Herman Melville's description of an angry whale holing and sinking a ship was not mere fantasy; the thing has happened, and more than once too. In fact, Melville drew heavily on such real-life incidents for the saga of his imaginary Pequod, one of them being the sinking of the Nantucket whaler, Essex, by an enraged sperm whale which it was hunting in the Pacific in 1820. There were 20 men on-board and they took to the boats, enduring terrible privations and in one case being reduced to cannibalism. In the end, a handful survived, some of them after a voyage of 2,500 miles - an achievement for a sizeable craft, let alone a small open one. A story which grips, and one well-told.
Fresh-Air Fiend: Travel Writings 1985-2000, by Paul Theroux (Penguin, £