Stephen Crane- The Open Boat

1) Sum up the personalities of each of the four men in the boat : captain ,cook , oilier , and correspondent.

The Captain

The captain is the consummate leader, a man who never shirks from the responsibility he takes for those who have entrusted their safety to him. When he loses his ship to the sea at the beginning of the story, the captain suffers infinitely more than the other survivors. Deprived of his ship, he becomes a broken man who has lost the very thing that grants him his authority. Yet the captain, through his dedication to guiding the men to safety, retains a degree of dignity to go with the ineffable sense of loss he feels at having failed in his charge. In this sense, the captain is at once a majestic and tragic figure, one who has not measured up to the standards he has set for himself but continues to fight for his fellow men. His quiet, steady efforts in the boat are not self-motivated and afford him no personal redemption. Instead, his actions are directed toward the others.

The Oiler (Billie)

Of the four characters in the boat, the oiler represents the everyman, the one whom Crane intends to resemble the average person most closely. The oiler functions as the lynchpin of the crew, holding everyone together through his staunch heroism. He has the fewest delusions about the men’s physical plight, but he never gives in to the hopelessness that the others mask with idle talk about nonexistent opportunities for rescue or meditations about the cruelty of nature. Instead, the oiler maintains an image of strength, warmth, and integrity. He echoes the captain’s orders, reinforcing the social structure of the crew and instilling confidence in the others, whose outlook rises and falls with the waves.

The Correspondent

For Crane, each crew member is an archetype that, when joined with his fellow castaways, constitutes part of a microcosm of society. The captain represents the leaders; the cook the followers; the oiler the good, working men; and the correspondent the observers and thinkers. As his profession as a reporter suggests, the correspondent functions as the eyes and voice of the story. Crane underlines this point in his introduction of the characters in the first section. While the cook is cowering on the boat’s floor and the oiler is silently working at his oar, the correspondent watches the waves and wonders why he is caught on the ocean, a question that reveals the correspondent’s search for purpose in life. With this question alone, the correspondent begins to shape our perceptions of the ordeal the men are undergoing. In the first five sections of “The Open Boat,” the correspondent’s challenges to the sea, which he associates with nature and fate, reveal his desire to make sense of surviving the ship only to drown in the dinghy. Although he understands that nature and fate do not act and think as men do, the correspondent nevertheless goads them because he believes that there is a purpose to nature, that it in some way validates his struggle for survival. The correspondent initially thinks he finds the answer when he considers the “subtle brotherhood of men” that develops among the crew in response to the overwhelming cruelty of nature. At this point, he takes pleasure in the pain caused by rowing in the rough sea because he believes that this pain is the healthy byproduct of his effort at community, which nature has forced them to create and is the only thing that really matters. As the men realize that no one is coming to save them, however, the correspondent comes to lose hope in the “subtle brotherhood” that had seemed to be the noble purpose of submitting to nature’s punishment.

2)  What theme in " The Open Boat " seems most important to you? Where is it stated?

Man’s Insignificance in the Universe

“The Open Boat” conveys a feeling of loneliness that comes from man’s understanding that he is alone in the universe and insignificant in its workings. Underneath the men’s and narrator’s collective rants at fate and the universe is the fear of nothingness. They have an egotistical belief that they should have a role in the universe, that their existence should mean something. When the correspondent realizes by section VI that fate will not answer his pleas, he settles into despair. His subsequent recollection of the poem about the soldier who lies dying in Algiers reflects his feelings of alienation at being displaced from his position in the universe. Like the soldier who dies in alien territory, the correspondent fears that he too will perish without a connection to whatever gives him his sense of self.

Throughout “The Open Boat,” the correspondent understands pain to be the necessary byproduct of his efforts to overcome nature, the willful enemy. He comes to value his suffering because it is nobly derived; in the earlier sections, the correspondent, whom the narrator says is cynical, is often cheerful and talkative in his descriptions of the physical pain he experiences. By the end of the story, however, the correspondent’s new awareness that the universe is unconcerned with the situation’s outcome makes him physically and spiritually weary. He decides that there is no higher purpose to surviving other than prolonging a life that is meaningless. His comment in section VII that the coldness of the water is simply “sad” underscores this despair. At this point, all sensations of pain and pleasure are merely physical and have no spiritual meaning.

3) How do you define heroism? Who is a hero in "The Open Boat"?

I feel that you can argue for three of the four characters being heroes in this story, namely the Captain, the Oiler and The Correspondent. The Captain can be considered a hero because he leads the men through the adverse conditions. He has been injured and has suffered the significant trauma of losing his ship, but continues to remain authoritative and competent throughout. We can consider the Captain as the hero of 'The Open Boat' for these reasons.