Italian seafarers are resilient, efficient at work and equipped with a sense of responsibility. But they are also stressed, work in an uncooperative environment, suffer from the repetitiveness of tasks and complain of a sense of loneliness which, in extreme cases, leads to depression. Thus Psicologia del Mare, a research group from the University of Turin and Sapienza University of Rome, which carried out a survey in collaboration with the maritime workers’ union Usclac-Uncdim-Smacd on 848 seafarers – 94% men, average age 41 years old, 45% officers, 33% commanders or chief engineers, 21% non-commissioned officers or common officers – with the aim of mapping the main stress factors and, consequently, providing answers to the problems.
We talked about it with Björn Larsson, the Swedish writer now at home in Italy, author of books with a salty flavor such as “The Celtic Circle” and “The True Story of the Pirate Long John Silver”, and about to return to bookstores – next February, for the types of Raffaello Cortina – with a philosophical-scientific essay entitled “To be or not to be human”.
On board ships, cargo or passengers, you feel alone. It could also apply on land, but let’s stick to the Sea Psychology investigation.
«Meanwhile, being alone on board begins with the captain: his is the solitude of power, the same as that of company managers, of the football coach. With a difference. The latter choose the team, rarely the commander. There are agencies that send crew on board and this undermines the sense of compatibility of his staff. The captain has gigantic responsibilities, sometimes not shared by the owner. I remember a friend of mine, the captain of a container ship, who had recovered a fishing boat adrift in a river in India, knowing that that hull was a precious resource for perhaps three or four families, and once it arrived in port he had been fined by his owner for 50 thousand euros because he had stopped the ship”.
The rest of the crew?
«There are several elements to consider. Multiculture, for example. Modern crews are made up of members of different nationalities, languages and customs and this does not help cohesion. The same hierarchical division leads to different rooms in which to eat together. Which does not allow you to establish a full human relationship. Which I think is different in the Navy, where there is more cultural uniformity.”
Technology doesn’t help? The seafarer can exchange emails and messages with home.
«It could also be a rip-off. Continuous contact creates and fuels lack. An app cannot replace the human relationship. During Covid my mother was in a retirement home, very nice, but I wasn’t able to go and visit her for 9 months. I called her, but I preferred not too much, because doing so accentuated the sense of missing her. Therefore, the sense of separation by feeling home every day can increase… Once upon a time you would perhaps set sail for a year and only write a few letters.”
Well, boarding trips are shorter today.
«Yes, but the seafarer’s sense of alienation remains. Every time he disembarks he must reconnect to a world in which he is and remains an outsider.”
The study also talks about routine evil.
«Maybe it’s part of the end of the dream. Once upon a time I dreamed of sailing, to see the world. Get down to the ground. Ships stopped in ports for a long time, you knew people, you were not alone. Today modern ships perhaps stop for a few hours, unload and load, never disembark. There is no more adventure, only routine. An element that is also linked to the lack and disappearance of the vocation. Filipino seafarers look at boarding as a mere job, they are not attracted by the sea, by ships.”
The discomfort of feeling alone on board is also said to be caused by the lack of solidarity from colleagues.
«A term, solidarity, that no one uses anymore today, starting with politics. Here we return to the lack of cultural cohesion, but flags of convenience must also be considered. Often it also means not having a structure behind you, a union that can support you.”
Have you ever sailed alone?
«Yes, with my sailboat. On the one hand, it’s a relief, because you don’t have responsibility for the safety and well-being of other people. If more free, you can decide for yourself and that’s it. And then, it depends where you surf. I sailed between Dublin and Cork, Ireland, and in every port there was a pub: I got off, went in and after two days they already considered me a regular. Never alone, at most a little tipsy.”
Is loneliness bad?
«Not absolutely. I need to be alone, to think, to write. I’m comfortable with it, and so it’s a privilege. But for maybe a month, not forever. In my new book I also talk about this: man is not born alone and being one is deadly in the long run if you want to remain human, it destroys you. For example, if you don’t talk to someone for years, you lose your language. If you are alone, you are less.” —