Sofa Spotlight - Captain Pamphile, Alexandre Dumas

Captain Pamphile is definitely a book of its time with values to match. It maybe qualifies as one of the lesser known Alexandre Dumas books and is not packed with the same amount of adventure as The Three Musketeers or The Count of Monte Cristo. But it does have its value and its moments.

It seems that Captain Pamphile is the owner of a ship who travels in a way that is sometimes less than legal and collects, among other things, stories. These stories are relayed back to us as part of another story, that of a Parisian collecting his one menagerie – which is where Captain Pamphile intersects this story – he often provides the unusual animals required. The bear was my favourite – I had an emotional connection with his adventures.

Although I wouldn’t describe this as thrilling, which is was meant to be, it did have some good points and once I’d got into it, I found I actually quite enjoyed it. It was originally written for children so it’s not a hard read and there’s a message behind it too, which given the time, is quite a surprising one. But you need to read it to find out for yourself.