We, The Drowned - by Carsten Jensen (Paperback)

About the Book

Follows a century in the port town of Marstal on an island off the coast of Denmark, whose citizens' lives are indelibly shaped by forces ranging from wars and shipwrecks to taboo survival practices and forbidden passions.

Book Synopsis

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER. We, The Drowned is an epic novel about generations of men who go to sea and the women and children they leave behind. Filled with adventure, cannibals, shrunken heads, prophetic dreams, forbidden passions, cowards, heroes, tragedies, love, and survival, this book takes its place among the greatest seafaring literature.

We, the Drowned is the story of the port town of Marstal, Denmark, whose inhabitants sailed the world from the mid-nineteenth century to the end of the Second World War. The novel tells of ships wrecked and blown up in wars, of places of terror and violence that continue to lure each generation. The result is a brilliant seafaring novel, a gripping saga encompassing industrial growth, the years of expansion and exploration, the crucible of the first half of the twentieth century, and most of all, the sea.

"We, the Drowned sets sail beyond the narrow channels of the seafaring genre and approaches Tolstoy in its evocation of war's confusion, its power to stun victors and vanquished alike . . . A gorgeous, unsparing novel." -- Washington Post

"A generational saga, a swashbuckling sailor's tale, and the account of a small town coming into modernity--both Melville and Steinbeck might have been pleased to read it." -- New Republic

From the Back Cover

AN INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER
A THRILLING EPIC TALE OF THE SEA
We, the Drowned sets sail beyond the narrow channels of the seafaring genre and approaches Tolstoy in its evocation of war s confusion, its power to stun victors and vanquished alike . . . A gorgeous, unsparing novel. Washington Post
A generational saga, a swashbuckling sailor s tale, and the account of a small town coming into modernity both Melville and Steinbeck might have been pleased to read it. New Republic
Hailed in Europe as an instant classic, We, the Drowned is the story of the port town of Marstal, Denmark, whose inhabitants sailed the world from the mid-nineteenth century to the end of the Second World War. The novel tells of ships wrecked and blown up in wars, of places of terror and violence that continue to lure each generation; there are cannibals here, shrunken heads, prophetic dreams, and miraculous survivals. The result is a brilliant seafaring novel, a gripping saga encompassing industrial growth, the years of expansion and exploration, the crucible of the first half of the twentieth century, and most of all, the sea.
Called one of the most exciting authors in Nordic literature by Henning Mankell, Carsten Jensen has worked as a literary critic and a journalist, reporting from China, Cambodia, Latin America, the Pacific Islands, and Afghanistan. He lives in Copenhagen and Marstal.
"

Review Quotes

We, The Drowned is "most memorable for the sheer gusto of its narrative. The author ennobles the old-fashioned art of storytelling by showing how the relating of a tale can itself foster a spirit of fellowship... We, The Drowned is itself a monument to the way that history can be made epic through legend."
-The Wall Street Journal

"As an epic of grand design, We, The Drowned is a thumping success."
-The San Francisco Chronicle

"Powerful reading for a long winter's night... This gorgeous, unsparing novel ends during the last days of World War II with a captain struggling to bring his crew home after their ship is torpedoed. The sea is Marstal's life and Jensen's unstrained metaphor: luring the Marstallers away from home, offering uncertain passage and providing few harbors that are safe for long."
-The Washington Post

"From adventures on the storm-ravaged seas and in exotic lands, to battles in town over the shipping industry and family life, dozens of stories coalesce into an odyssey taut with action and drama and suffused with enough heart to satisfy readers who want more than the breakneck thrills of ships battling the elements."
-Publishers Weekly (starred)

"For all the brutality and suspense in the manner of Conrad, Melville, and Stevenson, Jensen's oceanic novel (already a bestseller overseas and gorgeously translated) is tenderly human . . . Jensen's resplendent saga, an epic voyage of the imagination, is mesmerizing in its unsparing drama, fascinating in its knowledge of the sea, wryly humorous, and profound in its embrace of compassion, reason, and justice."
--Booklist (starred)

"Expertly told . . . Jensen is a sympathetic storyteller with an eye for the absurd, with the result that if this novel descends from Moby-Dick, it also looks to The Tin Drum for inspiration . . . An elegant meditation on life, death, and the ways of the sea."
--Kirkus Reviews

"...vast and daring... rich, powerful and rewarding... one of the more engrossing literary vorages of recent years."
-The Financial Times (UK)

"Carsten Jensen is without doubt one of the most exciting authors in Nordic literature today. I always wait with great anticipation for his books. He is, in my opinion, completely unique as a story teller."
--Henning Mankell

"A novel of immense authority and ambition and beauty, by a master storyteller at the height of his powers. This is a book to sail into, to explore, to get lost in, but it is also a book that brings the reader, dazzled by wonders, home to the heart from which great stories come."
--Joseph O'Connor, author of Star of the Sea
--

About the Author

CARSTEN JENSEN has worked as a literary critic and a journalist, reporting from China, Cambodia, Latin America, the Pacific Islands, and Afghanistan. A runaway international bestseller, there are now more than 450,000 copies of We, The Drowned in print.