Alan Villiers: Voyager of the Winds

Book excerpt: When Australian journalist Alan Villiers sailed on the last of the giant merchant windjammers in the 1920s and '30s, his writings and photographs made him famous. Villiers crewed on beautiful Herzogin Cecilie and tragic Grace Harwar, took tiny Joseph Conrad around the globe, sailed on Arabian dhows, led wartime landing craft, captained Mayflower II across the Atlantic, and inspired modern sail training and ship restoration projects. Drawn from his personal diaries, this award-winning biography of the author-adventurer reveals both his mythmaking and his achievements. It is a tribute to the greatest sailing ships ever launched – and to the extraordinary man who loved them. The book won the Mountbatten Maritime Award in 2009, and this Second Edition is fully revised. It contains over 100 photos, many of them new.