Originally posted by San Bernardhinault
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That’s a fair point. I have no idea what I was talking about. I did see someone who’d just written a book on an Antarctic explorer (that explorer might have been Cherry-Garrard but it might have been someone completely different) and perhaps that was what I meant. But frankly, have no idea. And can’t remember the name of either writer or adventurer.
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San Bernardhinault, you said earlier in this thread that you’d seen Apsley Cherry Garrard speak at the RGS - Can we assume you are very very old…? Cherry Garrard died in 1959 after a decade or so of seclusion …
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Ah. Shame. As I mentioned in the opening post of this thread, Old Glory is an absolute favourite of the genre.
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Having been laid up the last 6 weeks, I’ve had a bit of a reading binge. Probably because I can’t get out and about much, travel writing has been a means of escape.
Anyways, wanted to say I took the upthread recommendation(s) to read Kassabova’s Border book. Feck me, it’s superb writing. And on a topic/area I only vaguely knew about.
Also chomped through a couple of Bryson’s for lighter relief, and thinking about revisiting some Paul Theroux if this ailment goes on much longer.
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Over the Current Reading thread /or possibly Who likes looking at maps, someone mentioned Brooke-Hitching's 'The Golden Atlas". My apologies, to whoever recommended it, but I've done a search and it's coming back with zero results. Anyway, it's not a travel book, but a book about other peoples' travels. Finishes with the Shackleton expedition of 1914-17...It's excellent. He manages to condense years of travel - Raleigh's circumnavigation for example into a couple of pages. But the travels are simply excuses for some beautiful maps. Having just finished watching The Terror, his account of the Franklin expedition was particularly good. He also has quite a large chapter on female travellers. Many of whom I knew nothing about so that was fascinating. It's also a beautiful object (in hardback) to handle and possess.
During lockdown, I bought Essays in Idleness and Hojoki, by two Buddhist monks from medieval Japan. One, Chomei decided to exile himself as a hermit in a hut in the mountains. His section of the book deals basically with the opposite of travel.
Just started The Frozen River which was recommended by J over on the current reading thread. A walk down the frozen Zangskar river. Not far in, but it is lyrical. Almost a prose poem about Ladakh, a region have travelled in previously.
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Originally posted by ad hoc View PostNot sure if this is a travel book exactly, but I've just finished Ottoman Odyssey by Alev Scott. A journey around the various parts of the former empire mixing interviews with history with travel. She delves into Erdoğan and his attempts to revive the empire and the way he spends money to do so (especially in the Balkans). She's very up front and honest about Israel and Palestine and is not afraid to call apartheid apartheid. And she also doesn't shy away from using the word genocide to describe what happened to the Armenians. (The author, who is a young journalist, is from London from a Turkish Cypriot family)
Recommended. Think Antepli Ejderha would enjoy it in particular, but anyone who enjoys a good travel /modern history book will get a lot from it. My only criticism is that it could be much longer.
I didn't realise she was barred from Turkey, a badge of honour.
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Looking for some decent books to read I've taken ad hoc's recommendations and just ordered both Danube and Border.
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Originally posted by Gangster Octopus View PostI no longer have the concentration to read books.
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Originally posted by Gangster Octopus View PostReally pleased for you, and more than a little bit jealous.
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Originally posted by Antepli Ejderha View PostIn the last couple of days I've actually been able to read, for the first time in years
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Originally posted by Antepli Ejderha View PostIn the last couple of days I've actually been able to read, for the first time in years, so thought I'd start with something easy. Richard Parks 'Beyond the Horizon' is about the ex Wales rugby player turned extreme athlete, it's an easy read because it's well ghost written. I'm so happy to be reading again.
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In the last couple of days I've actually been able to read, for the first time in years, so thought I'd start with something easy. Richard Parks 'Beyond the Horizon' is about the ex Wales rugby player turned extreme athlete, it's an easy read because it's well ghost written. I'm so happy to be reading again.
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That's added to my Kindle toread list. I think I've hit 100 now.
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I think I've banged the drum about Kassabova on here before (ed: in this very thread! Back in 2018, mind). Definitely highly recommend Border. The second book you talk about there (To The Lake) is also good, though not nearly at the level of Border. Her previous book (Street Without a Name) is most definitely worth a read though, and between that and To The Lake, I'd recommend SWAN).
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Kapka Kassabova's Border, is utterly utterly superb. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.
Kassabova is a Bulgarian who lives in Scotland (as far as I can gather this book was originally written in English, and it won the Scottish book of the year award, or similar in 2017). But the book is about Bulgaria, or more specifically Bulgaria's southern border with Turkey and Greece. It's part travel writing, part social history, part just gloriously descriptive writing about an area of Europe that very few people ever see (Kassabova is a poet, which perhaps explains the beauty of the language). She tells stories of the villages and towns she stays in as she visits the border, and of some of the recent history there - the fact that it was a border closed from people heading south before 1989, and is now, thanks to the refugee crisis a border closed for people heading north. Stories of the number of people who tried to flee from the Soviet controlled world (many of them it turns out East Germans, who had heard that it was perhaps the easiest border to cross -spoiler alert - it wasn't). Stories of the ethnic makeup of Thrace in general. The "Big Excursion" in 1989 (I'll start a thread on this in World). Really, get hold of it. It's full of beautifully told stories of awful things and beautifully stories of amazing things (the fire walkers of the Strandja, for example)
I am now looking to get hold of a copy of her more recent book, where she goes to Macedonia.
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Originally posted by ad hoc View PostNo, that sounds good. I'll put it on my list
Hmm, also "How to Lose a Country" sounds like another of hers that would be worth reading
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No, that sounds good. I'll put it on my list
Hmm, also "How to Lose a Country" sounds like another of hers that would be worth reading
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Thanks ad hoc I've not read her work yet but know of her, I've bought the book on kindle now.
Have you read Ece Temelkuran? Turkey The Insane and the Melancholy is well worth a read.
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