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An unprecedented and masterfully told biography of Jacques Cousteau that reveals for the first time the fascinating and compelling individual behind this famous television personality.
Inventor of the aqualung and fearless scuba diver, Jacques Cousteau opened up the ocean to a mass audience for the first time. Here, with the cooperation of many of the subjects closest confidants and family, Brad Matsen makes clear the full picture of his remarkable life, showing the father, military man, inventor, entrepreneur, and adventurer behind the public face. Vividly conveying the people, the science, and the lure of the sea that shaped Cousteau's life, Matsen paints a luminous portrait of a man who profoundly changed the way we live on our planet.
Inventor of the aqualung and fearless scuba diver, Jacques Cousteau opened up the ocean to a mass audience for the first time. Here, with the cooperation of many of the subjects closest confidants and family, Brad Matsen makes clear the full picture of his remarkable life, showing the father, military man, inventor, entrepreneur, and adventurer behind the public face. Vividly conveying the people, the science, and the lure of the sea that shaped Cousteau's life, Matsen paints a luminous portrait of a man who profoundly changed the way we live on our planet.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
From early navy days and diving experiments to the final days of family wranglings, this biography gives great insight into one of the heroes of natural history television. By no means a mere eulogy, the darker side of Cousteau is revealed - his abandonment of collaborators, cold shouldering of family members, and maintenance of the expedition leader illusion of later tv series. Neither are Cousteau's magnetism, charm, invention and sheer drive neglected. A rounded portrait of a true innovator and undersea treasure!
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
9 reviews
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Fascinating, entertaining, filled with revelations
27 Oct 2009
Format:Hardcover
To cut to the chase, Sea King is a wonderful fast-paced, very entertaining read, a lively unauthorized, carefully researched biography of a 20th Century world icon, warts and all, skillfully told by arguably the best author on marine topics writing today (Matsen's two most recent books: Descent and Titanic's Last Secrets, both terrific). With Cousteau, the author had his work cut out. The man was a complex, formidable personality: inventor, self-taught scientist, filmmaker, adventurer, explorer, visionary, charmer, canny marketer, environmentalist, and celebrated world citizen. With his pitch-perfect narrative voice, Matsen delivers in spades, revealing Cousteau was also a bit of a con, self-absorbed, not a little sociopathic, a tireless ladies man (reportedly he slept with 10,000 women), and oh so French. He also had a secret life: a second family with a devoted mistress who bore him children and who following his death, emerged as the controversial controller of the Cousteau estate.
What surprised me is that Cousteau's life story is only now being told-amazing considering Cousteau's decades-long celebrity and profound impact on both scuba diving and the conservation movement. Matsen plunges in with gusto. It's all here: the invention of the double-stage regulator (replete with near fatal experiments), the breakthrough documentary The Silent World, behind-the-scenes tales of the Calypso voyages (groupies and all), the tragic death of Cousteau's son Philippe, Cousteau's quirky successful partnership with media mogul Ted Turner, the meteoric success of the Cousteau Society and its long messy public unraveling.
Great stuff, all of it. Matsen never gets in the way, steering an even-handed course, allowing the darker revelations and less-flattering aspects of the man speak for themselves. A bonus: the book's photos, many provided by family members and never before published, are excellent. Highest recommendation.
John Grissim, author of The Lost Treasure of the Concepcion and Pure Stoke
What surprised me is that Cousteau's life story is only now being told-amazing considering Cousteau's decades-long celebrity and profound impact on both scuba diving and the conservation movement. Matsen plunges in with gusto. It's all here: the invention of the double-stage regulator (replete with near fatal experiments), the breakthrough documentary The Silent World, behind-the-scenes tales of the Calypso voyages (groupies and all), the tragic death of Cousteau's son Philippe, Cousteau's quirky successful partnership with media mogul Ted Turner, the meteoric success of the Cousteau Society and its long messy public unraveling.
Great stuff, all of it. Matsen never gets in the way, steering an even-handed course, allowing the darker revelations and less-flattering aspects of the man speak for themselves. A bonus: the book's photos, many provided by family members and never before published, are excellent. Highest recommendation.
John Grissim, author of The Lost Treasure of the Concepcion and Pure Stoke
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Amazing that it was written before
21 Oct 2009
Format:Hardcover
An exciting and well written biography of an amazing man. The author tells the story of Cousteau with a nonsensational but highly engaging voice. Although I'm a big fan of all things Cousteau, Matsen reveals many aspects of him I was not even remotely aware of.
One of the remarkable things about the book is that it wasn't written a long time ago - as far as I know this is the only English-language detailed account of Cousteau's life and work: a man that not only revolutionized how we look at and engage with our watery planet, invented Scubadiving - but also had a fascinating (and thoroughly complicated...) personal life. This makes for a real page-turner, and Matsen delivers the goods with style.
I reccomend it to all people who are interested in the oceans, diving - or just want an entertaining read!
One of the remarkable things about the book is that it wasn't written a long time ago - as far as I know this is the only English-language detailed account of Cousteau's life and work: a man that not only revolutionized how we look at and engage with our watery planet, invented Scubadiving - but also had a fascinating (and thoroughly complicated...) personal life. This makes for a real page-turner, and Matsen delivers the goods with style.
I reccomend it to all people who are interested in the oceans, diving - or just want an entertaining read!
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Not Deep Enough
10 April 2010
Format:Hardcover
I grew up watching Jacques Cousteau on TV. He was a forerunner in the movement to protect our seas and our planet, and he was always entertaining as a filmmaker and storyteller. I can still hear his voice-overs in my head.
The appearance of "The Sea King" had me excited. I wanted to find out more about this man's life, his family, career, secrets, and more of the playful and dangerous experiences from his colorful life. The book starts at a snail pace. We wade through page after page of dry facts, told with little imagination or style. This reads like a textbook on the inventor of the Aqua-Lung, lacking that spark of storytelling prowess that infused Cousteau's own work. I plugged away, skimming well-researched but tedious details about the early efforts to perfect the Aqua-Lung. In between, I caught a few glimpses of Cousteau's background, including the conflict in the family due to his brother's collaboration with Nazis during WWII.
After the first few chapters, the book picks up a bit, giving us insights into the emergence of the Calypso ship--thanks to an heir of the Guinness Beer empire--and Ted Turner's part in helping the Cousteau Society press on in the changing times. It's sad to read how "Happy Days" and "Laverne and Shirley" (fun shows, in their own rights) pushed Cousteau's groundbreaking work into obscurity. Nevertheless, the man's face remained one of the most recognizable in the world until the late 1980's, and his impact is hard to measure.
The author gives only snippets of Cousteau's personal life, only peeks at his philandering ways, his family struggles, and his reactions to tragedy. I'm sure this was intentional, to protect the family legacy, but it only blurs the three-dimensional complexity of a man so many admired. And we are robbed of deeper understanding of his wife, Simone, who stood by him through many tough years relationally and financially. I wished for more humor, more tidbits, more insight. True, I came away with more facts about this man I once adored, but little heart connection. Sadly, "The Sea King" didn't go deep enough.
The appearance of "The Sea King" had me excited. I wanted to find out more about this man's life, his family, career, secrets, and more of the playful and dangerous experiences from his colorful life. The book starts at a snail pace. We wade through page after page of dry facts, told with little imagination or style. This reads like a textbook on the inventor of the Aqua-Lung, lacking that spark of storytelling prowess that infused Cousteau's own work. I plugged away, skimming well-researched but tedious details about the early efforts to perfect the Aqua-Lung. In between, I caught a few glimpses of Cousteau's background, including the conflict in the family due to his brother's collaboration with Nazis during WWII.
After the first few chapters, the book picks up a bit, giving us insights into the emergence of the Calypso ship--thanks to an heir of the Guinness Beer empire--and Ted Turner's part in helping the Cousteau Society press on in the changing times. It's sad to read how "Happy Days" and "Laverne and Shirley" (fun shows, in their own rights) pushed Cousteau's groundbreaking work into obscurity. Nevertheless, the man's face remained one of the most recognizable in the world until the late 1980's, and his impact is hard to measure.
The author gives only snippets of Cousteau's personal life, only peeks at his philandering ways, his family struggles, and his reactions to tragedy. I'm sure this was intentional, to protect the family legacy, but it only blurs the three-dimensional complexity of a man so many admired. And we are robbed of deeper understanding of his wife, Simone, who stood by him through many tough years relationally and financially. I wished for more humor, more tidbits, more insight. True, I came away with more facts about this man I once adored, but little heart connection. Sadly, "The Sea King" didn't go deep enough.
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