David Grann: It's like a strange Victorian novel where, "I'm not dead.

I've risen from the grave and I'm here!"

And you know, and it's just so crazy.

Marcia Franklin: Coming up, I talk with bestselling author David Grann about his latest book, a tale so far-fetched it's hard to believe it's true.

But it is.

Stay tuned for "Conversations from the Sun Valley Writers' Conference," next.

(Music) Announcer: Major funding is provided by the Idaho Public Television Endowment and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Franklin: Hello and welcome.

I'm Marcia Franklin.

Whether it's trekking deep into the Amazon rainforest or taking a small boat across the open ocean to a desolate island, my guest today is known for taking risks to tell true-life stories.

That's despite the fact that by his own admission he's a mild-mannered guy who'd much rather be holed up in a library doing research.

But David Grann does that, too.

The results of all that work are mega-bestselling books that are both informative and suspenseful.

When I spoke with Mr. Grann at the 2023 Sun Valley Writer's Conference, two of his books were on the bestsellers list: "Killers of the Flower Moon," which had just been adapted by Martin Scorsese into a major motion picture, and Grann's latest book, "The Wager," which Mr. Scorsese will also be turning into a movie.

I was enthused to talk with Mr. Grann about his obsession with the ship called "The Wager" and the bizarre story of its castaways.

But first, I asked him what he thought of the film version of "Killers of the Flower Moon."

Well, before we talk about "The Wager," um, the, the movie version of "Killers of Flower Moon" -- I mean, it's like accolades and accolades.

I do wonder, though, when you work so deeply on research for books and your goal is to get it as correct as possible, is it difficult to watch a fictionalized version of what you've worked so hard on?

Grann: I think the challenge is when you first let it go, 'cause you spend so many years working on a project, and in my case, it's a work of history that, you know, is all rooted in facts.

And, and then a, a, a film is a very different medium, and the way it's going to be adapted has to fit that medium.

Um, but I feel pretty fortunate in that, for example, "Killers of the Flower Moon," the people who were interested in it were Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio and Lily Gladstone and Robert DeNiro.

So right away you're like, "I don't know anything about the movie-making business.

These people really know what they're doing."

And the thing that you're looking for in that process is that they share a similar fierce commitment to the story that you have.

And especially with a story like "Killers of the Flower Moon," which is about a really monstrous racial injustice against members of the Osage Nation during the early parts of the 20th century being systematically killed for their oil money, um, that they're going to work closely with the Osage Nation in developing it.

Um, and I think the film is quite remarkable.

You know, there were Osage actors and, you know, Osage language consultants and Osage language is spoken.

So I think that kind of participation and immersion, I think inevitably is going to make you have a deeper, better, and more profound, profound film.

You know, this was a history that outside of the Osage Nation, the rest of us, and I included mys-, I include myself, were ignorant of this history.

We weren't taught it.

We had excised it from our consciousness.

So my hope is that a book can reach so many people, a movie can reach so many people, and hopefully gradually begin to reckon with this past and becomes more a part of our national collective memory.

Franklin: And this book, "The Wager," is also going to be made into a movie as well by the same team.

Grann: Yes.

Scorsese and DiCaprio.

Grann: Yes.

I mean, you know, when they, you know, you, going back to that bit of, you asked me about nervousness; you're always nervous when you, and you're giving up a project to others who are going to develop it.

But, you know, I had, in this case, I had the, a front row seat to see how, uh, these people and the care they work with this project.

So when they expressed interest in this, it was a very easy, uh, decision on my part.

Franklin: I have to say, I would not even want to be an extra on this.

Grann: (Laughs) Franklin: .on this movie.

Grann: You're going to be wet and cold!

(Laughs) Franklin: I, I just, just looking at a ship makes me seasick, as some of the people in this room know.

Grann: Yeah.

Yeah.

Franklin: I, I, uh, I can't imagine, and we'll get to the fact that, that you actually took a trip yourself for, for research.

But, um, let's, let's talk about the, the book.

I, to be honest, I am not interested in maritime history.

I'm not one of these kind of shipwreck nerds.

Grann: Yeah.

Yeah.

Franklin: Um, but I like to challenge myself when I do interviews and, and learn about things that I don't know about.

Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: And I knew that your writing wouldn't, so to speak, leave me high and dry.

Grann: (Laughs) Franklin: And it didn't.

This is just such a compelling story that even a land lubber like me got pulled into it.

Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: Because it's, it's, yes, of course, about, um, maritime history and a shipwreck, but it's also about leadership issues.

Grann: Yes, certainly.

Franklin: And, um, it's also about "What is the truth?"

Grann: Yeah.

How do we discern truth?

Franklin: You know, and how do we, how do we, how do we discern truth and when you have competing, competing histories.

So, um, I thought it was, uh, I thought it was a great, uh, read.

Let's first talk about your kind of semi-obsession with mutiny to begin with.

Grann: (Laughs) Franklin: .and how that, uh, in a way led you to, to this story.

Grann: Yeah.

So, you know, it's interesting; I, I was interested in mutinies, uh, as, um, you know, just as a very distinctive form of rebellion, um, because it takes place in, in a military organization that is designed, uh, to be an instrument of order by the state.

And so what causes its members to -- of order -- to suddenly disorder?

And are they these kind of extreme outlaws, or as we often see in literature and in various cases in film, where -- are there circumstances that that may justify the rebellion and even imbue it with a, with a touch of nobility?

So when I was looking into mutinies, um, I came across an 18th century account written by a 16-year-old midshipman from The Wager, uh, named John Byron.

Uh, he was 16 years old when the voyage set out.

And if the name is familiar at all, it's 'cause he would go on to become the grandfather of the famous, uh, romantic poet, uh, Lord Byron.

And I started reading this account, and he started describing the shipwreck and the scurvy and the cannibalism.

And, um, and it got its hooks into me.

And I realized that, you know, this held the clues to one of the more extraordinary sagas of survival and resilience, you know, that I'd ever come across.

It was a story that would later influence, um, philosophers like Voltaire and Rousseau.

It influenced two of the great novelists of the sea, Herman Melville and Patrick O'Brien, uh, and Charles Darwin carried copies of these accounts with him on, on the voyage of the Beagle.

So I realized it was this great story, but I should -- just as your point is, you know, it wasn't like I had any specialized or, or predetermined interest in 18th century maritime history.

But as I began to dig into this story, I realized not only was it kind of this unbelievably enthralling, gripping story, um, but it had all these other resonances, as you mentioned.

And so, in a way, it was the last place I ever expected to be to write a book.

Um, but sometimes you just go where the story takes you.

Franklin: Well, let's set the scene a little bit.

Grann: Sure.

Franklin: We're talking 1741?

Grann: Uh, so it set off in 1740.

Franklin: 1740.

Grann: Yes.

And wrecks in 1741.

Yes.

Franklin: Yeah.

Right.

So, well, let's set the scene.

Um, there's kind of an arcane war going on, uh, the War of Jenkins' Ear.

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: Which we don't need to go into (laughs), but needless to say, Spain and Britain are -- they're at loggerheads with each other.

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: And, um, among other things, uh, Britain wants to try and raid some ships, some Spanish galleons for jewels.

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: Treasure.

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: And they set out on the high seas.

And The Wager is one of those ships, not necessarily the, the best of the best.

Grann: Yes.

Yeah, even before the shipwreck, countless, uh, members of this expedition had perished, ships had broken, were breaking apart, men had drowned, scurvy had just wreaked havoc on this expedition.

Hundreds and hundreds of them had died.

And then the ships scatter in this unbelievable, uh, storm off of Cape Horn, where there are these 90-foot waves dwarfing the masts.

And, um, uh, you know, they're just being swamped.

They're caught in these unbelievable currents.

The winds are accelerating past a hundred miles an hour.

The sails are blowing out.

Um, and eventually all the ships in the expedition scatter.

The Wager finds itself all alone and left to its own destiny.

It comes up the coast of Chile along Patagonia, where it eventually hits a submerged rock.

And there it finally begins to rip apart.

Those who have been suffering from scurvy, who were too sick to get out of their hammocks, drowned.

But the ship did not yet completely sink.

It kind of got wedged between these pillars of rocks.

And so the survivors climb up onto the remnants, they look out in the distance, is a desolate island.

An island that is now known today as Wager Island.

Franklin: And you have been to this island.

Grann: I, yes, I have been to Wager Island.

Franklin: In the name of.

Grann: Research.

Franklin: True research.

Grann: (Laughs) Franklin: You know, you kept the companies of Scopolamine and Dramamine in business.

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: But you took a small boat.

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: What was it, like 300-plus miles?

Grann: Uh, yeah, it was about 350 miles.

Yep.

South.

Franklin: Uh huh.

To visit this island, which is just as desolate as it was in 1741.

Grann: Yeah.

It's a place of wild desolation.

It is remote.

Uh, for days and days on this little boat we were on - it was a wood-heated boat I was on -- uh, you know, we didn't see another ship or another soul.

There's no inhabitation along the coastline or anything.

The island is located in a, in a gulf that's known as the Gulf of Sorrows, or some prefer to call it the Gulf of Pain, uh, because it's a terrible place for, for ships.

You know, just like the castaways on the island, I could find virtually no food to eat.

There are no animals on the island.

There's some mussels and stuff along the coastline, which the castaways had rapidly consumed and exhausted that supply.

Um, one British officer had, uh, described the island as the place where the soul of the man dies in him.

And it was only after this visit that I could begin to understand that.

I had a better sense of what it would've been like for these -- there's about 146 of them who were cast out and exiled on this island for months and months, trying desperately to survive.

And I had a better understanding about why they eventually fractured into these warring, competing factions, as kind of the strictures of civilization and the kind of organization of, of their ship began to slip away from them.

And the island, in many ways, will become this laboratory that will inevitably reveal the secret nature of each of these people.

Uh, and both the good, 'cause some will do these kind of heroic acts.

And moments of sacrifice and, uh, heroism, and then also acts of just shocking brutality.

Franklin: Now, um, just a small aside, um, you have a history yourself of needing to go have experiences.

Grann: (Laughs) Franklin: .firsthand experiences, whether that be in the Amazon or going to an island, um, that, that push you as a person and as a writer.

But you are compelled to do this to really get yourself inside this story, yes?

Grann: Yeah.

I mean, I think you have, a certain kind of, you know, not to be too, too fanatical about it, but an obligation whenever you're telling a story and telling a true story to try to excavate and learn about every dimension.

And so, what'll often happen on these projects is, I don't have any plans originally -- I never thought I would go to Wager Island.

When I worked on my book "The Lost City of Z," I never had any plans to, to hike through the Amazon.

Uh, I am not a natural explorer.

I don't hunt.

I don't camp.

I hate bugs.

And yet there will usually come a point in the research where you begin to be gnawed by doubts.

Can I fully understand; what more could I learn?

And that was certainly the case with "The Wager."

I spent two years combing the archives, um, researching this story.

But it was at that point when I started, "Well, you know, maybe I really do need to go to this island myself."

Franklin: And your wife is like, "Oy!"

Grann: Oh, I know.

She's come, she's come to understand me.

When I first thought I was going to go to the Amazon for "The Lost City of Z", she's like, she made me go to like some camping store and get, get gear and, um, you know, get on an exercise regimen.

Now she's just like, "Oh, you know, he'll do it.

He'll find his way back."

Um, I'm, I'm a little like a character most, most your, most viewers won't remember, but when I was growing up, there was a character named Magoo.

He's like a cartoon character who was like half-blind.

And I am quite literally half-blind; I have a, an eye condition that makes it very hard for me to see.

And, um, you know, Magoo would always kind of go into these places and somehow like, it seemed like he was about to die at any minute, but yet somehow always finds his way out.

So, so far, knock on wood, (laughs) I keep coming out (laughs).

Franklin: Well, speaking of wood, um, there were enough pieces of this, uh, ship still around that a kind of makeshift boat was, was fashioned.

And, um, as you say though, there are these two camps and you, you, you draw them so well.

I mean, there's the captain himself.

Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: Captain Cheap.

Grann: Cheap, great name.

Franklin: .unfortunate name.

Grann: Great name, <laugh>.

Franklin: Um, and then John Bulkley, who's a, a, a gunner.

Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: .who comes from a very different class of society but has potentially more natural leadership skills.

And they have very different ideas of which way to try and get home.

Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: And I think you drew it so well that I started thinking, "Well, now which one would I be in?

Grann: Yes, yes.

Franklin: You know, would I, which, which man would I follow?

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: And, um, and, and most of them follow Bulkley, even though he's going to be going quite, you know, 3000 miles back.

Uh, but some stay behind with Captain Cheap, among them eventually, John Byron.

Grann: Yeah.

The six- yeah.

Franklin: Yeah.

Grann: Young boy.

Franklin: Yeah.

The young boy, the 16-year-old, who could have; I mean, he must've known that he, he could have died on this remote island.

Grann: Yeah.

I think when he decided to, to stay and go with Cheap, the chances of his surviving at that point were, you know, about 1%.

Franklin: Right.

Grann: Maybe less.

Franklin: Um, and did you get a sense once you were there and once you'd been through all the research of this, of which camp you'd be in?

And which one?

Grann: Yeah, that's an interesting question.

So this is in many ways a story about stories.

Because each of the survivors, um, will eventually have their own version of events.

Um, and, and in each of their version of events, they try to emerge as the hero of their own account.

They try to live with the things they've done and they haven't done.

They tell stories in many ways much the way we all do.

Um, and so there are these, there are these great battles of, of stories.

Um, and there's also this, as you mentioned, this titanic struggle between Captain Cheap and, um, and John Bulkely, the gunner.

It's also a class struggle in many ways.

'Cause they come from very different -- Cheap comes from the upper crust.

Um, John Bulkely, coming from the lower to middle class, uh, he knew he could never have been a commander of a ship because of, in those days, 'cause of the rigid class structure.

Um, but he was in many ways the most skilled seaman.

He was this instinctive leader.

And suddenly on this island, in this democracy of suffering, he begins to emerge as a commander in his own right.

So, and, and they each represent very different philosophical points.

You know, Bulkely is saying words that would resonate with Americans not that much later in the century: "Life and liberty."

He galvanizes the seamen with his phrases.

Franklin: And he ends up in the United States.

Grann: Yeah.

And he eventually.

Franklin: What would eventually be the United States.

Grann: Yeah.

And, and David Cheap is kind of extolling the virtues of empire, patriotism, dying, self-sacrifice.

Honor.

Honor for him was such, you know, you must.

Franklin: The way you say it now.

Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: I'm going with Bulkely.

Grann: Yeah, Yeah.

Franklin: (Laughs) Grann: Yeah, exactly.

So that is, so it is this struggle.

And, and so I told the story from the competing vantage points of, of, of Cheap, Bulkely and John Byron.

And so to your question of which, who would I have been and which I've gone with, you, you know, it's funny, when I was writing from each of the perspective, I was so with each one of them that you are like, "OK, I understand you," and then you shift to the other.

Um, but I think what was really interesting to me, and the question I always had, and it's not a question I can answer is, "Who would I have been on that island?"

Not just who would I have gone with, but who would I have been?

Franklin: I don't think I would've made it that far.

Grann: Yeah.

Would you, right.

Would you have died quietly?

Would you, you know, have descended into some of the murderous anarchy?

Would you have succumbed to cannibalism?

Like, who, who would we have been on the island?

And I think that's why a story like this can still hold us even in the past, because we're all reading this story saying, "Who, who are we?"

And it, and it's a study of leadership, but also a real study of human nature.

Franklin: You could not have done this without primary source documents.

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: Which to me, it's amazing that they even; I don't even understand how they survived.

Grann: (Laughs) I know.

Franklin: You know, gales and.

Grann: I know.

Franklin: .and all this, I, it's amazing they survived.

Grann: It's amazing.

Franklin: And you got a chance to.

Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: to see them and go through them and try and decipher them.

What was that like to just, and I understand that it's like there's still some of them, dusty.

Grann: Oh.

Franklin: .fragile.

I've seen some of the books.

Grann: Oh, yeah.

I mean, you, you know, you, you go to a British archive; that's where most of the documents are.

And, you know, they come out in a box, usually, and you kind of open the lid.

The moment you open the lid of the box --the box will be new -- and then you open the lid; the dust starts to waft out upon you.

And you, you pull the book out, the, the bound, um, the leatherbound covers are disintegrating.

You have to lay them on these pillows.

Um, and you can begin to read them.

They're hard to read.

You often, you know, I would often use a magnifying glass, but they're legible.

Um, they're water-stained in some cases.

Um, but they're amazing.

And because of them, you can reconstruct day to day, often hour by hour what was happening on this expedition.

Franklin: Because they were actually trying to document in case they did live, like "He's the bad guy, not me."

Grann: Yeah.

They were.

Franklin: And so they were keeping, you know, close accounts.

Grann: They were, they were very conscious at a certain point, especially once things went awry, that if they ever made it back to England, they, uh, would likely be summoned to face a court martial for any alleged crimes they had done on the island.

And if they did not tell a convincing tale, they could be hanged.

So some of them were trying to create contemporaneous evidence to justify, uh, their actions.

Franklin: I just think it's amazing any of them survived at all.

But one of the reasons certainly in the beginning is an indigenous, um, tribe that came their way and, and tried to help.

Were not treated all that well in the end, and, and left.

Had they stayed, they may have gotten off the island.

Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: .uh, you know, a lot earlier.

Grann: So here they are on this island, starving, fighting -- and out of the mist emerges a couple canoes, and onboard are these indigenous Patagonians known as the Kawésqar.

Um, and the Kawésqar had lived in this region of, off the coast of Chile, uh, for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years.

And they had adapted to this very extreme environment.

They knew where to find food, um, and, and marine resources; they mostly, uh, spent much of their time in canoes.

They kept a fire going even in their canoes to stay warm.

Uh, and, um, uh, and so when they get to the island, they offer the castaways a lifeline.

They go out and bring them back food.

Um, and yet some of the castaways mistreat them.

So eventually the Kawésqar, uh, look at the castaways who are spiraling, uh, into, into violence.

And they basically say, "We're outta here."

And they depart.

And after that, the castaways only descend further into a Hobbesian state of depravity.

And some of them succumb to, uh, cannibalism.

When I was exploring the island, um, I saw some, uh, timber that was kind of partially submerged in a, in a little stream on the island.

Um, they were about five yards long or so.

They were bound together by these wooden pegs, not nails, but nails made of wood.

And they are the remnants of an 18th century ship believed to be from His Majesty's ship The Wager.

And, and what is so amazing is that, you know, after all this, you know, this furious struggle that took place there, all the sound and the fury, nothing else, there's nothing else that remains.

That is it.

There's nothing else that remains of all those ravaging dreams of empire.

Um, just those few fragments of wood.

And interesting enough, the only sound I could hear when I kept looking at them was the, the, the hush of the sea.

And that really haunted me.

Franklin: You speak and you write in a very filmic way.

Have you ever wanted to write movies?

Grann: No.

I really, I mean, I don't.

I'm so busy, um, kind of trying to excavate these true stories.

You know, for me, the, the challenge and the puzzle of doing these projects is to try to come up with words that create visual images in the mind.

I always feel like I'm learning trying to do it.

I never feel like I reached the summits of it.

You know, it's always kind of like an elusive quest where you're trying to get closer and closer.

So I often write about people are on these obsessive quests.

And for now, at least, that's my quest.

I think in all these things, it's the human riddle that is the interesting part.

Part of the riddle of our own condition is why we do the things we do, and trying to make sense of our lives, our follies, our triumphs, whatever they may be.

Um, and what makes us tick.

I mean, I think that is, and to me, that is just such an endless riddle.

Um, and, you know, in a story like The Wager, you know, it's an unbelievable voyage with all these kind of events -- uh, tidal waves, uh, icebergs, earthquakes at sea, I mean, you name it.

Um, but ultimately it's about humans, and humans thrown together in those conditions.

And why are they there?

What do they do when they're there?

How do they endure?

How do they behave?

And then how do they make sense of what they did?

Franklin: From Captain Cheap's group, three people.. Grann: Yeah.

Franklin: .made it back, right?

Grann: Yes.

Three people.

And when John Byron gets back to England; when he set off, he was 16 years old.

When he returns, he's 22.

He's 22; he can't even figure out where to go.

He finally finds where his sister's living.

And his sister can't recognize him.

She obviously; they assumed they were dead.

I mean, six years had gone by.

Franklin: And Bulkely, um, more of his group comes back.

But I, I wanna say out of the 81 that he left with, is it 20-some that.?

Grann: Yeah.

30 -- uh, if my memory serves me-- 30 eventually make it to Brazil after traveling, uh, three, some 3000 miles on a little castaway boat, which they can't even, you know, they're packed so tightly they can't even stand.

I mean, there is something about the, uh, end of the book, toward the end, where these -- periodically, these stragglers just emerge from the sea, like Jonah.

And it's just, it's just so bewildering, you know?

It's, it's, if it wasn't true, you would say it's a little, you know, fanciful, like people just emerge, you know?

But it is that weird.

It's like a strange Victorian novel where, "I'm not dead.

I've risen from the grave and I'm here!"

And you know, and it's just so crazy.

Franklin: Needless to say, all of these, the, the journals that you went through, and then the accounts that the, these people wrote, you know, conflicting accounts, they were in fact, needed for an eventual trial.

Grann: Yes.

Franklin: .that was scheduled.

And it's a bit anticlimactic what happens, but also illustrative and instructive of this notion that the empire cannot stand either of these stories, because both are depraved.

Grann: Yeah.

They're, they're listening to these stories, uh, uh, you know, at this, these, you know, battling versions of the truth on, on each of these warring sides.

And they're thinking, you know, "Do we really like any of these stories?

You know, they, they make us look like brutes, not like gentlemen."

The Navy was supposed to be the vanguard of the empire, these so-called apostles of Western civilization.

Yet they had not behaved as such.

And so they suddenly have an interest in, in, in, in telling their own story.

And, and, and, and telling an alternative version of the story.

And so one of the central themes of the book is not only the way we tell stories to kind of edit and massage and, and, and burnish certain parts.

But so do nations, and especially so do empires.

They all spin their own tales to serve their own self-interests.

And this is a classic illustration of that.

Franklin: And, and you see, uh, shades of this in our own culture, of course, every day.

Who controls the narrative?

Grann: Who controls history, who gets to tell history?

How do we deal with our past?

Which parts of our past do we want to reckon with?

There was battles over disinformation and there was battles over misinformation.

And there was even allegations of so-called "fake journals."

So you can hear so many, um, of the same elements of battles over truth.

How do we discern the truth?

And also a battle over how we tell history and how do we shape our history?

Franklin: Well, ride the tide of this, of the success of, of this book, which is fabulous, as are, are your other works.

And it's just been wonderful to get a chance to talk with you.

Grann: It's my pleasure.

Franklin: So thank you very much.

Grann: Thank you.

Franklin: Appreciate it.

You've been listening to David Grann, the author of "The Wager."

Our conversation was recorded at the 2023 Sun Valley Writers' Conference.

My thanks to our team and to the organizers of the conference for all their help.

If you'd like to watch any of the 75 interviews we've taped at the esteemed event since 2005, check out the "Conversations from the Sun Valley Writers' Conference" playlist on YouTube.

The shows are also on the Idaho Public Television website.

I'm Marcia Franklin.

Thanks for spending time with us.

(Music) Announcer: Major funding is provided by the Idaho Public Television Endowment and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.