Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > O'Brian, Patrick - Alan Judd (review date 22 August 1998)

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Alan Judd (review date 22 August 1998)

SOURCE: “Those in Peril on the Sea,” in Spectator, Vol. 281, No. 8872, August 22, 1998, p. 32.

[In the following review, Judd offers a positive assessment of The Hundred Days, praising the novel's characterization, action, and credibility.]

The creation of a convincing imaginary world, one whose power to convince rests not only on the truth of history but the truth of experience, compelling assent—yes, this is what it is like to doubt, fear, love, thirst, hope and despair—is itself a significant literary achievement. To sustain that world over 19 sequential novels, as Patrick O'Brian has now done with The Hundred Days, goes beyond significance. These novels, set in the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic wars and featuring his two complementary heroes, Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, are as remarkable a literary endeavour as were the historical endeavours that gave them rise. Part...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Criticism
   1. John Bayley (essay date 7 November 1991)
   2. Frank Stewart (review date 4 April 1993)
   3. Byron Rogers (review date 10 July 1993)
   4. Michael Dirda (review date August 1993)
   5. Patrick T. Reardon (review date 19 December 1993)
   6. Frederick Pratter (review date 31 December 1993)
   7. John Balzar (review date 2 January 1994)
   8. Thomas McGonigle (review date 2 January 1994)
   9. Elliott Abrams (review date 24 January 1994)
   10. James Hamilton-Paterson (review date 26 December 1994)
   11. Frederick Pratter (review date 2 May 1995)
   12. Katherine A. Powers (review date July 1995)
   13. Sam Pickering (review date Spring 1996)
   14. Thomas R. Edwards (essay date Summer 1996)
   15. John Balzar (review date 20 October 1996)
   16. Edward T. Wheeler (review date 8 November 1996)
   17. Christopher Clausen (review date 16 December 1996)
   18. James Teacher (review date 4 January 1997)
   19. John Mullan (review date 10 January 1997)
   20. Books Magazine (review date October 1997)
   21. Molly Finn (essay date 19 June 1998)
   22. Alan Judd (review date 22 August 1998)
   23. Barbara Everett (review date 4 September 1998)
   24. Martin Jacques (review date 6 September 1998)
   25. Christopher Hitchens (essay date 9 March 2000)
4. Further Reading
5. Copyright