America's Columbus
Christopher Columbus: The Mariner and the Man. By Jean Merrien. (Odharns, 25s.)
CHRISTOPHER COI IMM.S is one of the most mysterious great men of history. His Christian name, surname, place and date of birth, nation- ality, social rank, are all in dispute : there is no agreement even on what his occupation had been before 1492. nor on how much (if any) experience of the sea he had had. This is partly due to the fact that Columbus was a great liar. On his first voyage to America he faked his log-book in order to maintain his men's morale; he deliberately falsified distances in his report so as to mislead anyone who might try to repeat the journey. His son and grandson, who are under suspicion of falsifying and destroying documents, helped to perpetuate many biographical legends : but Columbus was abetted in concealing his origins by the Spanish government itself, which also resorted to equivocations and suppressions.
It is all very mysterious. Scholars have sifted the evidence again and again, and have put forward many hypotheses. M.' Merrien has a low opinion of 'the learned.' He claims to be 'not a specialist, a writer not yet contaminated by this virus,' who therefore 'might perhaps be calmer, more candid, and produce a more readable book.' 'Though knowing that I was bound to be attacked by all and sundry, I have dared to plunge into these troubled waters.' M. Merrien sees himself as a bluff seaman, simple and guileless. But in fact he grinds axes with the best of 'the learned.' Rejecting theories that make Columbus either a Genoese or a Jew, he plumps for the view that he was a Catalan gentleman turned corsair, and that the mystery arose from the fact that Columbus had at one time been in rebellion against the sovereign for whom he discovered America. This theory has respectable sponsors, and M. Merrien argues it competently, turning a nautical blind eye towards difficulties, and throwing awkward documents overboard as forgeries, thus considerably lighten- ing ship. Unfortunately he (or his proof-reader) gets a number of the crucial dates wrong, so we sail through patches of dense fog.
Is it `a more readable book'? He (or his transla- tor) writes in a downright, salty way. 'The whole thing was an appalling and ignoble mess, and we shall not even try to make head or tail of it.' 'Surely he might have said to himself : "Christo- pher, you've been a sailor, why not go to sea again? A sailor is never done for, unless he is an invalid."' (We cannot but admire M. Merrien's imaginative thoroughness here. lf 1 understand him aright, he believes his hero's real name was Jaume Colom. But he knows that Jaume would have addressed himself, even in private, as Christopher. M. Merrien never misses a point that makes Columbus's 'life more homogenous and . . . redounds to the honour • of the sea.') But when neither taking a rope's end to the scholars nor beguiling innocent landlubbers, M. Merrien has much to say about Columbus as a mariner that is well worth reading. even in rather clumsy
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