The Open Boat
By Stephen Crane
Author’s background
Stephen Crane born November 1, 1871-June 5, 1900
He spent much time studying science and literature but he didn't attend
school until he was eight years old. However, when he did, he did two
years' worth of schoolwork in just six weeks. (=O wow ) As a teenager, he
enjoyed making up words and writing essays and often wrote many articles
with the help of his brother and he collected information for his mother,
who wrote journals for the Methodist Church.
Stephen Crane changed from many different schools in his life, finally when
he had enrolled at Syracuse University, there were too many distractions
at school and in town for him to concentrate on his studies, so in 1891, at
the age of twenty, he left the university without completing a degree.
Later on, he accepted a position with the Bachelor-Johnson Syndicate
working as a war correspondent. Crane was sent to Cuba to cover a
developing conflict between Cuba and Spain. The ship, Commodore, on which
he set out for Cuba, had serious structural damage after running aground
and sank. Crane's escape from the sinking ship by rowboat took a great
physical toll on him, the experience inspired him with the basis for the
short story, "The Open Boat”.
Plot Summary
"The Open Boat" is divided into seven sections, each of which is told
mainly from the point of view of the correspondent, who is Stephen
Crane himself. The story begins with a description of men aboard a
small boat on a rough sea.
The first part of the story introduces the four characters—the
correspondent, an observer from the rest of the group; the captain,
who is injured and lies in the bottom of the boat.; the cook, who is fat
but optimistic that they will be rescue is bailing water out of the
bottom of the boat. The cook is the most talkative of the four; and the
oiler, Billie Higgins, who is physically the strongest, as well as the only
one who is named throughout the story. The four have survived a
shipwreck, which occurred before the beginning of the story, and are
drifting at sea in a small boat the size of a bathtub.
This section features character development and many descriptive
passages depicting the tiny boat’s course across the rough waves. The
captain doubts about their chances of survival, but then reassures the
men that “we’ll get ashore all right.” Later on, the captain is the first
to spot a barely visible lighthouse and they know they are approaching
shore.
The captain makes a sail using his overcoat and rows himself to give the oiler
and correspondent a chance to rest.Unwilling to risk running the boat ashore in
the rough surf, the men smoke cigars, drink from their water supply, and wait
to be spotted by the lighthouse rescue crew.
The lighthouse appears deserted. The men discuss rowing toward land and
swimming through the surf once the boat capsizes in the rougher water closer
to shore. When the oiler takes the boat toward shore, it quickly become
apparent that the rougher waves will capsize their vessel when they are still
much too far out to swim. The four men return to deeper but safer offshore
water. Later on a current takes them away from the lighthouse, and they row
towards “little dots which seemed to indicate a city on the shore.” The
correspondent and the oiler take turns rowing so they each can have some time
at rest.
Someone is seen on the shore waving to them. Soon a crowd gathers,
disembarking from a bus. The men realize that the people on shore are tourists
who think they are fishermen or pleasure boaters. No one is helping them.
The four men spend a cold night rowing steadily toward distant lights. While
the correspondent is rowing alone, a large shark cruises in the surroundings of
the boat. The predator is never named, but is described in terms of its shape,
size, speed, and the sound of the fin slicing through the water.
The crew all are afraid of drowning and dieing so they agonize privately over
the injustice of their situation: “If I am going to be drowned. . . why. . . was I
allowed to come thus far?”
At dawn, the men decide that their only chance is to row toward the distant
shore again and swim when the boat capsizes. The narrative stays primarily
with the correspondent’s inner thoughts during this passage. He reflects that
nature is malicious, desiring his death and is in fact perfectly indifferent to
his fate. On the captain’s order, the oiler rows the boat directly toward
shore. Waves crash into the boat as it enters the breakers. The cook briefly
bails out water, and then the men abandon the boat filled with water that’s
about to sink. The oiler swims strongly and steadily toward the shore. The
cook, in his lifejacket and clutching an oar, floats along until the captain calls
to him to turn over on his back; in that position he rows himself as if his large,
bouyant body were a canoe. The correspondent clings to a piece of a
lifejacket and paddles slowly, thinking of the vast distance he has yet to
cross. The injured captain clings to the stern of the overturned boat, which
is pushed toward the beach by the strong surf. A wave tosses the
correspondent over the boat and into waist-deep water, but he is too weak to
even stand up. Suddenly, a man appears on shore, stripping off his clothes and
running into the water. The rescuer drags the cook to safety and then
approaches the captain, who waves him away to help the correspondent first.
Billie, the oiler, is face-down in the shallow water, dead. The three living men
are fed and tended. That night they listen to the sound of the waves against
the shore “and they felt that they could then be interpreters.”
Tasks A & B
A) Pairs complete the following:
Student A = odd pages
Student B = even pages
1. Adjectives = ‘A’
2. Metaphor = ‘M’
3. Simile = ‘S’
4. Personification = ‘P’
B) Identify techniques used to
describe these 3 aspects of the
story.
i) Characters– Correspondent;
Oiler; Cook; Captain
ii) The sea / waves
iii) The boat
SETTING
Find evidence to support the following assertions about the setting:
1.
Set on a 10 foot dinghy which is floating upon a rowdy ocean near the
coast of Florida
2. Set in the late 1800s
Crane uses the setting to show the relationship between humans and
nature :
"None of them knew the colour of the sky … and all of the men
knew the colours of the sea“
He implies that the men in the dinghy are so overwhelmed by the
power of nature that they cannot see the colour of the sky.
He also suggests that nature is unpredictable and the men are
uncertain of their fates.
Find two more examples of this relationship and explain then.
-"Their back- bones had become thoroughly used to balancing in the boat
and they now rode this wild colt of a dinghy like circus men“
Crane uses this description to portray the chaos of the sea and
the idea that the men have slightly adapted to some of nature's
ways in order to survive.
-Crane's descriptions of the sea show nature's lack of concern
for their tragedy:
"The birds sat comfortably in groups, and they were envied by some in the
dinghy, for the wrath of the sea was no more to them than it was to a covey
of prairie chickens a thousand miles inland".
-When a tower is sited on a nearby island, Crane describes it
as a:
"giant, standing with its back to the plight of the ants", the ants
obviously represent nature and the tower is seen as the power
of humanity. It represents freedom, hope, and a win against
nature
Crane includes many living figures
in his short story. It is, however,
mainly based on the four men who
survived the shipwreck of their
ship Commodre.
Characters
Correspondent
The four men consist of:
Captain
Cook
and
Dingy
Oiler
The Correspondent
The Captain
The Oiler
The Cook
Other minor figures involves the
people at the beach who rescues
the stranded men. The seagulls
which are hated by the sailors but
shows the men are close to land.
The shark which represents danger
and awareness. The “sea babes” are
mythical sea creatures of which
sailors back in that time period
believed in their existence.
Task:
Characters
Correspondent
Provide a detailed description
of each of the characters in the
boat.
i) The correspondent
ii) The oiler
Captain
Cook
and
Dingy
Oiler
iii) The cook
iv) The captain
Use supporting quotes and
examples, explain their
characteristics and role in the
story. How might the
characters link to the themes in
the story or what other purpose?
The Correspondent:
-Story is mainly written from his perspective. He represents the author and
retells the story of Stephen Crane’s shipwreck.
-well educated man. He is addressed by the oiler as “sir”
-The correspondent is friends with the three other men. Stephen Crane
describes their relationship as “..they were friends – friends in a more curiously
ironbound degree than may be common”
-He is especially closely bonded to the oiler. “They sat together in the same
seat, and each rowed an oar”
-he wears a drenched “coat” of which he finds cigars – he smokes
-The correspondent accepts the situation he is in. He does not mind dying “I am
going to drown? Can it be possible?” He doesn’t moan or groan for the
misfortune of being stranded in the sea (he sees it rather positively as being
fortunate to survive the shipwreck)
-Inexperienced. “The correspondent was at the oars then and for some reason
he too were important”
-He could be left handed “his pale left hand was upon his chest..to thrawt the
going of his life”
-Has an inner fear as shown with his experience alone with the shark.
The Oiler
-Billie
-Oiler is the man who oils the engine of the ship.
-He is one of the dingy’s oarsmen along with the correspondent
-Billie is a confident swimmer “[he] was ahead in the race. He was
swimming strongly and rapidly”
-He strives to survive as the men and their dingy fight against nature.
The correspondent questions him “Did you ever like to row, Billie?” and
Billie replys “No” but he does it anyway as he is determined to reach
land safely.
-The oiler obeyed the orders of the captain without doubt.
-The oiler is the experienced men. He does a lot of steering.
-Billie drowns at the end of the story and dies “but a still and dripping
shape was carried slowly up the beath, and the land’s welcome for
it..sinister hispitality of the grave” – same as the real life situation
which happened to Stephen Crane; the oiler (Billie) is drowned to
death.
Captain
-Injured “his captain was handing with his one good hand”
-He is like the mother figure in this short story. He looks after his
boys and instructs them what to do “soothing his children”
-He is depressed about the shipwreck and the death of seven of his
crews “captain had on him the stern impression of a scene in the grays
of dawn of seven turned faces”
-the captain is respected by his men as every order is obeyed with no
hesitation.
-captain is considerate. He makes sure the oiler and the
correspondent gets enough rest “give you two boys a chance to rest”
“we’ll give those boys a chance to get into shape again”
- “The patient captain”
-has a strong will to survive. “the correspondent marveled that the
captain could still hold to it”
-sacraficial. “the captain waved him (rescuer) away and sent him to
the correspondent”
Cook
-Physical descriptions of the cook includes “His sleeves
were rolled over his fat forearms, and the two flaps of
his unbuttoned vest dangled as he bent to bail out the
boat”
-enthusiastic “he murmured dreamfully” “said the
cheerful cook”
The Dingy
-Much described as a human. Stephen Crane refers to the
dingy with human characteristics.
“The little boat turned her nose once more down the wind”.
-The Captain shows concern for this dingy “Take her easy now”
Note: The boat is given a feminine title as water
transportations are know as “she” during the time period this
short story was written.
Four Themes
main themes in
this short story
includes:
1. Individual vs
Nature
2. Perspective
3. Death
4. Free Will –
Existential crisis
1. Individual Vs. Nature
During the late nineteenth century, Americans had believed that
they could control and conquer their environment. With the
technological breakthroughs of the Industrial Revolution, humankind
appeared to have demonstrated its ability to both understand and to
dominate the forces of nature. In “The Open Boat,” Crane questions
these self-confident assumptions by describing the precarious
situation of four shipwrecked men as they are tossed about on the
sea. The men seem to recognize that they are helpless in the face of
nature. Their lives could be lost at any moment by the most common
of natural phenomena: a wave, a current, the wind, a shark, or even
simple starvation and exposure. In a passage that drips with irony,
Crane writes of the correspondent: “He thought: ‘Am I going to
drown? Can it be possible? Can it be possible? Can it be possible?’
Perhaps an individual must consider his own death to be the final
phenomenon of nature.” This passage suggests the absurdity of an
individual’s sense of self-importance against the power of nature.
2. Perspective
One of the main themes of the story is the perspective, or point of view.
Crane’s famous first sentence of the story presents this theme immediately:
“None of them knew the color of the sky.” The men in the boat are so
focused on the danger presented to them by the waves that they are
oblivious to all else. The story continually emphasizes the limitations of a
single perspective. When the shipwrecked men are first spotted from the
shore, they are mistaken for fishermen. The people on shore do not perceive
their distress and only wave cheerfully to the men. Crane writes of the men
in the boat that if they were viewed “from a balcony, the whole thing would
doubtless have been weirdly picturesque.” This serene perspective contrasts
markedly with the frightening and violent reality the men in the boat are
experiencing. Crane’s point seems to be that humans can never fully
comprehend the true quality of reality, but only their own limited view of it.
Throughout the story, the situation of the men in the boat seems to them
“absurd,” “preposterous,” and without any underlying reason or meaning. Yet
once the three survivors are safely on shore at the end of the story, they
believe that they can look back and “interpret” the import or meaning of what
has happened to them. The reader is left to wonder whether anything can
ever be truly understood, or if all understanding is simply an agreed-upon,
limited perspective that provides the illusion of unity to the chaos of lived
events.
3. Death
The drama of the story comes from the men’s realization that they
are likely to drown. Having to confront the probability of their own
imminent death, each of the characters accepts what Crane calls a
“new ignorance of the grave-edge.” It is interesting that Crane
refers to this understanding as “ignorance” rather than “knowledge.”
Being at the mercy of fate has demonstrated to them how wrong
their previous beliefs about their own importance had been. The
correspondent, in particular, is troubled by the senselessness of his
predicament, and he thinks about a poem in which a French soldier
dies, unceremoniously, far from his home and family. Facing
senseless death, the universe suddenly seems deprived of the
meaning he had previously attached to it. Thus, he is overtaken by a
new “ignorance” about life, rather than a new “knowledge.” Crane
seems to endorse the idea that nature is random and senseless by
having the oiler drown in the surf. Of all the men, the oiler seemed
the most likely to survive, being the most physically fit. His death
implies that the others’ survival was merely the result of good
fortune. Once the survivors are safe from danger, however, death’s
senselessness is quickly forgotten.
4. Free Will
Crane was regarded as a leading member of the Realist or Naturalist
movement in his time. One of the main concerns of the Naturalists
involved the dilemma of whether human beings could exercise control
over their fate or whether their fate was predetermined by their
environment. To state it differently, they asked whether humans
possess a free will or were powerless to shape external events.
Drawing upon deterministic philosophies such as those of Charles
Darwin, Auguste Comte, or Karl Marx, the Naturalists analyzed the
various natural forces that effected the “struggle for life.” These
concerns are evident in “The Open Boat.” Although the four men are
clearly making the best effort to get to shore, it is never certain
until the end whether they will drown. Their fate seems to rest
mostly in the hands of forces beyond their control. A prime example
of this comes when the correspondent gets caught in a current while
trying to swim to the shore. He is trapped by an invisible force — an
underwater current — which he can neither understand nor escape.
For unknown reasons, the current suddenly frees him and he is
washed ashore by a giant wave. It seems clear that Crane attributes
the correspondent’s survival more to uncontrollable forces than to
his own efforts.
Style
Stylistically, critics note Crane's use of irony and praise his
shifting perspective in the story.
Tone may be characterized as serious or ironic, sad or happy,
private or public, angry or affectionate, bitter or nostalgic, or
any other attitudes and feelings that human beings
experience in the story.
Stephen Crane's story gives us an example of another kind of
irony, in this case cosmic irony, which occurs when a writer
uses God, destiny, fate, or some larger force to dash the
hopes and expectations of a character or of humankind in
general.
Three specific examples of cosmic irony symbolism used by
Crane are, the power of the ocean against the insignificance
of the boat, the sea against the universe, and the little boat
in a vast sea from the people on the shore.
The story is told from the perspective of
each of the crew members, as well as from
the vintage point of an objective observers.
Dialogues, in which different speakers are
never identified. In these ways, the reader is
given the sense that all of the crew members
share similar feelings.
Similar to other major works by Stephen
Crane, "The Open Boat" contains various uses
of imagery, metaphor and colour, combined
with simple, clear writing.
Humour also appears throughout, serving in
stark opposition to the dreary setting and
desperate characters.
Glossary:
Apropos- appropriate
Opprobrious- Bringing disgrace
Billows- A large wave or swell of water.
Obstreperous- Noisily and stubbornly
defiant.
Myriads- Constituting a very large,
indefinite number
Cessation- A bringing or coming to an end
Essay and exam questions
Discuss how Crane presents the relationship between man and nature in
the story, The Open Boat.
How does Crane explore the idea of fate versus free will in his story?
Crane reveals more ignorance about life and
death, with
than knowledge in his
Compare
The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar
story. Discuss.
Allen Poe
How it Happened by Arthur Conan Doyle
Real Time by Amit Chaudhuri
A person’s own views on reality can only ever be narrow and limited.
Discuss in relation to The Open Boat.