Wanderer is a wonderful journey back in time for any lover of ships that has come of age since the end of the great age of sail. Hayden puts his reader in a dory on the Grand Banks, or at the masthead of the Gertrude L. Theabaud during the last of the great schooner races, or at the helm of the Yankee way off in the pacific somwhere between Pitcarin Island and Tahiti. Hayden led the last mutiny of the great age of sail. Against the better judgement of the superior court of the great State of California, he took his four young children, his old windjammer, and a crew of friends and dreamers on a voyage of dicovery. In the end, though this book is about the wind which drives his ship, and the spirt that drives his soul.

Just replace the word 'Wanderer' with 'Philosopher' throughout this book and you will get the idea of what the author is unconsciously trying to say. The autobiography WANDERER (c.1963, 2000) by Sterling Hayden, is a narrative written in the first and third person of a man who became enamoured with working sail at an early age, and in its pursuit, acquired a multitude of diverse life experiences few people have achieved, and/or, depending on your viewpoint, would want.

The author has compiled a litany of accomplishment simply by writing about the lifestyle he loved best. Sterling Hayden was a dory fisherman in the Grand Banks as a teenager; captained a two masted brig from Boston to Tahiti at age 22; he then became one of the youngest Master Mariners at age 24; sailed around the world twice; sailed to Tahiti several times; was the protege of the top men in his field such as: Robert O. White (Instrument Maker); Irving Johnson, Lincoln Colcord, and Ben Pine. He was also a mate on board the Gloucesterman 'Gertrude L. Thebaud' in its historic race against the big Canadian saltbanker'Bluenose'. He dined with the President of the United States; became a movie star; married a movie star; starred in two Stanley Kubrick productions; became wealthy and became broke; was an enlisted man then a Marine Corp officer; test-ran some of the first PT boats for the U.S. Navy; became an intelligence officer in the Balkans during W.W.II with the nascent O.S.S. and met with its founder 'Wild Bill' Donovan; and testified before the Senate Committee investigating un-American activities in Hollywood. Even from his best jobs Sterling Hayden would willingly descend down the social ladder as drifter, vagabond, and working sailor, because to him they were all interchangeable.

Taking his natural abilities and high innate intelligence for granted, Sterling Hayden essentially gravitated to the forefront of every occupation he fell into, and didn't know why. This is one source for the author's angst, that is, his unconscious attraction to the elite, and then when excelling in that particular field with a talent he is unaware and doesn't understand, developed a mental fugue and leaves.

Such is the nature of the existentialist who collects life experiences to build his character rather than material goods to increase his mercantile wealth. Sterling Hayden measured his wealth in a different way and just as a rich man might judge a man who lacked money, Sterling Hayden judged men throughout WANDERER who lacked character.

Yet Hayden fled from a broken home and his nomadic existence and unstable environment came with a price; the author suffered from alcoholism, depression, conflict, obsessive guilt, and anxiety neurosis. His autobiography is tinged with regret.

But Sterling Hayden's autobiography is valuable for the first hand view of Grandbanks fishing schooners during the 1930s; the actual terminology of the fishermen he represents; his first hand accounts of depression era Boston - his experiences in East Boston and South Boston, his employment with fisherman on Boston's old 'T' wharf; and his friendship with Lawrence Patrick Joseph O'Toole (of the South Boston O'Tooles) who pushed Hayden into his acting career; and Hayden's account of Hollywood agents and 'B' movie contracts.

The autobiography WANDERER by Sterling Hayden, should be required reading in any philosophy, sociology, psychology, or political science course; and it also makes fascinating reading of the interesting life of a complicated man.

Despite being marketed as a maritime book, "Wanderer" is as much a description of one man's inner wanderings as it is a travelogue of Hayden's travel to Tahiti.Throughout, Hayden comes off as a resolute man of principle and insight.I have read the book three times and always glean something new from it. Highly recommended.

I like epic novels. This one looked big enough to be written by Michener or Tolstoy. However, it lacked the character definition and storyline of a good novel and was not a satisfying read.

Voyage was disappointing in three regards. First, while many of the characters had the potential to be well-developed protagonists, the reader is left with only a superficial understanding of Pendleton, MacLeod, Harwar, and Blanchard. Their motivations remain only shallowly understood, even after nearly 700 pages. Second is the philosophy of the book -- the idealists dream of Marxist Utopia while the capitalists clutch their wealth and status... a simplistic theme, and yet with such poorly drawn characters, the reader is certainly _not_ swept up in the struggle. Third was the plot itself. The reader waiting for developments is finally rewarded on page 400 with a promising plot twist, bringing the action to a boil, but the excitement is left to fade back into a tepid simmer. While this was not the worst book I have read this year, I would not recommend it, even to someone who loved tales of the high seas.

I'm sorry Sterling Hayden only wrote two books because I think he could have been one of the greats. But as with his acting career, he dropped out early, (although I must say I think he was a much better author than an actor). I read Voyage many years ago and went on to read "The Wanderer" his autobiographical work. Voyage is about a sailor and the hardships of the sea in the late 1800s. It also deals with the labor union movements of that era. A victim of McCarthyism which ended his acting career, Sterling Hayden's political agenda, in my opinion, was evident in this book. As a sailor I enjoyed it for its realism of the sea and would compare it to Richard Henry Dana's classic "Two Years Before the Mast".

Maverick actor Sterling Hayden's first book was "Wanderer", the tale of how he took his children and escaped to sea. His lifelong love of sailing and his great knowledge of the sea fill the pages of "Voyage". But "Voyage" is not so much a sea story as a snapshot of America at an important, even a major turning point: the election of 1896. In that year, the Democratic party was captured by the Populist left, led by William Jennings Bryan, and was defeated in the general election by McKinley and the Republicans, thereby setting American politics on a conservative course which has lasted to our own day.

But "Voyage" doesn't talk much about the politics of the times so much as the people who lived in those times. Above all, they were hard people.

On the one hand are the working stiffs. Shanghaied into the crew of the great four-masted barques, poor brutal men who have no control over their lives, well aware how badly they are used, capable of huge tenderness and sensitivity, and immensely skilled at fighting their ships through the world's worst weather around Cape Horn. On the other hand are the great capitalists who build the ships and the railways and the banking empires, and the tough-minded captains and mates who do their work for them.

All of them are strong in their way, with a kind of iron toughness that has pretty well vanished nowadays, and they fight out their story across 704 pages of great adventure and conflict.

Hayden surprised people with this book. He took a stab at a huge important story filled with colorful, exciting characters in all their strengths and weaknesses. "Voyage" is important, and exciting, and is as close to the mythical "Great American Novel" as anything ever attempted.