Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic I need your help!

I need you remind me of books, novels, fairy tales, epics etc... where sea or sea creatures have a major part (from Odyssey to The Little Mermaid), but it must be an all around known story.
Thank you FoLCs!!!

Simona

the book of Jonah (in the Bible), Moby Dick, The Old Man & the Sea, Free Willie, Finding Nemo, SpongeBob SquarePants (okay, maybe that one's not universal )

I'm sure there are tons of others but that's all that comes to mind at the moment

PJ

also 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, parts of Robinson Crusoe and Swiss Family Robinson, Treasure Island, Captains Courageous, The Argosy (Jason and the Argonauts), Noah and the Ark, ... depends on what kind of point you want to make.

Frank

Also, how about "L'archipel en feu" and "Un capitaine de quinze ans" (sorry, I don't know the English titles) by Jules Verne? I'm afraid they're not as popular as the other mentioned, though. (Some help I am...)

See ya,
AnnaBtG.

P.S.:

ROFL! My brothers love singing this song!!

Hrm, those are ones I hadn't heard of before. "The Archipelego on Fire" and "A Fifteen Year Old Captain". Then again, I haven't read any Jules Verne... gotta fix that some time.

Sorry, don't have any suggestions other than what's been mentioned. Well, except for Lt Robin Crusoe, U.S.N., but that's really a movie... I just have the book based on it.

Thanks for your help! I'm trying to write a short story for a letterary competition, and it has to be about sea, but my inspiration is on holiday, I think, so I need all the help you can provide me!

Simona

by the way, never heard about SpongeBob SquarePants

S.

How about Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea and Eugene O'Neill's The Long Voyage Home.

Jude

Hi Simona,

This is Spongebob Squarepants.

Hmm. How about "The Little Mermaid"? There are also a bunch of short greek myths having to do with the sea. The tale of Hero and her lover (forget his name) comes to mind. There was another one having to do with the capture of Dionysus (hopefully I haven't mangled the spelling too much). Short version: some pirates took him, he used his power to free himself, and when they jumped overboard to escape him, he turned them into dolphins.

Oh, there's also "The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner."

My Mom's reading a book now called "The Hungry Ocean," but I don't know too much about it. She's not here to ask at the moment, either.

"The Loss of the Essex" is the true story that inspired Moby Dick.

There are a lot of books and stories about the Titanic. Not just its loss and the stories of the survivors, but also a couple about Bob Ballard finding it again. There was also one called (iirc) "Raise the Titanic." I think they made it into a movie. It's a fictional story based on a plan to recover and repair the ship.

That's all I can think of offhand.

As for Spongebob, as you can see, he's a cartoon. Quite popular around here. They sell Spongebob everything these days. Even had a Spongebob celebrity fashion show to benefit charity. I've never seen the actual cartoon, but I do know enough to guess his secret origin. See, Spongebob lives in "Bikini Bottom Ridge." Now, the Bikini islands were the site of an early U.S. atomic bomb test. The first, I think. They took an experimental bomb and used it to blow the pefectly good isolated tropical islands to teeny little radioactively "hot" bits. About a decade later, someone invented a "hot" little swimsuit composed of teeny little bits and named it after the blown up islands.

So, one could suppose that if bits of the Bikini islands sank, thanks to that atomic test, they would form a ridge at the bottom of the ocean. That ridge would, of course, be radioactive. Although water does nicely scatter any kind of radiation (which is why subs have to use sonar instead of radar), the immediate area would still make your average geiger counter go nuts.

Now, as anyone who has ever read a comic book or seen a sci-fi "B" movie knows, radiation can have a variety of interesting and unexpected effects on living creatures.. For example, a perfectly ordinary living sea sponge could, upon being exposed to radioactive bits of the Bikini islands, mutate into... Spongebob Squarepants!

I doubt it ever came up officially on the show, but I think it explains things nicely, don't you?

Paul

There are indeed a lot of Greek myths, although I don't know how popular they are. As for the myth you mention, Hero's lover was Leandros. If you need more information on them, Simona, just say so and I'll be back.

Some other stories popped in my mind: One story from the 1001 tales, about a guy we call Sevah here (I can't remember his English name, but I think there has been a movie with him fairly recently), the Pirates of the Caribbean... I had thought of another very good one, but it just slipped me while I was typing

See ya,
AnnaBtG.

Oh! I remembered the story that had slipped me!! The Loch Ness legend.

See ya,
AnnaBtG.

Thank you FoLCs!
I just finished my short story, and the major influence was greek and latin mithology with a little of popular local folklore; for example: I discoved a legend about a half-fish-half-man creature who (which?) would live in the dephts of Mediterraneo and supports one of the three columns which Sicily stand on. It's not exactly "local" because I live in Tuscany, but it's Italia!. The atmosphere which I tried to infuse in is from Montale and James (what a arrogance!)

Thanks again,
Simona

Glad we could help, Simona.

Anna - I believe the sailor you're referring to would be Sinbad. At least, that's the main sailor story I can think of from 1001 Nights. There was a movie about him recently, too.

Reminds me - we forgot Gulliver. Oh well. Doesn't sound like he was needed anyway.

Paul

This was him, Paul. Thank you very much.

AnnaBtG.