Reading Notes: Week 5 Extra Credit Reading

Title: Sindbad: Sixth Voyage (The Raft)
Author: Andrew Lang
Link: Story Link.

Plot:

• Sindbad, despite his family's protests, heads off into the wild blue yonder in search of another adventure.
• He meets a captain and they set sail -- immediately running into a storm that blows them off course.
• They end up determining their location as -- coincidentally -- the single most dangerous location in the entire ocean.
• Their ship founders on the rocks and our hero is shipwrecked once more.
• Sindbad notices a peculiar stream of fresh water which leads him into a cave that is crusted with diamonds and precious stones.
• The other sailors ration out their food and try to survive, but they each perish from starvation. Only Sindbad remains.
• In desperation, Sindbad decides to make a raft and ride it down the stream he found earlier.
• After quite some time, Sindbad surfaces in an unfamiliar land, that of Serendib.
• The King is kind and the land is lush -- Sindbad stays for a span, treated quite well, until he petitions the King to return to his home. The King accepts and gives him even more riches to take as tokens of his benevolence.

Sindbad and his cargo take on the rapids. Illustration: Milo Winter.

Setting:

• Baghdad, and its outskirts.
• Sindbad's home, over dinner.
• A "distant Indian port" -- not 100% sure where this would be, but I did a little research and the Port of Kolkata is India's oldest operating maritime port, opened by the British East India Company.
• Serendib, a land of plenty in which Sindbad finds himself after many days on the raft.

Characters:

• Sindbad: Still restless, still headstrong, still fly-by-the-seat-of-his-pants lucky. He's had five near-death experiences at this point, and he still isn't satisfied with a quiet life in the country. 
• By this point, I'm starting to get a little irritated by his boastful nature. We get it -- you're the perfect adventurer (and you've got some great stories) but it's no fun when the characters aren't flawed or you know that everything is going to work out for them in the end, regardless of what happens.
• Captain/Sailors: Sindbad is joined by a crew, but they perish quickly after the shipwreck. The captain is a pretty melancholy guy -- he tells his crew outright that they're going to die after they crash on the island.

Writing Style:

• First person might be fine for a little bit, but six miraculous voyages in, Sindbad's humblebrags are starting to grate on my nerves. If I was to employ this style, it would need to be a quick-hitter tale, not a drawn-out affair.