This review concerns the new (revised) Doubleday edition of the book, published in 1999.

Here is a book that is quite unique in my experience. I don't think I have ever read a book that has offered so much initial frustration, which has ended up turning out quite so well. In the first couple of chapters I was sure I was not going to be able to finish it. I put this down largely to poor editing, but I think there may be the added factor that this edition involved a major revision of an earlier work and that the two were not married very happily together. Yet the book soon strikes out on a new path, and on another level, as we leave the Manx and Cumbrian origins of Fletcher Christian behind, and begin to learn some of the details of that murky event known to history as the "Mutiny on the Bounty." One thing is obvious and it is to the author's credit, as he is a direct descendent of Fletcher Christian (and, something which will appear obvious given the nature of life on Pitcairn at the time of the first settlement, of several of the other mutineers): he makes a very bold attempt not to hoist Bligh on too high a yardarm, in spite of the man's obvious and well-established shortcomings. Indeed, he allows Bligh to hang himself in the book, which is something he seems to have tried very hard to accomplish in real life.

The book's last section of three concerns the personal odyssey by author Glynn Christian back to Pitcairn in search of traces of Fletcher and a greater understanding of some of the legend which grew up around him and his fellow conspirators of over 200 years ago. It is well done, and if we are a bit frustrated by the results, it's not because the author didn't try hard enough. In fact, this is a very successful project from every point of view, even if I did think at first that it was going to be "another island book," like the one on St-Kilda I read many years ago and still haven't digested to this day. Anyone interested in the Bounty story must read this and all those interested in the history of the Pacific, or even just plain family history, will probably enjoy this very much. After initially wanting to almost burn it, I now find myself giving it my highest recommendation. It's quite unique. By the by, it's interesting to reflect on the book's title. Ordinarily, one would think it referred to Pitcairn, the ancestral home as it were; but I rather fancy it refers to Tahiti instead, that fabled place from which some of Glynn Christian's other ancestors sprang.

A new edition, by the same author, is due out in 2000. New research gives a clearer picture of the tension aboard BOUNTY after sailing from Tahiti, there is more evidence about Bligh's method of captaincy and, for the first time, a full chapter on the Tahitian women, who they were, how they thought and how, even though overlooked for two centuries, they are crucial to the survival of Christian's remote settlement on Pitcairn Island.

I found FRAGILE PARADISE to be one of the best biographies I have ever read. The amount of research GLYNN CHIRSTIAN gathered about his famous descendent was just mind blowing. I often wonderd about FLETCHER CHIRSTIAN'S life before his days on the bounty. Having seen all of the movies based on the mutiny I never really felt that hollywood told his story with any accuracy at all. We never really get to know who CHIRSTIAN was and why he did what he did and the price he had to pay for his actions. Also I discoverd while I was reading this book the information about his family in ENGLAND and thier roots which hollywood often chooses to forget about when telling the story about the bounty muntiny. All in all if you like the story of the mutiny on the bounty you'll love this book.

Funnily enough the really interesting story of the Bounty begins after most movies have 'faded into the sunset' and the credits start to roll. This is what Lummis has picked up - and this book "Pitcairn Island, Life and Death in Eden" is the story of just that. What happened to the Bounty mutineers. It is an awful lot more interesting, bloodthirsty and downright fascinating than the story of the Bounty mutiny itself.

Lummis seems to have done his research too. He has tracked down all the accounts available, and compared them with one another. He clearly points out the strengths and weaknesses in each account and how he has reached his own conclusions about the actual story. In this way he makes his deductions, and the story far more transparent for us - and makes it all the more believable.

As most people know the mutiny on the bounty as about the uprising of a group of sailors led by acting Lieutenant, Fletcher Christian against their captain, Bligh. Lummis discusses the mutiny and the events which lead up to it, putting it perspective of the times and the problems which Bligh had had to deal with before hand (especially through the incompetency of the admiralty in delaying his sailing to Tahiti in the first place.) There is also a brief history of the English encounters in Tahiti prior to the arrival of the Bounty.

The most interesting part is really what happened to the Bounty muntineers once they sailed away from the Bligh. Some went reluctantly and stayed in Tahiti when the Bounty returned there. However Christian and a few others knew that they would never be safe unless they stayed out of range of the long arm of the British Navy. They therefore found the most remote island possible - Pitcairn - and settled there.

Then followed almost 20 years in which there was no contact with the outside world, just a handful of bounty mutineers, 6 tahitian men and a handful of Tahitian women. At the end of those 20 years just one of the men was left, John Adams. His story of what happened to the other men was at first straightforward. However as more people visited the Island his story started to become more complicated and even contradicted itself. It seemed that there must have been at least one catastrophic massacre of some sort. Yet they were all living in this peaceful and ideal society.

Lummis gleans the truth of the fate of the men of Pitcairn through the various accounts Adam's gave, as well as accounts given by one of the women, Jenny, and one of the eldest sons after Adam's died. In fact it seemed that Adam's himself had triggered the entire debacle. This I found the most fascinating part of the book - the careful unravelling of various stories by comparing them with others, and with logical progression.

Lummis completes the book with the fate of the islanders up until recent years. The gradual deterioration of the island, the move to Norfolk and the return of some of them to Pitcairn.

This book is well worth reading if you enjoy the story of the mutineers. It is also an interesting insight into pre-European Pacific culture, and it proves to be a darn good mystery as well....

Most readers would have a reasonably good knowledge of the events that took place on HMS Bounty in 1789 and they might even know the details of why the Bounty sailed and what happened to Bligh after he and those of the crew that didn't mutiny were set adrift in the Bounty's long boat. I would guess however that only a handful of people anywhere in the world would have an idea of what happened to the mutineers after they landed on Pitcairn and burnt their only means of escape-the Bounty herself. Trevor Lummis has done a tremendous job of research by stringing together all the odd bits of scattered information in order to present the whole bloody, sordid story of the events that ultimately left only one male alive on the island plus a number of Polynesian women who were part of the original group. What happened to the mutineers and the Polynesian men that went with them to Pitcairn is the subject of this book and what an extraordinary story it is! Hollywood missed it by building a movie around the mutiny-they should have filmed the story of the events after the mutiny. Anybody with even a miniscule curiosity about the incidents on Pitcairn owe it to themselves to savor this wonderfuly readable story.

Excellent, exciting story of what happened AFTER the Mutiny on the Bounty. The author, using original source material, did extraordinary detective work to draw conclusions from limited sources about how the mutineers ended up slaughtering one another, as well as a few sympathetic natives who escaped with them to the miniscule island of Pitcairn--not even on the map at that time. Only one of the original white men survived (having killed or watched the killing of all the others).

It's a sordid story of swapping "wives," drunkenness on home brew, murder, rape and the survival of the fittest--here the most devious and cunning. That did not include the famous Mr. Christian who was among the first to go. Gripping story and a good read.

I truly enjoyed this book. I loved the way it was laid out in chronological order. It was easy to pick up and read for a few minutes, without getting so engrossed you couldn't leave. (But if you had a lot of time to spend, you could get engrossed then!) Each month is approximately 2 pages, and includes information on different scenarios--The Bounty, Tahiti, Pitcairn, Bligh's launch, England--wherever there is something important happening at the time that is known about, all of it is included. The author's views are presented in a manner which lets you know they are his views only, but are done in a very non-assuming way. This book is pleasant,exciting and very informational--it really draws everything together. Highly recommended!!!...

Dr. Sven Wahlroos' book "Mutiny and Romance in the South Seas" provides a careful review of the Bounty mutiny without taking any sides. His analysis exposes the underlying tensions that ultimately led to the undoing of everyone involved. Reading this book cannot help but be an enriching experience for anyone who has pondered the situations that led to Bligh's epic voyage in an open boat and Christian's sad end on Pitcairn.

This book was absolutely great! It was written in 1850, and is about things that happened on Pitcairn around the time of the 30's and 40's. Includes copies of letters to the Admiralty from captains who had stopped on the Island. Has the information contained in the Pitcairn's Island Register from 1790 to 1850. Also has a section on the laws of the Island. This book was rather high, but I feel it was well worth the price, to get the piece of history it contains. The author was "marooned" on the island for about 3 weeks when his shipmates left him and a couple others, rather than spend an extra hour to pick them up. (They were going to California--did they REALLY think the extra hour would have killed them???) The author's journal for that time is in the book, as well as the other things that happened to him when he left (that was pretty interesting, also). The author seems a very sincere and kind man, and dearly loved the Pitcairn people.

I give my highest praise to these books. They are far better than current "adventure" stories because of the struggles they had to endure. I found all three books in the trilogy to be excellent (Mutiny on the Bounty, Men Against the Sea, and Pitcairns Island). My favorite one was Pitcairns Island. In all the books I have ever read, this is the first book that ever actually sent a chill up my spine. I won't give the story away, but you will not believe what happens in that book. It's absolutely thrilling and fascinating!

I read these stories while at sea on a British research vessel. If you've ever been to sea, or have ever wanted to, you'll probably enjoy reading this trilogy. Nordhoff and Hall write in plain, unelaborate English, so the phrasing never gets in the way, and you can concentrate on all the colorful characters and incredible events. The first two (and half of the third) books are written in first person, putting you right into the action and events, making you think about what you would do in the situations as they arise.

This trilogy has it all: adventure, drama, comedy, history, life at sea, love and loss. It's hard to believe this all really happened. I've given this book to two of my friends already, and they both liked it. You'll probably like it, too.

This book is, quite simply, a fabulous trilogy of novels. It deals, of course, with the two-year voyage of HMS Bounty from England to Tahiti, the captaincy of Captain William Bligh, the mutiny against him, and the aftermath. This is an unforgettable story, beautifully told, well-written, and fast-paced.

I have read reviews here and there that claim this book is written at a "young adult" level. Not so. This is a complex story that only seems to be easily told because the author has mastered the ability to write with utter clarity, and without sacrificing style. As one who reads all day for a living (attorney) I have learned to appreciate authors who can write well. Nordhoff does this--the reader never loses the storyline because it is well told. The novels proceed with the precision of a laser beam but with a poetic, wistful, thoughtful tone that is a delight to read. This book has class.

The story of the trip to Tahiti and the mutiny which takes place early on the return voyage are wonderfully told. The ONLY possible criticism is that this story is not terribly true to the facts of the actual mutiny. The protagonist, Roger Byam, is an imaginary person. By the way, this novel is the source for the first of the Mutiny on the Bounty movies starring Charles Laughton.

The other two novels in the trilogy deal with the voyage by Captain Bligh and those of the crew who remained loyal to him, and the aftermath of the mutiny when the mutineers settle on Pitcairn Island. Both stories are first-rate.

Persons interested in a somewhat more accurate depiction of what happened on the Bounty voyage, as well as a ripping good movie, will want to see "The Bounty" starring Mel Gibson (Fletcher Christian) and Anthony Hopkins (Captain Bligh).

The Bounty Trilogy is a book anyone who enjoys adventure will want to read and own.

This is an entertaining if odd little book and is much overated. I had two problems with it: 1) There are no footnotes but all sorts of two-hundred year old dialogue provided. The author has verbatim discussions taking place on the remote island that certainly could not have been recorded (but how would we know since none of it is footnoted?). Mostly, the author made it up it seems and the device shadows the credibility of the whole book. 2) And if I was not incredulous enough over the history-as-soap opera style, the author saves his blockbuster thesis for the last chapter. He agues that the crusty Captain Bligh and Spencer Christian were really gay lovers and this explains the combustibility and passions that came into play. Bligh according to this view was jealous of Christian's love affair with the Tahitian girl he later fathered three children with. The author offers not one shred of evidence for this, not one shred, and says as much in the final pages of the book. This book has an amateurish feel, written by an author who got away for too long with writing pseudo-histories. This book is not without redeeming qualities; it certainly is interesting and a good read. The 1984 movie The Bounty was based on this account, though the movie, mercifully, skipped over some of Robert Blough's more nutty conclusions.

I can't remember exactly where I came across my copy of this book...I think my parents unearthed it in thier attic one afternoon and gave it to me, the family's avid reader. I took it with me to St. Croix as a means to pass the time, and there sitting in a hammock on a beach not unlike the ones described in the book I began my adventure.
"Mutiny on the Bounty" chronicles the story of the HMS Bounty under Lt. Bligh, a thoroughly tyrannical leader if ever there was one. Shortly after thier departure from Tahiti (to get breadfruit trees for the slave colonies of the West Indies), the mutiny takes place and Bligh and a dozen other loyal crew members are put into the Bounty's open launch and set adrift. The remaining pages are dedicated to those left behind on the Bounty, both mutineer and loyalists.
"Men Against the Sea" tells the story of Bligh and the other loyal crewmembers who were stranded with him in the launch, and of thier gripping journey back to civilized land, covering some 3600 miles according to the book.
"Pitcairn's Island" continues the saga by finishing the stories of Fletcher Christian and his small band of remaining mutineers trip to the deserted island of the same name. There they set up a safe haven to hide in, until the Tahitian men rebel...
I read this book, unable to put it down. All three of the stories are amazingly gripping and this book is a true page-turner in every respect. Maybe being on a tropical island added something to it, I may never know, but I would certainly recommend this to anyone who just wants a really good story!

The subject matter is engrossing and will leave you wanting for more when it's all done. I'm a sometime visitor to Pitcairn Island's website, check there to see how the decendants of the original crewmembers are doing :)

The Bounty mutiny is perhaps the most fascinating and stirring sea adventure in world history, even more so than the TITANIC. Hough's book is an excellent reexamination of the story and of the complex relationship between William Bligh and Fletcher Christian. While I don't agree with Hough's conclusions as to what was really at the heart of the mutiny (I won't spoil it for you by revealing that here) the relationship was combustible and was at the heart of the mutiny.

The Bounty crew were for the most part hand-picked and young. Christian was only in his early 20s, Bligh was in his early 30s and only a very few of the crew were in their late 30s or early 40s. Despite the popular image of the story, Bligh was actually pretty lenient with his crew when it came to punishment and he made it all the way to Tahiti losing only a single man. During his epic open boat voyage after the mutiny, he made it to Coupang having lost only one man en route, although many of the survivors died within weeks of their rescue. Bligh was a complainer, a nagger and had a viciously sharp tongue though which was more than the youthful Christian could bear.

Far from the heroic image that Christian is given in the movies, Hough shows that Christian was impulsive and not much of a leader. While Bligh, sharp tongue and all, was able to save nearly all of the men who were kicked off the ship with him, Christian and his men met with disaster at almost every turn, primarily because Christian was a failure as a leader. The mutineers' disastrous attempt to settle on Pitcairn Island is perhaps the most gripping and fascinating part of the story.

Hough's book is excellent and the Mel Gibson/Anthony Hopkins movie "The Bounty" was based on it and is by far the most authentic and best of the Bounty movies.

"Pitcairn's Island" tells the story of nine mutineers from the Bounty after they took the ship and set Captain Bligh adrift in an open boat. Settling on a tiny uninhabited island in the South Pacific, they and their Polynesian companions found an earthly paradise. The island was large enough to sustain the small population, and was so remote that discovery by the British navy was unlikely. During the first years on the island, they worked to develop the community, and there was little strife. But as their living conditions became less precarious, they were confronted with timeless problems that eventually plunged the inhabitants of the island into turmoil. Jealousy, lust, drunkenness, sloth, oppression, adultery, avarice and race hatred soon destroyed this ideal society in violent and shocking ways.

The authors present a meticulous fictional narrative, derived from the accounts of vistors and islanders. They treat the savagery and debauchery that occured there mainly in a decorous and oblique manner. The only real flaw with the book is the map, which is inadequate to guide the reader throught the events. Notwithstanding, the book is very entertaining and one will certainly want to learn more about the island and its people. Best of all though, is the way in which the book raises questions about the essential nature of human beings. The mutineers and their companions had an Eden, but it could not and did not last.

This is a magnificent book and the best of the Bounty Trilogy. I've read it many times over the years and find myself wholly captivated by it each time.

"Pitcairn's Island" follows the story of Bounty mutineer Fletcher Christian and eight of his men who are hunting for a sanctuary in which to hide from the long arm of the Royal Navy. They bring their Tahitian wives and several Tahitian men along with them. Finding Pitcairn's Island uninhabited, they settle there in 1790, less than a year after the mutiny. The men range from about age 21 to 38, Christian himself was only about 24 yrs old although the movies always seem to depict him as being older.

The Pitcairn story operates on multiple levels--- the attempt by criminals to make a Utopian society, the conflict between the English and the Tahitians, the conflict between the men and the women, conflict between the educated officers, Christian and Young, and the low-born seamen. The tiny colony struggles with alcoholism, race warfare, slavery, rape, insanity and even religious rebirth. The story seems impossible to believe and yet all of it is true. The mutiny story has made for several rousing motion pictures but they always end with the mutineers arrival at Pitcairn and never deal with what happened afterwards, which is the most fascinating part of the story.

Will some filmmaker PLEASE bring this story to the screen?

Before reviewing this book, let me note that it contains explicit scenes of violence that would cause this book to exceed an R rating if it were a motion picture. These scenes are very effective in enhancing the emotional power of the story, but certainly exceed what had to be portrayed.

Pitcairn's Island is by far the best of the three novels in The Bounty Trilogy. While the first two books seem like somewhat disconnected pieces of the whole story of the events leading up to and following the mutiny on H.M.S. Bounty, Pitcairn's Island stands alone as a worthy story. In its rich development of what happened to nine of the mutineers and those Polynesians who joined them, this book ranks as one of the great adventure and morality tales of all time.

The story picks up with the H.M.S. Bounty under sail in poorly charted seas, commanded by Fletcher Christian and looking for Pitcairn's Island. On the ship are 27 adults (9 British mutineers, 12 Polynesian women, and 6 Polynesian men). Everyone is a little edgy because Pitcairn's Island is not where the charts show it to be. After much stress, Pitcairn's Island is finally sighted. Then, it becomes apparent that the Bounty cannot be kept safely there in the long run because of the poor mooring conditions. If they commit to Pitcairn's Island, there will be no leaving it. Should they stay or go?

The novel follows up on what happens in the 19 years following that fateful decision. The key themes revolve around the minimum requirements of a just society, differences between the two cultures of British and Polynesians, the varying perceptions and expectations of men and women, and the impact of immorality on the health of a society. Anyone who has enjoyed Robinson Crusoe, Swiss Family Robinson, or The Lord of the Flies will find this novel vastly appealing. Here, part of the fascination is that real-life events are being described.

The decision to turn this into a novel is a good one. The accounts of what occurred vary, and cannot be totally reconciled. So no one can really know what happened, other than it was dramatic. Towards the end of the book, the narration becomes that of one character, and the use of that character's language, perspective, background is powerful in making the novel seem more realistic and compelling.

This is a story where the less you know when you begin, the more you will enjoy the story. Out of respect for your potential reading pleasure, I will delve no more into the book.

After you finish reading the book, I suggest that you take each of the characters and imagine how you could have improved matters for all by speaking and behaving differently then that character did. Then, think about your own family, and apply the same thought process. See what you would like to change about your own speech and behavior in your family, as a result.

Think through the consequences of your potential actions very carefully when many others will be affected!

I confess my main interest was reading about the Bounty mutineers and their life on this island. There is little of that in this book, and it may well be that not much more is known, but to me it was a disappointment. If you're solely interested in the history of this island - how it came to be formed, populated, what it's like there - then you will probably like this book. Also, though this may seem petty, the book is in an odd shape - quite large, and flimsy softcover - not easy to store on your library shelves (if you want to keep it, that is).

Beginning with several chapters devoted to the Bounty Mutiny that resulted in the Pitcairn colony, Murray covers the island itself, the history of the Pitcairners, day-to-day life on the island, movies made about the Bounty saga, and thoughts on the future of this isolated place. The book is written in a relaxed, informative style, liberally illustrated with photographs and artifacts. An excellent book for a public or high school library.

I, too, found this book to be a plodding bore. I did finally manage to get all the way through, but it took months of effort (got to get back to it--after all, I paid good money for it!). Way too scholarly for any except the most masochistic. Re-read "Mutiny on the Bounty" -- maybe not the historical accuracy wanted, but a wonderful read none-the-less!

Social theorists have tried many definitions of human nature: human beings are the animals that make tools, that laugh, that play. I have another: Human-beings are history-makers. We eternally make our present by looking backwards. We present ourselves by expressing a significant past. To know us in our history is to know who we are. -Greg Dening (Performances)

At 4:30 A.M. on April 28, 1789 a series of events began which has ever since held a grip on Western imagination. Fletcher Christian lead a mutiny against Captain William Bligh aboard HMS Bounty. The aftermath of this rebellion included: Bligh's remarkable 4,000 mile journey with 18 loyal crewmen in an open launch; the sinking of HMS Pandora, which had been sent out to arrest the mutineers, with a loss of 34 men, including 4 of the Bounty crew; and the establishment of a weird sort of tropical commune on Pitcairn's Island by Christian and eight other men along with the Tahitian women (and a few friends and progeny) who may or may not have been the precipitating cause of the whole fiasco. Eventually Bligh would return to sea, three of the mutineers would be returned to England and hanged and all but one of the men on Pitcairn's Island would be murdered or die of disease.

Now there's obviously enough material there to justify the boatload of Bounty books, plays and movies that have poured forth in a steady stream over the past two centuries, but what Professor Dening has uniquely done is to consider the uses to which the story has been put over those years. He makes the convincing argument that Captain Bligh, contrary to popular imagery, was not particularly abusive of his men. Indeed, the title of the book is reflective of Dening's position that Bligh was mostly despised for the harsh language he used in upbraiding men, not for any physical measures nor for the quality of his command in general. Having made his case, Dening moves on to a consideration of why our historical understanding of Bligh requires that he be seen as an ogre. If the "reality" is that he was a fairly mild captain for his time, why do we, looking backward, see him as the very embodiment of tyrannical authority? Why are Christian and his cohorts seen as heroes, virtual freedom fighters?

The book is wide ranging, learned, entertaining and thought provoking, but its best feature is the balance that Dening strikes between the effort to present the story of the Bounty as ethnographic history ("an attempt to represent the past as it was actually experienced") and the realization that:

a historical fact is not what happened but that small part of what has happened that has been used by historians to talk about, History is not the past: it is a consciousness of the past used for present purposes.

Everyone who has ever been subjected to a history course in the modern university is familiar with the obsession with primary sources, the Left dictatorship which controls academia insists that the "truth" is to be found in the pamphlets and diaries and letters of the unimportant and the obscure, rather than in the texts and speeches of the great who shaped our understanding of events. Dening, on the other hand, understands that there is a fundamental dichotomy between the way participants experienced historical events and their importance to the society as a whole. In a very real sense, it is simply not important whether Christ was the son of God, whether England ruled the colonies harshly, whether Southerners fought for slavery, whether FDR ended the Depression, whether Nixon subverted the Constitution and Clinton merely lied about sex--what matters is that this is how we perceive these events. In Denings' felicitous phrase: Illusions make things true; truth does not dispel illusion.

GRADE: A-

Dening provides an interesting history of the Bounty story - what makes it different is his focus on the disparity between fact and the fiction that developed surrounding the characters of Christian and Bligh.

I liked the book (I read in twice, in fact), and I was a little put-off by the other online reviews. Maybe the book is, as another reader put it, "scholarly" but I didn't view that as a negative. All books need not be written for the average Joe (and, incidentally, cliometrics can be found in any decent dictionary) - so what's the problem?