Of Bogg and Sodd

The Fellowship of Ghosts by Paul Watkins

You only have to take a walk round the labyrinth of an IKEA outlet to witness the wonderful talent the Scandinavians have for naming things with a monosyllabic label that raises a smile to the ears of English speakers!  (Yes, I meant to mix my metaphors there!!).  As a prelude to my Norwegian road trip with my son Barney I did a little online search to see if I could find something, other than the trusty Lonely Planet guide, to act as a gazetteer that would help us get into the country, it's landscape which is so tied to its geology etc etc. I found little except an expensive and comprehensive tome but in searching on Abeboôks I did stumble on 'The Fellowship of Ghosts' by Paul Watkins.  It was a cheap copy and has turned out to be a gem.

In this lively chronicle, Watkins recounts his solitary travels around mountains and fjords, describing the reality and retelling the myth of the magnificent landscape.  And it is wonderful, beautiful in its uniformity and permanence; we have travelled many roads, passed through many tunnels and boarded several ferries whilst peeling off the miles and miles of beautiful forest clad mountains falling sheer to fjords.  It can be this wild .......... with a land area of some 380,000 square kilometres and a population of 5 million.  (For comparison in the UK we have some 250,000 square km and a population 65 million)

I'm not normally good with travelogues but Watkins, who has several novels to his name, has woven history, folklore, anecdote and reflection - and also including something on the Vikings (who fascinate me because I feel I may have some Scandinavian roots) as well as the attempts by Scott and Amundsen on the North Pole - into a colourful account of majestic Norway and its hardy people.  Barney read it whilst we were travelling and loved it and will pass it on to his brother who is quite a picky reader it has to be said.

It probably helps if you are a climber, or at least a roamer of the countryside and enjoy travelling but if not I would like to think you might try this book if only to find out what or who Bogg and Sodd are!

Tempus doni

A Time of Gifts by Patrick Leigh Fermor

In 1933, at the age of 18, Patrick Leigh Fermor set out on an extraordinary journey by foot - from the Hook of Holland to Constantinople. A Time of Gifts is the first volume in a trilogy recounting the trip, and takes the reader with him as far as Hungary.

It has been described as a book of compelling glimpses - not only of the events which were curdling Europe at that time, but also of its resplendent domes and monasteries, its great rivers, the sun on the Bavarian snow, the storks and frogs, the hospitable burgomasters who welcomed him, and that world's grandeurs and courtesies. His powers of recollection have astonishing sweep and verve, and the scope is majestic.

This is the second travel memoir that I have read within a month.  And it is altogether of a far superior calibre to the account of Bryson's latest roamings around Britain.  Fermor came to be regarded as Britain's greatest living travel writer during his lifetime, which spanned 96 years.  That I found Fermor's book tedious is accounted for by several factors.  I did find the author's raconteur style rather grandiloquent, and this was not helped by a very able narration by Crispin Redman of the book on Audible.  He managed to inject the tone of a rather self-centred and pompous young traveller.  Nevertheless I doubt I would have been able to read this book in paper form.  In the final analysis I have come to the conclusion that I am not an armchair traveller and that vicarious globe-trotting is not my thing. 

The Road to Little Dribbling

The Road to Little Dribbling by Bill Bryson

I first encountered Bill Bryson's writing decades ago, when I read his first travel memoir, Notes from a Small Island.  I remember there were many moments when I laughed out loud.  Bryson's ability to look at the English, to sum them up and share his observations and his humorous perspectives on the traits which characterise the inhabitants of these European island outposts was something refreshing.  We could laugh with him at ourselves whilst at the same time celebrating our customs, foibles and contradictions.

So when I came across this latest contribution and because I needed to find a travel memoir to fulfil a category in my Read Harder Book Challenge, I ordered the book.  I reasoned it would be entertaining to revisit the pleasure of seeing ourselves reflected in Bryson's mirror.  The book started well, I did indeed laugh but after a while I came to see a snide side to his narrative.  What a disappointment.  

Either I am remembering Bryson's earlier book with far more charity and less discrimination than I have now, or Bryson has developed a rather small-minded approach to the encounters he had with natives of the United Kingdom.   Maybe with age Bryson has become less tolerant and more curmudgeonly.  I think he is also rather full of himself.  He revels in being recognised and in one place in the book he laments the failure of an assistant in an outdoor clothing emporium to recognise him:  He fantasises:  'Bill Bryson was in today.  He was stocking up for an expedition to Cape Wrath'.  and that they would reply 'Goodness he's brave.  I think I will go and buy some of his books'  But he didn't recognise me so that fantasy was still born...............  

He is critical of two couples who leave, in his opinion, a small tip in a café.  He is rude about the level of donations to a Cathedral fund.  And if someone thwarts his intentions or fails to rise to his expectations he then has a petty and rude imaginary conversation in his head which he nevertheless is quite happy to commit to print. 

He does himself no favours in showing his mean side.  It did not surprise me at all when he mentions in his narrative that he is involved in litigation in America.  Just not a nice man any more, if he ever was.  I won't be reading any more of his offerings.  I think he has outstayed his welcome as a commentator on the British way of life and the inhabitants of our lovely islands.

Last Days and Last Letters

Peking Story: The Last Days of Old China by David Kidd

I doubt I would have heard of this book were it not for the fact that David Bowie has it itemised on his list of 100 good reads.  And this list might not have come to my attention had not the death of David Bowie in January this year given rise to the publication of that book list.  There the book is listed as All The Emperor’s Horses .  What we know about the author is that he has taught Transcendental Meditation for twenty-eight years. He has been an environmental activist for nearly twenty-five years, and a vegetarian for thirty. He lives in Canton, Ohio.

From photographs in the book we can also see that Bowie carries a certain resemblance to Kidd.

Here is what Kirkus Reviews has to say about the novel, under the title of All the Emperor's Horses.  "Set in Peking during the first days of Mao's entry into official power, this is a personal, and delicate depiction of what to some is a disaster, to others a deliverance. The author, an American university professor, marries Aimee, the daughter of an ex-justice of the Chinese supreme court, just as the entire order from which springs her dignity and grace is receiving its death blow. Like the crumbling mansion so vital to Buddhist mythology, the palatial home of the Yus quickly succumbs as the various members of Aimee Yu's family go about finding a way of survival within the new order of things. The author, highly suspect as an American and as a member of the aristocratic Yu menage is, himself, subject to scrutiny and even arrest, although with comic rather than dire results. Throughout his ordeal he maintains a perspective on the situation which admits nostalgia, awe, and humour. David Kidd writes with restrained composure. The atmosphere he evokes is strong, exercising a poignant effect on the senses. He is discreet and despite the chain of lamentable events he reveals-- often with humour--one does not feel that a political judgment is being made. Here, rather, is a picture of a world in transition, a world which, under the scrutiny of the author, emerges rich, refreshing and real. "

Last Letters from Hav by Jan Morris was my choice to fulfil a category on the BookRiot Read Harder Challenge.  (Read a work either by or about a transsexual.)  Jan Morris is a  is a Welsh transgender historian, author and travel writer. Last Letters from Hav is a narrative account of the author's six-month visit to the fictional country of Hav.

The novel is written in the form of travel literature. The work is structured in an episodic format with each chapter corresponding to a month spent in Hav. Hav itself is imagined to be a cosmopolitan small independent peninsula located somewhere in the eastern Mediterranean. The novel proceeds with little in the way of connecting plot but contains several episodes describing the author's subjective experience in Hav. The author narrates a string of evocative episodes including visiting a languid casino, a courteous man claiming to be the true Caliph, watching a city-wide roof race, and a visit to the mysterious British agency. The novel concludes with the author's invited visit to a strange ritual conclave where she observes several cowled men whom she thinks she might recognize as her acquaintances from her time in Hav. The author then recounts the rise of strange and ill-defined tensions in the country. The author decides to leave the country amidst the growing unrest. On the last line of the novel the author writes that she could, from the train station, see warships approaching on the horizon.

The title appeared on the Man Booker Shortlist as a work of fiction, which it is.  However such is the vivid account of the imagined Hav - just look at the book cover image - that the book really does have the feel of a travelogue, a first-hand account of the author's visit to that country. 

Driving Over Lemons

I read this book for my village Book Group January choice.  There is no doubt that Chris Stewart writes very well.  He has great powers of description and I was able to visualise much of the landscape and setting of the derelict farm that he bought, probably in the '70s.  His prose flowed really well although sometimes I felt he was a bit pretentious in his turns of phrase… why refer to someone’s organs of perception when the use of the word 'eyes' would serve very well?  But that’s a quibble and maybe I picked up on that because by that stage in the book I was feeling really irritated with this man.  

OK, he made an error of judgement with Pedro, buying the farm at a so-called bargain price, allowing him to continue to perch in the house even when Ana arrived to join her husband.  He seemed to be reluctant to allow Pedro to return to town life.  How could he imagine his wife would enjoy having a rather ignorant local under their roof?  He seemed very phlegmatic when he discovered Pedro had been loud-mouthing him all about town.  Then you had Arsenio, not a bad name, for a man who steadfastly refused to understand anything Stewart said in Spanish.  And talking of names I thought the self-fulfilling name that the so-called terminally ill woman called Expira had, was amusing.  Only in Domingo did you meet a character who seemed to have integrity, loyalty and respect for his neighbour.  It didn’t paint a particularly good picture of Andalucians.  There was little mention of the good qualities they might have as a people.  Their purpose in life seemed to be to pull one over on foreigners brave enough to venture onto their territory.  Then you had the series of events in which Stewart came out the worse for the experience.  His forays into the keeping of poultry, the selling of lambs, the acquisition of dogs who might have actually brought something positive to the farmstead.  I found it hard to credit that someone could continue to fail to learn, and take pleasure in giving the reader chapter and verse  on his failures.  He painted a picture of a rather gullible and hapless character to whom life’s vicissitudes and misfortunes just happen.  I did not think the description of the pig slaughter sat very comfortably in the book, I struggled with the savaging of the sheep, feeling this might have been avoidable.  Stewart couldn’t even point a wall without realising that no amount of cement will fix a wobbly one.

In writing this review I do recognise that I have had a complete failure of sense of humour.  But I don’t think that is all my fault.  It is partly the job of the author to engage his reader.  He had a book in him and it was up to him to sell it to the reading public.  I think if I had understood Stewart’s remit - to give the reader laughs at his expense - I would have approached the book differently.  As it is I see that the author has made a career out of his role as a sometimes misguided optimist (I noticed he had had a spell as a clown in a circus so the clues were there early on) and he is the author of further travel memoirs notably Three Ways to Capsize a Boat described as a charming and lyrical read, awash with the joy of discovery, from an immensely likeable narrator. People like Stewart will certainly keep the RNLI on their toes. Don't put me down for that sequel.