Review: Another Great Day at Sea - Geoff Dyer

Last year, I volunteered to review a book called The Contest of The Century for Bookmunch, assuming that the author was the same Geoff Dyer who had written Out of Sheer Rage and Jeff in Venice. I was mistaken, and ended up with the task of critiquing a Financial Times journalist’s treatise on Chinese foreign policy. A large section of that book dealt with America’s attempts to project its power overseas through the use of its navy. Coincidentally, this is also, in a roundabout way, the theme of the literary Geoff Dyer’s latest piece of non-fiction; Another Great Day at Sea is the record of Dyer’s two week stint as writer-in-residence on the USS George H W Bush, an aircraft carrier on patrol in the Indian Ocean.

During his time on board, Dyer meets crew at all levels, rides in a helicopter, dines with the captain and attends religious services. As always, though, we end up finding out at least as much about Dyer as we do his subject. Never afraid to document the less attractive sides of his character, the opening section documents Dyer’s unwillingness to share sleeping accommodation during his fortnight on the carrier; provided with a stateroom to himself, he complains about the noise of jets taking off above him. There are further quibbles about the unpleasant food, and smell: ‘the essence of my character,’ he explains, ‘is an inability to get used to things’.

Dyer is an outsider, the quintessential Englishman placed in the heart of the American quest for continual improvement ('it's not broke you're just using it wrong' reads a typical sign). The tallest, thinnest & oldest man on board, he is 'never more conspicuous than when I was attempting to lurk unseen...like Peter Crouch looming into the penalty box'. Reacting to the culture shock of the first few days on board (the rigid hierarchy and order of life on board is somewhat at odds with his experiences in the literary world), he finds himself retreating into a sort of old world cliché: the experience is 'as near as I was ever likely to come to being a touring politician or a member of the royal family. I actually found I'd adopted the physical stance of the monarch-in-the-age-of-democracy (standing with my hands behind my back) and the corresponding mental infirmity: nodding my head as though this brief exchange of pleasantries was just about the most demanding form of communication imaginable'.

This outsiderdom is typified by the dramatic highlight of his stay on the carrier: a man overboard. During the crisis, Dyer is confined to his stateroom, remembering snatches of poetry, whilst activity rages outside. In the end, it turns out to be a false alarm, but he is still impressed by the way that 'an exceptional event was dealt with by the meticulous application of endlessly rehearsed routine'. This is typical of his experience on board: life is generally much less dramatic than you might expect, but the crew are nonetheless meticulously prepared and ready to jump into action if the worst did occur.

Speaking of poetry, at one stage, Dyer wonders 'why not re-brand all the carriers and give them the name of poets,’ which reminded me of Ben Elton’s novel This Other Eden, in which a character argues that overly macho nomenclature is the reason for much global aggression: after all, ‘a politician pandering to jingoistic public opinion would find it much less tempting to deploy ‘HMS Dubious Use of the World’s Resources’.’ Dyer’s point is different, though. He sees a Whitmanesque unity of spirit and purpose among the crew of USS George H W Bush, which sets him off down a poetic side track.*  

Dyer retains his eye for small details. In this world, the sheer scale of the operation renders everyday activities absurd. He is particularly struck, during a tour of the carrier’s food stores, by the Warrant Officer’s use of the first person singular which leads him to claim that he will 'eat my way through everything on the boat', a bold statement considering the huge weight of provisions on board. The abundance of supplies is such that in the event of it sinking, rather than being loaded with jewels and gold like a Spanish galleon, future deep sea divers would find something more like 'a cut-price hyper-market that had slipped beneath the waves'. As his time on board progresses, though, Dyer becomes more impressed with the dignity of the crew members, and while he ‘had trouble recording even the simplest things such as someone's name and rank’, he forms genuine attachments with many.

One thing that Dyer learns from his stay on the carrier is that ‘of all the kinds of writer I was not, 'reporter' was top of the list'; this is reflected in some occasionally clumsy prose which you wouldn’t expect from a writer of his quality. Early on, we are told that 'a noisy increase in power had taken place and the noise was deafening'. After disembarking, he observes 'a couple of women in dresses and heels who looked prostitution'. Maybe a little of the immediacy could have been sacrificed for a bit more finessing.

Another Great Day at Sea is not the book to read if you are looking for any kind of geopolitical critique from Dyer. The aircraft carrier is there, and Dyer is attempting to detail the experience of being there: whether it should be there or not is irrelevant to this account. Dyer is respectful of the crew’s motivations whilst remaining broadly neutral. This is a relatively slight book, and shouldn’t be ranked alongside the likes of Out of Sheer Rage or Zona, but it is still an entertaining and diverting read.

* On another side-note, during World War II, Winston Churchill sent a note to the British Chiefs of Staff cautioning them against giving frivolous codenames to actions involving deadly peril. No wife or mother, he said, wanted to remember that her husband or son had died in an operation called "Bunnyhug" or "Ballyhoo". (source: Chase Me Ladies, I'm In the Cavalry)