Reallife accounts of the worlds most notorious pirates from the Golden Age of Piracy and beyondSpanning three centuries and eight thousand nautical miles and compiled by a direct descendant of a sailor who waged war with pirates in the early nineteenth century The Penguin Book of Pirates takes us behind the eye patches the peg legs and the skull and crossbones of the Jolly Roger and into the nomansland of piracy that is rife with paradoxes and plot twists.Here in a fascinating array of accounts that include trial transcripts journalism ship logs and more are the grit and patois of real maritime marauders like the infamous Blackbeard the pirates who inspired Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean Stede Bonnet in Maxs Our Flag Means Death and the Dread Pirate Roberts in The Princess Bride the astoundingly egalitarian multiethnic and multilingual crews that became enmeshed in historical horrors like the slave trade and lesserknown but no less formidable women pirates many of whom disguised themselves as men.By turns brutal harrowing and inspiring these accounts of the radically free sailors who were citizens more of the oceangoing world than of any nation on land remind us of the glories and dangers of the open seas and the seductive appeal of communities forged in resistance.