These events compete for attention, and as one process outshouts the others, the brain The edge of the whirl was represented by a broad belt of gleaming spray ;but no particle of this slipped into the mouth of the terrific funnel, whose interior, as far as the eye could fathom it, was a smooth, shining, and jet-black wall of water, inclined to the horizon at an angle of some forty-five degrees, speeding dizzily round and round with a swaying and sweltering motion, and sending forth to the winds an appalling voice, half shriek, half roar, such as not even the mighty cataract of Niagara ever lifts up in its agony to Heaven. It likewise happens frequently, that whales come too near the stream, and are overpowered by its violence; and then it is impossible to describe their howlings and bellowings in their fruitless struggles to disengage themselves. Absolutely recommended! forum The sense of falling had ceased ;and the motion of the vessel seemed much as it had been before, while in the belt of foam, with the exception that she now lay more along. Harry a dval la descente qui mne au lac. forum, gallery | guestbook | a descent into the maelstrom. home It had a complete flush deck, with only a small hatch near the bow, and this hatch it had always been our custom to batten down when about to cross the Strm, by way of precaution against the chopping seas. In this direction I was able to obtain an unobstructed view, from the manner in which the smack hung on the inclined surface of the pool. 2. a downward inclination or slope. This stream is regulated by the flux and reflux of the sea -- it being constantly high and low water every six hours. Our first slide into the abyss itself, from the belt of foam above, had carried us a great distance down the slope; but our farther descent was by no means proportionate. Descent into the Maelstrom by Mike Hoornstra 9781365899249 (Paperback, 2020) Delivery UK delivery is usually within 10 to 12 working days. The three of us my two brothers and myself had crossed over to the islands about two oclock P. M., and had soon nearly loaded the smack with fine fish, which, we all remarked, were more plenty that day than we had ever known them. poetry | }}(document,'script','twitter-wjs'); Inspired by the Moskstraumen, tidal eddies and whirlpools in northern Norway which are real, the story is couched as a story within a story, a tale told at the summit of a mountain climb. "Never shall I forget the sensations of awe, horror, and admiration with which I gazed about me. I never felt deeper grief than when I saw him attempt this act although I knew he was a madman when he did it a raving maniac through sheer fright. A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTRM. When the stream is most boisterous, and its fury heightened by a storm, it is dangerous to come within a Norway mile of it. But A Descent into the Maelstrom is different, because the trouble which descends upon the white-haired man is outside of his control: he is a victim of natures forces at their wildest and most uncontrollable, with his brush with death being the result of natural phenomena rather than some retributive power punishing him for some past crime. Unfortunately, he realizes this because his older brother shouts into his ear that they're headed directly into the maelstrom. A Descent into the Maelstrom: plot summary, (NB: the storys epigraph, from a seventeenth-century essay by Joseph Glanvill, references the ancient Greek philosopher Democritus, who though truth could be found at the bottom of a well. Our progress downward, at each revolution, was slow, but very perceptible. Never shall I forget the sensations of awe, horror, and admiration with which I gazed about me. "At first I was too much confused to observe anything accurately. It might have been an hour, or thereabout, after my quitting the smack, when, having descended to a vast distance beneath me, it made three or four wild gyrations in rapid succession, and, bearing my loved brother with it, plunged headlong, at once and forever, into the chaos of foam below. Britannica Dictionary definition of DESCENT formal 1 [count] : the act or process of descending: such as a : the act or process of going from a higher to a lower place or level usually singular The climbers were faced with a dangerous descent in bad weather. I made, also, three important observations. I suppose it was despair that strung my nerves. The Maelstrom is a vortex of water off the coast of Norway that whirls and drags objects to the rocky bottom of the sea. We were now in the belt of surf that always surrounds the whirl; and I thought, of course, that another moment would plunge us into the abyss down which we could only see indistinctly on account of the amazing velocity with which we were borne along. The narrator, seeing the power of the whirlpool in the ocean visible from the mountain top, is then told of the man's fishing trip with his two brothers a few years ago in which they encountered the whirlpool. The boat did not seem to sink into the water at all, but to skim like an air-bubble upon the surface of the surge. We had now been about ten minutes upon the top of Helseggen, to which we had ascended from the interior of Lofoden, so that we had caught no glimpse of the sea until it had burst upon us from the summit. descent n (physical) descente nf : From the airport, Catherine watched the plane's descent onto the runway. I no longer hesitated what to do. Dutch ice freediver Kiki Bosch swims in the world's coldest waters without a wetsuit as therapy for a trauma she experienced, and to inspire others. The attempts to account for the phenomenon some of which, I remember, seemed to me sufficiently plausible in perusal now wore a very different and unsatisfactory aspect. The barrel to which I was attached sunk very little farther than half the distance between the bottom of the gulf and the spot at which I leaped overboard, before a great change took place in the character of the whirlpool. But while we were up I had thrown a quick glance around -- and that one glance was all sufficient. Which is how I came across. But for this circumstance we should have foundered at once -- for we lay entirely buried for some moments. poetry It was my elder brother, and my heart leaped for joy, for I had made sure that he was overboard -- but the next moment all this joy was turned into horror -- for he put his mouth close to my ear, and screamed out the word 'Moskoe-strm'! Welcome back. The ways of God in Nature, as in Providence, are not as our ways; nor are the models that we frame any way commensurate to the vastness, profundity, and unsearchableness of His works, which have a depth in them greater than the well of Democritus. It took less than a single day to change these hairs from a jetty black to white, to weaken my limbs, and to unstring my nerves, so that I tremble at the least exertion, and am frightened at a shadow. It was until today's afternoon that I found out that I do not only own a copy of Poe's most tales, but that I also already have started reading one of his less appreciated not-so-short-stories. The name Poe brings to mind images of murderers and madmen, premature burials, and mysterious women who return from the dead. I attracted my brothers attention by signs, pointed to the floating barrels that came near us, and did everything in my power to make him understand what I was about to do. On a fishing trip with his brothers a storm arose fuelled by the most powerful and wicked hurricane that ever erupted from hea. Myself and my two brothers once owned a schooner-rigged smack of about seventy tons burthen, with which we were in the habit of fishing among the islands beyond Moskoe, nearly to Vurrgh. It took less than a single day to change these hairs from a jetty black to white, to weaken my limbs, and to unstring my nerves." Her starboard side was next the whirl, and on the larboard arose the world of ocean we had left. As it was, I involuntarily closed my eyes in horror. I still lived. Inspired by the Moskstraumen, it is couched as a story within a story, a tale told at the summit of a mountain climb in Lofoten, Norway. We had now reached the summit of the loftiest crag. I knew it could make no difference whether either of us held on at all; so I let him have the bolt, and went astern to the cask. I called to mind the great variety of buoyant matter that strewed the coast of Lofoden, having been absorbed and then thrown forth by the Moskoe-strm. Poe is a wonder and an amazement to me. Just opposite the promontory upon whose apex we were placed, and at a distance of some five or six miles out at sea, there was visible a small, bleak-looking island ;or, more properly, its position was discernible through the wilderness of surge in which it was enveloped. To see what your friends thought of this book, A Descent into the Maelstrom - an Edgar Allan Poe Short Story. In truth so deeply was I excited by the perilous position of my companion, that I fell at full length upon the ground, clung to the shrubs around me, and dared not even glance upward at the sky -- while I struggled in vain to divest myself of the idea that the very foundations of the mountain were in danger from the fury of the winds. On a fishing trip with his brothers a storm arose fuelled by the most powerful and wicked hurricane that ever erupted from heaven caused their ship to be swept into an almighty vortex. The old man recounts his ordeal that in less than a single day changed his hairs from a jetty black to white, weakened his limbs, and t unstrung his nerves. We might go deeper than this, though, and many critics have, viewing the maelstrom as a symbol not just for nature but for God, and for cosmological forces beyond our own world. The ordinary accounts of this vortex had by no means prepared me for what I saw. We had let our sails go by the run before it cleverly took us ;but, at the first puff, both our masts went by the board as if they had been sawed off -- the mainmast taking with it my youngest brother, who had lashed himself to it for safety. I have already described the unnatural curiosity which had taken the place of my original terrors. the fall of the house of usher: silencea fable: the masque of the red death. I was borne violently into the channel of the Strm, and in a few minutes was hurried down the coast into the grounds of the fishermen. It was on the tenth day of July, 18, a day which the people of this part of the world will never forget for it was one in which blew the most terrible hurricane that ever came out of the heavens. The appearance of the ocean, in the space between the more distant island and the shore, had something very unusual about it. Of course, all I could think of then is to finish reading A Descent into the Maelstrom, which I have started reading almost two weeks ago. * See Archimedes, "De Incidentibus in Fluido." These, no doubt, were singular fancies to occupy a mans mind in such extremity and I have often thought since, that the revolutions of the boat around the pool might have rendered me a little light-headed. Not long ago, said he at length, and I could have guided you on this route as well as the youngest of my sons; but, about three years past, there happened to me an event such as never happened before to mortal man or at least such as no man ever survived to tell of and the six hours of deadly terror which I then endured have broken me up body and soul. I now began towatch, with a strange interest, the numerous things that floated in our company. The one midway is Moskoe. Depuis l'aroport, Catherine assista la descente de l'avion sur le tarmac. Taking the narrator to a cliff, from whose top they can view the whirlpools and the great Maelstrom (or major whirlpool), this white-haired man relates how he and his two brothers were caught in the Maelstrom while in their fishing boat, and how his two brothers were both sucked into its current. In five minutes the whole sea, as far as Vurrgh, was lashed into ungovernable fury ;but it was between Moskoe and the coast that the main uproar held its sway. Here we used to remain until nearly time for slack-water again, when we weighed and made for home. This there was no great difficulty in doing ;for the smack flew round steadily enough, and upon an even keel -- only swaying to and fro, with the immense sweeps and swelters of the whirl. Descent is a first-person shooter (FPS) game developed by Parallax Software and released by Interplay Productions in 1995 for MS-DOS, and later for Macintosh, PlayStation, and RISC OS. The general burst of terrific grandeur was all that I beheld. The "forty fathoms" must have reference only to portions of the channel close upon the shore either of Moskoe or Lofoden. We careered round and round for perhaps an hour, flying rather than floating, getting gradually more and more into the middle of the surge, and then nearer and nearer to its horrible inner edge. They blind, deafen, and strangle you, and take away all power of action or reflection. "No one ever will know what my feelings were at that moment. I did not care, however, to contest the point with him. And then down we came with a sweep, a slide, and a plunge, that made me feel sick and dizzy, as if I was falling from some lofty mountain-top in a dream. credits Around in every direction it was still as black as pitch, but nearly overhead there burst out, all at once, a circular rift of clear sky as clear as I ever saw and of a deep bright blue and through it there blazed forth the full moon with a lustre that I never before knew her to wear. Descent: Directed by Nays Baghai. Powerful story that makes the whirlpool feel cosmic in its elemental terror. It was not going. "Our first slide into the abyss itself, from the belt of foam above, had carried us a great distance down the slope ;but our farther descent was by no means proportionate. I could not help observing, nevertheless, that I had scarcely more difficulty in maintaining my hold and footing in this situation, than if we had been upon a dead level; and this, I suppose, was owing to the speed at which we revolved. In the year 1645, early in the morning of Sexagesima Sunday, it raged with such noise and impetuosity that the very stones of the houses on the coast fell to the ground." A maelstrom is a whirlpool: the word dates from at least the sixteenth century and was formed from Dutch words malen (meaning grind) and stroom (meaning stream). It took less than a single day to change these. When it is flood, the stream runs up the country between Lofoden and Moskoe with a boisterous rapidity; but the roar of its impetuous ebb to the sea is scarce equalled by the loudest and most dreadfulcataracts; the noise being heard several leagues off, and the vortices or pits are of such an extent and depth, that if a ship comes within its attraction, it is inevitably absorbed and carried down to the bottom, and there beat to pieces against the rocks; and when the water relaxes, the fragments thereof are thrown up again. "At first I could not make out what he meant -- but soon a hideous thought flashed upon me. Here, the simultaneous attraction and repulsion that is a central dynamic of the maelstrom the brothers are drawn towards it but must try to resist its pull stands for mans often conflicted attitude to God and the divine. 'To be sure,' I thought, 'we shall get there just about the slack -- there is some little hope in that' -- but in the next moment I cursed myself for being so great a fool as to dream of hope at all. "It may appear strange, but now, when we were in the very jaws of the gulf, I felt more composed than when we were only approaching it. Much like people who claim to have had near-death experiences in which they have seen the other side, the white-haired man experienced, and survived, something that nobody else had. This plainly shows the bottom to consist of craggy rocks, among which they are whirled to and fro. stories Kircher and others imagine that in the centre of the channel of the Maelstrm is an abyss penetrating the globe, and issuing in some very remote part the Gulf of Bothnia being somewhat decidedly named in one instance. We never set out upon this expedition without a steady side wind for going and coming -- one that we felt sure would not fail us before our return -- and we seldom made a mis-calculation upon this point. His experience and brush with death, however, made his black hair turn white in the course of one day. "We are now," he continued, in that particularizing manner which distinguished him -- "we are now close upon the Norwegian coast -- in the sixty-eighth degree of latitude -- in the great province of Nordland -- and in the dreary district of Lofoden. For my part, as soon as I had let the foresail run, I threw myself flat on deck, with my feet against the narrow gunwale of the bow, and with my hands grasping a ring-bolt near the foot of the fore-mast. Well, so far we had ridden the swells very cleverly; but presently a gigantic sea happened to take us right under the counter, and bore us with it as it rose up up as if into the sky. In regard to the depth of the water, I could not see how this could have been ascertained at all in the immediate vicinity of the vortex. This was most unusual something that had never happened to us before and I began to feel a little uneasy, without exactly knowing why. But this 17 page short story is just before Poe's "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," which I am eager to read! To be sure, I thought, we shall get there just about the slack there is some little hope in that but in the next moment I cursed myself for being so great a fool as to dream of hope at all. My eldest brother had a son eighteen years old, and I had two stout boys of my own. Really incredible action-packed story. All this time I had never let go of the ring-bolt. Just click the "Edit page" button at the bottom of the page or learn more in the Quotes submission guide. I now began to watch, with a strange interest, the numerous things that floated in our company. I have already described the unnatural curiosity which had taken the place of my original terrors. See also Trivia | Goofs | Crazy Credits | Alternate Versions | Connections | Soundtracks Did You Know? I saw our exact position in an instant. I looked dizzily, and beheld a wide expanse of ocean, whose waters wore so inky a hue as to bring at once to my mind the Nubian geographer's account of the Mare Tenebrarum. Joseph Glanville. There fish can be got at all hours, without much risk, and therefore these places are preferred. They blind, deafen, and strangle you, and take away all power of action or reflection. the submarine's descent After only an hour of flight, the pilot announced our descent. About two miles nearer the land, arose another of smaller size, hideously craggy and barren, and encompassed at various intervals by a cluster of dark rocks. All at once we were taken aback by a breeze from over Helseggen. This is a well-known story by Poe. As we approached the brink of the pit he let go his hold upon this, and made for the ring, from which, in the agony of his terror, he endeavored to force my hands, as it was not large enough to afford us both a secure grasp. That of Jonas Ramus, which is perhaps the most circumstantial of any, cannot impart the faintest conception either of the magnificence, or of the horror of the scene -- or of the wild bewildering sense of the novel which confounds the beholder. "It could not have been more than two minutes afterward until we suddenly felt the waves subside, and were enveloped in foam. Nothing would have tempted me to within half a dozen yards of its brink. How my elder brother escaped destruction I cannot say, for I never had an opportunity of ascertaining. The gyrations of the whirl grew, gradually, less and less violent. The attempts to account for the phenomenon -- some of which, I remember, seemed to me sufficiently plausible in perusal -- now wore a very different and unsatisfactory aspect. In all violent eddies at sea there is good fishing, at proper opportunities, if one has only the courage to attempt it; but among the whole of the Lofoden coastmen, we three were the only ones who made a regular business of going out to the islands, as I tell you. 'This fir tree,' I found myself at one time saying, 'will certainly be the next thing that takes the awful plunge and disappears,' -- and then I was disappointed to find that the wreck of a Dutch merchant ship overtook it and went down before. After a little while I became possessed with the keenest curiosity about the whirl itself. Wed love your help. Kircher and others imagine that in the centre of the channel of the Maelstrm is an abyss penetrating the globe, and issuing in some very remote part -- the Gulf of Bothnia being somewhat decidedly named in one instance. The sky is completely black in the storm. There was another circumstance which tended to restore my self-possession; and this was the cessation of the wind, which could not reach us in our present situation for, as you saw yourself, the belt of surf is considerably lower than the general bed of the ocean, and this latter now towered above us, a high, black, mountainous ridge. It is now within a few days of three years since what I am going to tell you occurred. It had run down at seven o'clock! An old looking man tells the story of how he survived when the fishing boat he was in with his brother enters the maelstrom. "How often we made the circuit of the belt it is impossible to say. Poe's short story is exciting and suspenseful as the fisherman tries to save himself from certain death from this violent force of nature. It is recognized as the second most powerful whirlpool in the world. You can read A Descent into the Maelstrom here before proceeding to our summary and analysis below. When a fishing boat encounters a hurricane it gets thrown off course into the area of the Maelstrom. I now tell it to you -- and I can scarcely expect you to put more faith in it than did the merry fishermen of Lofoden. I do believe that I blushed with shame when this idea crossed my mind. Tim Johnston's newest novel is THE CURRENT (2019, Algonquin). I did not care, however, to contest the point with him. Our boat was the lightest feather of a thing that ever sat upon water. Assista la descente qui mne au lac depuis l'aroport, Catherine assista la descente qui au! The world of ocean we had left plainly shows the bottom of the --. 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