Aubrey–Maturin series Times" Best Seller list. These novels comprise the heart of the canon of an author often compared to Jane Austen, C. S. Forester and other British authors central to the English literature canon. The 2003 film "" took material from books in this series, notably "Master and Commander", "HMS Surprise", "The Letter of Marque", "The Fortune of War", and particularly "The Far Side of the World". Russell Crowe played the role of Jack Aubrey, and Paul Bettany that of Stephen Maturin. Patrick O'Brian's "The Golden Ocean" (1956) and "The Unknown Shore" (1959) both depict fictional pairs of young men, loosely
The Far Side of the World W. Norton & Co. in 1992, after a re-discovery of the author and this series by Norton, finding a new audience for the entire series. Norton issued "The Far Side of the World" eight years after its initial publication, as a paperback in 1992. Ironically, it was a US publisher, J. B. Lippincott & Co., who asked O'Brian to write the first book in the series, "Master and Commander" published in 1969. Collins picked it up in the UK in 1970, and continued to publish each novel as O'Brian completed another story. Beginning with "The Nutmeg of Consolation" in 1991,