THE MAIDEN VOYAGE

Much more than A Night To Remember, this is a retellingand a reexamination of the Titanic story to show ""the efficacyof planned, official prevarication"" and to ""get at the realtruth""--bad seamanship. Although Mr. Marcus' much moreextensive book doesn't have the instamatic action-incidentalsof the Lord, Marcus probes aspects Lord did not pursue: amongthem the ice reports by wireless which were undelivered to thebridge; the rockets' (white) glare observed and ignored by theSecond Officer of the Californian; the Conduct in ""the MoneyBoat"" (of the Duff Gordans) and their refusal to rescueothers; the Titanic's maintenance of high speed in an icytrack...none of which was ""unforseen nor unforeseeable""--theofficial conclusion. This version disposes of the assortedapocrypha while retaining the drama of the disaster at fullspeed ahead--the waste, the gallantry, the almost catatoniccalm of the tragedy.