Visit our Popular Forums

unbusted67 · 10-12-2015, 19:28

What percentage of this book is complete baloney? Did he really haul his boat by hand across a section of desert? Did he really sail in the Andes?

Sent from my iPhone using Cruisers Sailing Forum

belizesailor · 11-12-2015, 03:38

Tristan Jones was a great story teller, but I think there was a high BS quotient.

As another great sailing story teller calls his yarns, I think Tristan's were mostly "Semi-True Stories".

Benz · 11-12-2015, 03:54

I choose to believe that the skeleton of the story is true--boat across the Andes and all--but that many details are added for storytelling's sake. I've known other prime storytellers who embellished heavily for the sake of effect, but the framework that supported the story was true. Since Mr. Jones is dead, we may never know ...

denverd0n · 11-12-2015, 04:49

Who knows, and who cares? He didn't write a chronicle intended to be used to determine the precise series of events. He wrote stories. Never let the truth get in the way of a good story.

**atoll** · 11-12-2015, 04:57

a friend of mine, Conrad jellicoe was the crew on the voyage from isreal to south America,he shared a few interesting anacdotes about sailing with Tristan and the voyage,so I can vouch for veracity of at least that part of the voyage

SaltyMonkey · 11-12-2015, 05:36

As a supposed good Welshman and as a yarn telling sailor, I would expect, as a tradition, nothing but the best story coming from him. Hence the bigger the lie, the better.

Cormorant · 11-12-2015, 05:45

A book has been written trying to sort out the truth of his voyages vs his fabrications. . . .

"Wayward Sailor: In Search of the Real Tristan Jones" by Anthony Dalton

From the back cover:

No one really knew Tristan Jones. He was larger than life, perhaps the most successful sailing writer of the twentieth century, and by his own account the greatest sailor. But he was not who he said he was. He told us what he wanted us to believe, and he told the tales so well that we either believed or suspended disbelief. As Anthony Dalton reveals in this uncompromising yet admiring biography, the real Tristan Jones was both a lesser and a greater man than his invention. Self-educated, self-taught, enormously creative, he was himself his most creative act.

"A thoroughly researched and absorbing account of Tristan Jones's lives—the one he created for himself, and the one he actually lived. This is a necessary book for anyone who has read Tristan Jones's stories with enjoyment or suspicion, or both."—Derek Lundy, author, Godforsaken Sea and The Way of a Ship

"I was enchanted from start to finish by Anthony Dalton's biography, in which he proves that Tristan Jones's most brilliant creation was his own fascinating life story."—John Rousmaniere, author, After the Storm; Fastnet, Force 10; and The Annapolis Book of Seamanship

"[An] arresting study. . . . Dalton achieves stark poignancy. . . . Jones's story as related here should appeal to all those who love adventure, as well as to those who enjoy analyzing the wreckage of damaged, enigmatic and fascinating personalities."—Publishers Weekly

Jon Eisberg · 11-12-2015, 05:48

In my opinion, Anthony Dalton's biography WAYWARD SAILOR is far more fascinating than anything ever written by Jones himself...

Astonishing, how much of his life story was a total fabrication, beginning with the story of his birth, and the inspiration for having been given the name "Tristan"... One of his first books, HEART OF OAK, was an account of his service in the Royal Navy during WW II... A work of gross invention, as he did not actually join the service until after the war was over... And it just goes on from there...

One of the more interesting aspects of this 'self-invention', was the extent to which it was 'enabled' by various consumer sailing magazines and their editors, SAIL and Patience Wales among them...

http://www.amazon.com/Wayward-Sailor.../dp/0071440283

Tayana42 · 11-12-2015, 07:02

Tristan Jones? All true. Every word. I take it on faith.

S/V B'Shert

Liam Wald · 11-12-2015, 07:03

"Never let truth get in the way of a good story". - Mark Twain.

LakeSuperior · 11-12-2015, 07:15

I had a lady (and her husband) join us for several legs of our sailing trip from from France to Portugal in 2011. She was an item with Tristan's first mate meeting him when the boat was in Israel. She sailed with the mate and Tristan for a number of months.

She didn't really get a mention in the book covering that part of his voyage but she was there.

LakeSuperior · 11-12-2015, 07:19

Atoll - I suspect your friend and my friend know each other and are friends.

bobnlesley · 11-12-2015, 08:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by SaltyMonkey

As a supposed good Welshman and as a yarn telling sailor, I would expect, as a tradition, nothing but the best story coming from him. Hence the bigger the lie, the better.

Another part of the myth/literary licence Salty; TJ was actually English a Liverpudlian/Scouser, not Welsh.