The King of the Sea

Westerman, Percy F. (Percy Francis), 1876-1959Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.5

Word count: 295K words
Chapters: 30

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.De Koning der Zee by Percy F. WestermanAuthor: Westerman, Percy F. (Percy Francis), 1876-1959,Language: Dutch, Class: PZ: Language and Literatures: Juvenile belles lettres, Release Date: Jul 28, 2018

Editor's review

This is a Dutch-language adventure novel for young readers by the British author Percy F. Westerman, a popular work in the sea-and-ships genre. The story revolves around life and adventure at sea, moving at a brisk pace with strongly action-driven characters, and carrying the courage, discipline, and comradeship common to juvenile fiction of its era. As a public-domain ebook, its value lies first in language and genre reading: the Dutch original can give language learners exposure to narrative texts, and can also serve readers studying popular juvenile literature and maritime themes. The descriptions of navigational detail and crew life convey the narrative appeal of early twentieth-century adventure fiction. Read it as genre fiction to be enjoyed, without demanding deep characterisation; you will gain more by noting its period attitudes and nautical terminology.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers learning Dutch who want to build reading volume through fiction
Young and adult readers who enjoy sea adventure and ship-themed stories
Enthusiasts studying popular juvenile literature or the adventure fiction genre
Anyone looking for a brisk, plot-driven read

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting the depth and complex psychology of serious literature
Those unfamiliar with Dutch who are unwilling to read with reference tools
Readers sensitive to the period attitudes found in old-fashioned adventure stories

Reading tips

Read a chapter first to gauge the language difficulty, then decide whether to study it closely sentence by sentence or read quickly for plot.
Note unfamiliar nautical terms separately and look them up together afterwards to improve comprehension.
If your goal is learning Dutch, read dialogue-heavy passages aloud to build a feel for the language.
After finishing, compare it with similar sea-adventure novels and consider the narrative conventions common to the genre.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

What language is this book written in?

The original is in Dutch, by the British author Percy F. Westerman. It suits readers with some Dutch who want to practise reading through fiction.

Can I read it without any Dutch?

Reading it directly is quite difficult. You can work through it paragraph by paragraph with a dictionary or bilingual tools, or first find a translation to learn the plot and then compare it with the original.

What age group is the story suitable for?

It belongs to the juvenile adventure genre, with a brisk, action-driven plot that young readers can enter easily; adults can also leaf through it as light genre reading.

Does this book have value for literary research?

As a sample of early twentieth-century popular juvenile adventure literature, it can be used to observe the genre features and period attitudes of maritime fiction, but one should not expect the depth of classic literature.

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About the author

Westerman, Percy F. (Percy Francis), 1876-1959 Author

Percy F. Westerman (1876–1959) was a British author known for adventure novels for young readers. Public information about him is limited, and few details of his life are available. The library holds 36 of his works, mostly naval and war stories: A Watch-dog of the North Sea and Under the White Ensign are set against naval operations in the Great War; The Nameless Island is a modern Robinson Crusoe tale of survival on a deserted island; and The Quest of the Golden Hope returns to seventeenth-century maritime adventure. He also wrote early aviation fiction such as The Dreadnought of the Air, and battlefield stories like A Lively Bit of the Front, about the New Zealand Rifles on the Western Front. His novels are tightly plotted, with attention to technical detail and discipline, and were influential in early twentieth-century English boys' fiction.