Master
of the Sea
Jose Sarney
Reviewed by Michelle Boucher-Ladd
“Not Cristorio, Captain Cristorio! From
today on I want to be addressed
like that: captain, Captain Cristrorio. I got my papers last night at
sea.” These are the words of Antao Cristorio, an everyman, a
fisherman, a master of the sea, and the major character in Jose
Sarney’s new book Master of the Sea, translated by Gregory Rabassa.
Master of the Sea is
an interesting novel that reads more like a screenplay. It shows a
reminiscence of Homer in that it is an epic story of sea myths
following the mortal life of Antao Cristorio, a Brazilian fisherman who
sails the Chita Verde between the Archipelagos Islands and the
phantom world.
Written by Jose Sarney, the former President of Brazil from 1985 to
1990, Master of the Sea chronicles
the rich nautical history of the region incorporating many local myths
and legions. Cristorio is awaken one night with the news that his son
has been murdered and from this point on the book flashes back to the
beginning of Cristorio’s life on the sea. His fiancée Maria
Quertide is
captured by the mythical pioco, who steal young virgins from
beaches and rob them of their virginity before returning them to their
villages with no recollection of having been taken. Except the pioco
never return Quertide and Cristorio spends the rest of his life trying
to recover his lost love.
This novel has many interesting characters that hover between the
living world and the phantom world, he most evident of which is
Querente. He is, according to the Table of Characters found in
the appendix, a “companion of Antao Cristorio, incarnation of Diogo de
Seixas, a soldier thrown into the sea from the ship Sao Tome off the
coast of the Land of Smoke in 1589.” Querente is for the lay reader a
Jack Sparow (Pirates of the Caribian) type character that guides
Cristorio amongst the phantoms and spooks he encounters on many fishing
trips. Querente is a symbol of youth and vigor as he never ages and
“dies” after each sexual encounter.
The two most striking things about this novel is the intense use of
symbolic imagery and its graphic sexual nature. It is the kind of novel
a third year lit student could tear into for a ten page essay on
Sarney’s use of the color green or for the age old man vs. nature comparative.
What lies beneath this meandering yarn is a somewhat disturbing use of
female characters. Cristorio, views all women as objects; things that
he has in his possession or things he can use to further himself. At
one point, he even has sex with his boat. The boat, like a few other of
Cristorio’s women , kills itself after it is no longer deemed useful.
In
the end Cristorio is not the master he knows himself to be but
a mere mortal grappling to control things that are beyond his control.
Master of the Sea is
very well written but not by any means light reading. The novel takes
its reader to place that they don’t necessarily want to go but is so
well crafted that it is hard to find an intelligent reason to fault it.
It is the kind of book that disturbs you just enough that you continue
reading.