The terrifying physics of going up-mast in heavy seas are inescapable.

If one tries to navigate unknown waters one runs the risk of shipwreck

كم هو حزين ان تسير بمفردك على ساحل البحر

The allurement that women hold out to men is precisely the allurement that Cape Hatteras holds out to sailors: they are enormously dangerous and hence enormously fascinating.

Being in a ship is like being in jail, with the chance of being drowned.

The allurement that [women] hold out to men is precisely the allurement that Cape Hatteras holds out to sailors: they are enormously dangerous and hence enormously fascinating.

Nothing is more dangerous than solitude.

No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned.

Other than ... freediving is the most dangerous adventure sport in the world.

The most fatal thing a man can do is try to stand alone.

A literature that is alive does not live by yesterday's clock, nor by today's but by tomorrow's. It is a sailor sent aloft: from the masthead he can see foundering ships, icebergs, and maelstroms still invisible from the deck. He can be dragged down from the mast and put to tending the boilers or working the capstan, but that will not change anything: the mast will remain, and the next man on the masthead will see what the first has seen. In a storm, you must have a man aloft. We are in the midst of storm today, and SOS signals come from every side.

If you're a sailor, best not know how to swim. Swimming only prolongs the inevitable — if the sea wants you and your time has come.

When you are walking up a mountain to attempt something that nobody’s ever tried before, and you pass people bringing corpses down, it becomes very clear that if you get it wrong, the consequences could be fatal.

A ship in port is safe; but that is not what ships are built for. Sail out to sea and do new things.