Write of High Adventure
while, livinq I r/4{^!Mi^Hl^9
Awa M from it All
THE World War was dragging
along through fts bloody middle
years. Two young Americans,
flyers in the famous Lafayette
Escadrille. decided like some hun
dreds of thousands of other fighting
men—that they could do with a large
slice of peace and quiet, once the war
should be over.
So they made an agreement, these
two, that if and when the war ended—
if both of them survived—they would
cut loose from civilization, go to the
quietest and remotest spot they could
find, and devote their lives to writing.
The war ground its way along and
finally came to its end. The two young
flyers, somewhat to their surprise, were
still alive. They collaborated on one
writing job and found it good. Thev
recalled their old war-time compact.
And eventually, along in 1920. they
pulled up stakes and went to Tahiti
Years passed. The two friends, writ
ing separately, produced several books
and magazine articles. As writers go
they were moderately successful. Thev
never hit the best-seller lists, although
their work enjoyed decent sales; and
they never applied themselves to “seri
ous"’ fiction, although the critics recog
nized them as sound craftsmen.
Then, in the fall of 1932, the Atlantic
Monthly Press received from the two
friends a new manuscript—an historical
novel, based on a famous incident in
the British navy. The book was pub
lished, as all Atlantic books are. by
Little, Brown and Company, and tht
public snapped it up Within a few
months it was one of the most talked
of books of the day and its authors were
famous.
The book was “Mutiny on the
Bounty.” The authors were James
Norman Hall and Charles Nordhoff.
two men are today considered
A the most remarkable writing team
in existence. Beginning with “Mutiny
Half’s plane just after it had crashed behind the German lines during the
war. Above, a photograph snapped 15 minutes later, showing Hall.
bandaged, a prisoner of war.
on the Bounty” they have written four
successive best-sellers—which have the
peculiar property of continuing to sell
year after year.
Today all four of these books are in
wide demand. In addition to “Mutiny
on the Bounty,” they are “Men Against
the Sea,” “Pitcairn’s Island,” and “The
Hurricane”—which last sold more than
22,000 copies before publication.
Altogether, more than 200,000 copies
of the “Bounty” books have been sold.
A moving picture made from the first
book has been shown all over the world.
The tv4t authors have become famous
and wealthy.
But the desire for peace and solitude,
born of the war, is still with them.
They continue to live in Tahiti. Their
photographs are rarely seen; interviews
with them are never published. Instead
of returning to America to bask in the
public attention which goes to literary
lions, they stay oo their island, attend
It was the famous 1 \yl eSRI
mutiny on 11. M. yL Jw
S. Bounty that / ‘ aCTF
provided Hall and ♦ / i
Nordhoff with the t t /
plot for their first , '* \« f 1
best seller. c l> (v-'. jf 4 U /ij| f k
M,
strictly to their work, and shun the
publicity and adulation which could he
theirs for the asking.
Wouldn’t you expect two such men
to be unusual individuals, with un
usual records? Well, you’d be quite
right if you did. They are unusual—
particularly so in the way in which they
are able to unite their separate talents
in one literary personality, working to
gether so skillfully that the most care
ful critics have never been able to tell
which part of which book was done by
which author.
DORN in Colfax, lowa, in 1887, Hall
was educated at Grinnell College,
also in lowa, receiving a Ph. D. degree
in 1910. In 1914, ad the outbreak of the
war, he enlisted in the British army and
went to France with Kitchener’s famous
“first hundred thousand,” serving as a
machine gunner in the 9th Royal Fu
siliers. In the fall of 1916 he trans-
•
ferred to the famous Lafayette Esca
drille and became a pursuit pilot in
Groupe de Combat 13.
It was there that he met Nordhoff.
Nordhoff was born of American par
ents in London in 1887. He grew up
on his father’s ranch in Lower Cali
fornia, Mexico, was graduated from
Harvard in 1909. and raised sugar cane
in Mexico until the revolution of 1911
interfered. He went into business in
California, and in 1916 went to France
as an ambulance driver with the Amer
ican Field Service. Then he joined the
French Foreign Legion, went to two
schools of military aviation, and trans
ferred to the Lafayette Escadrille.
He and Hall became fast friends at
once. When the United States entered
the war they transferred, together, to
the U. S. army flying corps.
In May, 1918, Hall crashed behind
the German lines and was carried off
to a German prison camp, where he
remained until the spring of 1919. He
escaped and rejoined Nordhoff in Paris.
Both men were decorated for gallantry
by this time; Nordhoff won a Croix de
Guerre, and Hall a Medaille Militaire
(awarded twice), a Croix de Guerre
and an American Distinguished Serv
ice Cross.
The literary partnership between the
two men began there in Paris, when
they wefe commissioned to write the
story of the Lafayette Escadrille. Hall
had already won his spurs as a writer,
having published a series of papers on
“High Adventure” in the Atlantic
Monthly and having interested the edi
tor of that magazine, Ellery Sedgwick,
in his work. And then, the history of
the Escadrille out of the way, the two
r >4-1 % % / v
Jr /
S T V; : ?
The men who write best sellers of
literary merit—James Norman Hall ,
(left) and Charles Nordhoff.
decided to join forces more or less
permanently.
It seemed important to them to get
away from the falsities and conven
tionalities of modern civilization. They
were ardent admirers of Stevenson and
Melville, who had written glowingly of
life on Tahiti; and when they visited
Boston, Mr. Sedgwick strongly urged
that they follow their already-formed
hunch and go to Tahiti themselves.
TVOW that island is full of young white
'men who go there to “get away from
it all,” succumb to the island’s easy life,
and never thereafter do anything worth
mentionir But Hall and Nordhoff
were different. They went to the mid-
Pacific to work, not to loaf, and work
they did—diligently and to some con
sequence.
A great deal of research was neces
sary for their book on the Bounty. For
a time Hall thought he would have to
go all *he way to England to examine
the files of the British Admiralty—for
only there could he read the records
of the mutineers’ trials, the statements
of Captain Bligh and other officers, and
other essential documents. But he
wrote to admiralty officials first—and
found them so generous of their time
that the trip to London was unneces
sary.
Photostatic copies were made of the
mutineers’ trial and other important
papers. A British naval officer sent
plans of the ship’s deck and rigging,
copied her log, and even made a de
tailed scale model of the ship, and seat
the photographs along.
Armed with all of the facts, the tw®
authors started then the method of col
laboration which they have used ev«r
since.
First they spend hours talking tha
story over until they have the char
acters and the plot thoroughly in mini
Then they divide the prospective book
into chapters and decide what action
shall take place in each chapter That
done, they go through the list and each
man picks the ones he would t specially
like to handle. When both ; ,rk th*
same chapter, they toss a coin to see
who gets it.
Then the actual writing begins. As
each one completes a chapter he hands
it to the other, who reads it carefully,
suggests revision where he thinks U
advisable, and hands it back. It is in
this way that they make their books
read like the wor kof one man, elimi
nating individualities of style.
Working in this way, “Mutiny on the
Bounty” was at last completed. Its suc
cess with the reading public, was im
mediate and sustained. Hall and Nord
hoff at once turned to the task of con
tinuing the story of the famous mutiny,
and two years later brought out “Men
Against the Sea,” telling of Captain
Bligh’s trans-Paciftc voyage in an open
boat. A year later they finished the
tale with “Pitcairn’s Lsland.’’ And feft
1935 came “The Hurricane."
Both Hall and Nordhoff have married
since going to Tahiti. Hall was mar
ried in 1925, to Sarah Winchester, and
lives with his wife and their son and
daughter in a fairly new and (for
hiti) up-to-date house. Nordhoff mar
ried Pepe Tearai of Tahiti in 1920, and
bow has three daughters and a son.