The Pyrates

The Pyrates is a 1983 novel by George MacDonald Fraser and probably the single most deliberately Trope Overdosed work of literature in history. Fraser set out to tell every single pirate adventure story simultaneously, and he largely succeeded.

In brief, Captain Benjamin Avery, a classic hero, is commissioned to deliver the immensely valuable Madagascar Crown, but by sheer mischance, the ship is also carrying the notorious Colonel Blood and Sheba, the pirate queen. Pretty soon, Sheba's five fellow pirate captains rescue her, and discover the Madagascar Crown, which conveniently is easily split into six jeweled crosses, one for each captain. Avery and Blood are left marooned, facing certain death.

After their inevitable escape, Avery announces he will single-handedly wipe out all the pirates, and recover the stolen crown, but ends up accidentally abducting a noble Spanish lady, on her way to marry the loathsome Don Lardo. Much excitement later, Avery ends up leading the pirates in a climactic battle against the Spanish. The Crown is recovered, the pirates escape with a boat full of Spanish gold, and Avery gets the girl. Admittedly, the other two women intent on claiming him might prove a problem, but he is a hero and a gentleman.

"To cap it all, the pirates had taken over the ship's intercom, and instead of the normal hymns and rousing sea shanties, the muzak now consisted entirely of dirty drinking songs illegally taped from Radio Tortuga."
 * The Ace: Avery, whose initial description in the novel is to the effect that he's good at everything.
 * Adjective Animal Alehouse: The Foundered Squid.
 * Affectionate Parody: Very much this toward the pirate fiction/historical fiction genre.
 * Agent Peacock: Bilbo, who is on the cutting edge of fashion, and is the best swordsman the Coast Brotherhood has.
 * Anachronism Stew. Governed entirely by Rule of Funny. As in:

"His idea of living was to hit people with anything handy, grab any valuables in sight, and blue the lot on wenches and drink. He was a pirate for these reasons, and also because he enjoyed bellowing those hearty songs which John Masefield would write in course of time."
 * Anti-Hero: Colonel Thomas Blood. To a lesser extent, Calico Jack Rackham, but the text makes a point of describing Blood as the antihero.
 * Aren't You Going to Ravish Me?: Once Donna Meliflua Etcetera realises Avery doesn't intend to subject her to a fate worse than death she is momentarily baffled given that he is a stranger with a sword who's burst into her cabin and she is a beautiful young Spanish noblewoman.
 * Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: The long list of charges Black Sheba is convicted of (by Judge Jeffries, no less) ends in '...murthers, slaughters, robberies, putting in fear and operating without a Board of Trade Certificate!'
 * As Long as It Sounds Foreign: Donna [sic] Meliflua Etcetera, daughter of Don Miguel Alonzo Bonanza Verandah Etcetera, is betrothed to Don Lardo Baluna del Lobby y Corridor.
 * Meanwhile, there's Happy Dan Pew, an Englishman who labours under the delusion that he's a French pirate, despite not actually speaking very much French. This has a somewhat... interesting effect on his dialogue.
 * Attempted Rape: Vanity is repeatedly threatened with rape and saved just in time.
 * Author Appeal: It's George Macdonald Fraser.
 * Awesome McCoolname: Colonel Thomas Blood.
 * Big Beautiful Woman: Anne Bonney is described as having become this.
 * Boisterous Bruiser: Firebeard.

""Did you see the terror and hatred in those beautiful eyes ere she swooned, Enchillada?" he croaked. "She loathes me, the little darling! Boy, what a honeymoon we're going to have!" His huge shoulders shook ecstatically and his dentures shot out broadcast. "I just hope she doesn't go mad -- at least, not too quickly.""
 * Bunny Ears Lawyer: Dan Pew communicates exclusively in Poirot Speak, but is such a competent pirate, that it's overlooked.
 * Captain Color Beard: Firebeard
 * The Cavalier Years: the setting.
 * Colonel Badass: Colonel Thomas Blood (cashiered). He's a coward, lecher and poltroon, but also an extremely capable fighter.
 * Complete Monster: Don Lardo, the dastardly Spaniard. His reaction on meeting his bride-to-be:

"...suspending him face down over the dreaded maguay plant, which has a nasty sharp point and grows two feet overnight (eek!), or chaining him in an underground cellar with the tide coming in which slowly raises a burning candle inch by inch until it smoulders through a rope from which dangles a glittering blade which falls to break a phial containing acid which eats through the lock of a boxful of black mambas. (The incoming tide will probably drown the brutes, but it's the thought that counts.)"
 * Complexity Addiction: The pirates like to kill in unusual and complicated ways if they have the time to arrange it.

"First among equals was Calico Jack, by reason of being literate and smart and able to navigate and do all things shipshape and Bristol fashion, look'ee, as his admiring associates often agreed. Also he was strong enough to break a penny between his fingers, which helps..."
 * Dumb Muscle: Firebeard.
 * Easily Forgiven: Blood is a master at achieving this. Note that this was true of the real Col. Tom Blood, as well.
 * Even Evil Has Standards: Several of the pirates express outraged sympathy for Donna Meliflua when they hear she's being forced into marrying Don Lardo.
 * Everything's Even Worse with Sharks: At one point the pirates interrogate Avery by dangling him head-down over the side of a ship while offal is tipped into the water. He decides to bite the first shark to come at him.
 * Expy: Blood definitely calls to mind Fraser's famous Flashman, although Blood is much more likable in his roguishness.
 * Fake Nationality:
 * The pirate captain Happy Dan Pew labours under the delusion that he is French, despite not speaking much of the language. His crew and peers alike tolerate this curious foible because he's otherwise as close to competent as they've got.
 * Cockney pawnbroker Validimir Mackintosh-Groonbaum is not Russian, Scottish, Jewish - or Cockney - but By God he knows what a buccaneer expects a pawnbroker to be.
 * Fashion Hurts: At least, Black Bilbo's boots do.
 * Fat Bastard: Don Lardo, and to a lesser extent (in both weight and bastardry) Enchillada.
 * Five-Bad Band: The Brotherhood of the Coast is a decent example:
 * The Big Bad: Calico Jack Rackham
 * The Dragon: Black Bilbo
 * The Evil Genius: Happy Dan Pew (by default, kind of - it's implied late in the book that he's an exceptional captain when he's not completely bonkers, and he is very studious in his way.)
 * The Brute: Firebeard
 * The Dark Chick: Sheba
 * Foil: Blood to Avery, explicitly.
 * Funetik Aksent: Weeth thee Spaneesh, an' wif Vladimir Mackintosh-Groonbaum.
 * G-Rated Drug: The Jungle Princess has a chocolate addiction.
 * Let's be clear on this: She has snorted it, injected it, and rubbed it behind her ears. The one thing she hasn't done is drink it.
 * Genius Bruiser: Calico Jack Rackham.

""There's no boat! Jayzus, trust the French! Whoever heard o' pirate ship without a small boat moored 'neath the stern an' provisioned wi' all necessities, so that fugitives can light out unseen!""
 * Genre Savvy: Everyone knows the rules. Especially Blood.

""Why don't you overwhelm them, you cowardly rabble? You're not doing it properly! Disarm them by letting them stab you, and roll away with their swords! Collapse on them, you filth!""
 * Go-Go Enslavement: Sheba's plan for getting her romantic rival, Vanity, out of the picture involves selling Vanity into this.
 * The Good Captain: Capt. Benjamin Avery, the hero.
 * Good Is Dumb: Played with. Ben Avery is by all accounts an ingenious young man possessed of a shining intellect, but he's got a gullible streak a mile wide.
 * Gotta Catch Them All: The six crosses of the Madagascar Crown.
 * Hair of Gold: Golden Vanity. Lampshaded with her name, obviously.
 * Hell-Bent for Leather: Sheba.
 * Hello, Nurse!: Lady Vanity.
 * Hidden Depths: Lady Vanity shows a surprising amount of courage and composure after being captured by the pirates and taunted by Sheba.
 * Historical Domain Character: Several.
 * Samuel Pepys, the royal family and others appear briefly in the London scenes.
 * Colonel Thomas Blood really did steal the English Crown Jewels, and then talk the King into pardoning him.
 * Anne Bonney is a genuine female pirate. Calico Jack is loosely based on her partner, Jack Rackham, while Firebeard has a tenuous connection with Blackbeard, and Dan Pew was inspired by two French pirates.
 * All of the pirates, even those with about three lines, are apparently based more or less on real pirates, with the exception of Bilbo who is any villainous character Basil Rathbone ever played.
 * Historical Hero Upgrade: According to the endnotes, Long Ben Avery existed. Also known as Henry Avery, he got away with one of the biggest treasure hauls of all time. Everything else is upgrade. Colonel Blood might also be considered one of these, except that in real life he was far more of a charming (and eccentric) badass rogue than the novel lets him be.
 * Hollywood Tactics: Parodied by Don Lardo's cunning martial strategies:

"Six gorgeous feet she was, from the heels of her tight-fitting Italian thigh boots (from Gucci, undoubtedly) to the curling plume of her picture hat, breeched and shirted in crimson silk that clung to her like a skin, lithe and sleek and dangerous as a panther -- Sheba, the black pirate queen, looking like something out of Marvel Comic with her lovely vicious face and voluptuous shape, her dark eyes flashing against her ebony skin, smouldering silently as she unsheathed her dainty rapier with its Cartier hilt, and posed with the contemptuous grace of a burlesque star, indifferent to the ecstatic sighs and groans of her besotted followers."
 * Hot Amazon: Sheba. And how.

"The long black rapier on his hip was reckoned the deadliest from St Kitts to Coromandel, with stoccata and imbroccata and punta rinversa, sa-ha! and he had a nice showy trick of spinning up finger-rings and impaling them on his flourished blade, like the Duke of Monmouth. Not easy."
 * I Have You Now, My Pretty: The sole purpose of Don Lardo. And Donna Meliflua.
 * Sheba also gets pretty touchy-feely with Vanity after taking her prisoner.
 * Incorruptible Pure Pureness: Captain Avery.
 * Jungle Princess
 * Let's Just Be Friends: Calico Jack and Anne Bonney.
 * Master Swordsman: Bilbo.

""Aaargh!" cried the burly captain, twice for emphasis. "Aaargh! Easy, handsomely, I say, wi' they chests, rot 'ee! 'Tis ten thousand pound you'm carryin', ye lubbers!" This was his normal habit of speech, since anything else would have been incomprehensible to his crew. "A pesky parlous cargo it be, an' all, an' glad I am to be rid on't, burn me for a backstay else.""
 * Marooned: Blood and Avery, on the same island, both with bags tied over their heads.
 * Mayincatec: The lost city of Cohaclgzln.
 * Meaningful Name: Don Lardo.
 * Medium Awareness: On page 115, Avery says, "You don't suppose you can stab me in the back on page 115, surely?"'
 * Noble Demon: Most of the Coast Brotherhood.
 * Obviously Evil: Don Lardo, in spades.
 * Officer and a Gentleman: Captain Avery, much to the disappointment of pretty much every woman who crosses his path.
 * Only Sane Man: Calico Jack, among the pirate captains. Colonel Blood rapidly comes to consider himself this as well.
 * Pirate Booty: Blood finds a treasure hoard in the Frantic Frog, much to the surprise of its captain.
 * Pirate Girl: Black Sheba
 * Prisoner of Zenda Exit: Blood attempts one (and fails).
 * Product Placement: Helena Rubinstein beauty products and Gucci leather goods (and rapiers). Governed almost entirely by Rule of Funny (much like the rest of the novel)
 * Professional Butt-Kisser: Enchillada, and to a lesser extent Goliath the Dwarf.
 * Shallow Love Interest: Lady Vanity. No, the name is not a coincidence. She herself says she's insufferably spoiled, "Very properly."
 * Shout-Out: To Treasure Island
 * Stalker with a Crush: Sheba.
 * Tailor-Made Prison: Sheba is held for two weeks in a cage suspended above a pond full of ravenous octopuses, and three hundred feet below the main building, but after two weeks on a starvation diet, she manages to climb up the chain and escape.
 * Talkative Loon: Solomon Shafto, with a hey-diddle-die-hey-diddle-fol-derol-do.
 * Talk Like a Pirate: With much o' the narration being written in a suitably nautical fashion.
 * And the dialog is frequently Turned Up to Eleven, and usually Lampshaded, as in the very first dialog in the book:


 * Treasure Map: Anne Bonney draws one of her own bedroom, after coming into possession of part of the Madagascar Crown.
 * Unwanted Harem: Everywhere he goes, Captain Avery finds beautiful women hurling themselves at him.
 * Walk the Plank
 * We Hardly Knew Ye:  bites it pretty early on in the story.
 * Weird Trade Union: For the pirates, though the main characters don't take much notice of the shop steward.
 * Worthy Opponent: The reason Black Bilbo spares Avery's life. Also, Bilbo knows lots of dirty tricks, but in his big duel with Avery, he's having too much fun against such a well-matched adversary to even think of using them.
 * There's an It Has Been an Honor moment near the end when Avery tells Bilbo "you're the best swordsman I've ever seen," and Bilbo replies, "I have never met my master." With a grin and nod to Avery, he adds, "Only my match."
 * Ye Goode Olde Days: The opening paragraph is a description of the idealized picture of the setting, which exists in countless novels and films, which is then followed by a description of what "stuffy historians" say the era was actually like. The novel chooses to go with the former.
 * You Got Spunk: The pirates think this about Vanity after seeing her stand up to Sheba.