Andrew Lansdale
Winner of the 2006 'News Journalist of the Year' award
It is an interesting
biological fact that all of us have in our veins the exact same percentage of
salt that exists in the ocean. And, therefore, we have salt in our blood, in our
sweat, and in our tears. We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the
sea - whether it is to sail on it or just to study it - we are going back from
whence we came.
John F Kennedy
At the age of 18 months he broke his leg trying to play with a policeman’s bicycle. At the age of six he lost his best friend and constant companion, his twin sister, Sheila. At the age of forty-five he became a novelist and later, a journalist.
A
great deal happened between six and forty-five; ranging from two and a half
years on a three-masted training ship and seven years as a Cadet and Deck
Officer in the Merchant Navy. He attended Sydney University and worked in
Bangkok, in Tokyo and in Hong Kong: But he has always wanted to write.
Life
has been full of colour from travelling across India by train in high summer
and being in Zanzibar during its nasty civil war. He has rattled across Sri
Lanka in an old Victorian polished mahogany-panelled carriage pulled by an
elderly steam locomotive in the steamy monsoons and ridden out typhoons in the
South China Sea.
He has been mocked and chanted at by a million Red Guards in Shanghai
during the Cultural Revolution and at the other end of the decibel scale, spent
numerous solitary vigils watch-keeping on ship's bridges in the middle of the
Pacific in the quietness of the night.
'The
tongue is not enough to say and the hand is not enough to write of all the
beauties of the sea'
Wrote Christopher Columbus in 1492.
In
fact life has been a long and eventful journey. Just when he feels that he has
settled onto a permanent course to steer, his life moves in a different
direction and a new existence starts, like a dream strangely coming true. As an
editor, he won the 2006 News Journalist of the Year award,
Fulfilling his desire to write,
Andrew has written several novels, the most prominent of which 'Julius Raphael's Diary'
was published in the USA and was released in October 2004. His second, 'The Devil and the
Deep' appeared in print in the USA in 2006. His third ‘Life Uncovered’, appeared the next year. It describes the
life of a dysfunctional family, where the author draws from personal
experience.
He has written episodes for a TV comedy series and
a screenplay, ‘Cleopatra's Mountain’; a film for
audiences in the USA. He has been responsible for editing books such as The
Admiralty Manual of Seamanship, The Admiralty Manual of Navigation and Casualty
Management Guidelines for The Nautical Institute. He has written, rewritten and
edited sixteen text books for the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers, of which
he is a Fellow.
In 2017, he was commissioned by the Genoese
Shipbroker, Lorenzo Banchero, to write an account of shipping over the last 69
years; a period which has seen the greatest evolution and development in the
history of the industry. The work was published in 2018
He has been a keen supporter of the Old
Worcester’s Yacht Club whose members
are drawn from the ranks of ex-cadets from the training ship HMS Worcester.
He was appointed Commodore in 2013.
He
now spends his time at his home on an island on the River Thames or on his
yacht Saving Grace.
© Andrew James Lansdale 2019 ©
'Those who go down to the sea in ships and occupy
their business in great waters, they have seen the wonders of the deep and the
glories of the Lord thereof.'
Psalm 107