The Little Blue Book of Sailing Wisdom

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The Little Blue Book of Sailing Wisdom by Stephen Brennan

Editor Brennan has compiled a unique book of quotes, verses, and traditional sailing axioms. He searched far and wide to find passages from such classic authors as Lewis Carroll, Ernest Hemmingway, Rudyard Kipling, and Herman Melville. He uncovered quotes from JFK and Ted Turner, Mark Twain and Jack London, and even mixed in some Shakespeare and Walt Whitman. It’s an easy read that is perfect for the older sailor who has everything, the perfect gift and coffee table book that can be read or browsed in many sittings.

To organize all the information, the book is divided into seven parts that address different themes of sailing.

The Deep Blue Sea
Seamen and Women
Ship
Storm and Calm
Weather-Eye
The Philosophic Sailor
Sea-Fever

All of these parts are then followed up by a great ‘Sailor’s Glossary’ with words and phrases of old.

Some of my favorite selections were:

Years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you did not do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. — Mark Twain

Never a ship sails out of a bay, but carries my heart as a stowaway. — Roselle Mercier Montgomery

Separately there was only wind, water, sail, and hull, but at my hand the four had been given purpose and direction. — Lowell Thomas

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