventure in the Napoleonic era, which Winston Churchill found "vastly entertaining" and Ernest Hemingway recommended to "every literate I know", are being eagerly embraced by a new generation of readers. Back Bay takes pleasure in reissuing these classic tales in handsome new trade paperback editions.
— The Hornblower renaissance is in full sail with a nearly tenfold increase in sales: more than I5O, OOO Hornblower books sold in the first six months of 1999.
— The A&E television network's series of original movies based on Hornblower's adventures have been tremendously successful — praised by critics, enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of viewers, and winner of the Emmy Award for best miniseries.
— Two new movies will be premiering in the spring on A&E.
— Readers and booksellers who admire Patrick O'Brian's novels delight in discovering this "new" series of nautical adventure stories.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316289382
Publisher:	Little, Brown and Company
Publication date:	04/05/1989
Series:	Horatio Hornblower Series
Edition description:	Revised
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.10(h) x 1.00(d)
Age Range:	12 - 18 Years

About the Author

C. S. Forester (1899 - 1966) wrote several novels with military and naval themes, including The African Queen, The Barbary Pirates, The General, The Good Shepherd, The Gun, The Last Nine Days of the "Bismarck" and Rifleman Dodd. But Forester is best known as the creator of Horatio Hornblower, a British naval genius of the Napoleonic era, whose exploits and adventures on the high seas Forester chronicled in a series of eleven acclaimed historical novels. Over the years, Hornblower has proved to be one of the most beloved and enduring fictional heroes in English literature, his popularity rivaled only by Sherlock Holmes.

Born Cecil Louis Troughton Smith in Cairo, Egypt, Forester grew up in London. At the start of World War II, he traveled on behalf of the British government to America, where he produced propaganda encouraging the United States to remain on Britain's side. After the War, Forester remained in America and made Berkeley, California, his home.

The character of Horatio Hornblower was born after Forester was called to Hollywood to write a pirate film. While the script was being drafted, another studio released Captain Blood, starring Errol Flynn, based on the same historical incidents about which Forester was writing. Rather than seek another movie project, and to avoid an impending paternity suit, Forester jumped aboard a freighter bound for England. By the end of the voyage he had outlined Beat to the Quarters, which introduced the now legendary character Hornblower, Bush, and Lady Barbara.

Forester died in 1966 while working on Hornblower During the Crisis.

Author biography courtesy of Time Warner.

Date of Birth:

August 27, 1899

Date of Death:

April 2, 1966

Place of Birth:

Cairo, Egypt

Place of Death:

Berkeley, California

Education:

AlleynGuy's Medical School of the University of London