Narrative of a Voyage to Senegal

Gericault's famous painting The Raft of the Medusa, which hangs in the Louvre, commemorates the shipwrecking of the French frigate Medusa off the coast of Senegal in 1816. Here two survivors tell the raft's story: government officials on the voyage took the ship's few lifeboats while the 150 other passengers were left on a hastily built raft. Only 15 on the raft, including Savigny and Correard, survived, and while the group expected congratulations on their arrival ashore, they were mistreated because of their knowledge of the officials' cowardice and betrayal. This grim story originally appeared in English in London in 1818 and here is published in the U.S. for the first time. Although the language is stilted and awkward, the harrowing, heroic and disillusioning story emerges nonetheless. (December)