Matthiessen was among the entourage when Peter Gimbel set out in
1968 to track down and film the awesome great white shark - the
biggest, heaviest, meanest (it will attack anything and down a man
in one or two bites) shark around. That was its appeal for Gimbel,
who had already hobnobbed almost to the point of boredom with
lesser breeds. But the great white is also very rare. . . . For
most of the book the crew sails back and forth in South African
waters, lights, cameras and aluminum submersion cages at the ready,
and Matthiessen glides after with loads of preparatory shark and
nature lore; but the white hides out and the interim account is one
of technical difficulties, inclement weather, spluttering tempers,
deepening friendships. That isn't to say there aren't extraordinary
diversions, such as an unprotected swim among blues and tigers and
hand-feeding a monster barracuda, or that the narrative filler
isn't worthwhile (for example, angry digressions on whale killing
and apartheid). It's simply that such diffuse attractions tend to
cancel the excitement of the Great Wait and vice versa; and though
the encounter is still chilling when it comes, many months and a
million dollars later off southern Australia, some of the impact
has been lost. It ends as an agreeable miscellany, pitched vaguely
in the direction of Moby Dick and due to land with the reflective
bedside reader, though the film's release may greatly improve its
prospects. (Kirkus Reviews)
In 1969 Peter Matthiessen set out with the expedition led by Peter
Gimbel, whose aim was to find and film underwater for the first
time the most dangerous of all sea creatures - the great white
shark. Acting as the expedition's chronicler and spare hand (both
on the surface and below), Matthiessen accompanied the crew from
the Carribean to the whaling grounds off the Durban coast, to
various islands in the Indian Ocean, to Ceylon, and finally to
success off the bleak south coast of Australia. Blue Meridian
records the awesome experience of swimming in open water among
hundreds of sharks, the beauties of strange seas and landscapes and
the camaraderie, humour and tension of people who live in close
proximity and risk their lives day by day.
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