Books : Search

Average Rating:

.Venice

by: Jan Morris

October 07, 2004
I decided to read "Venice" in preparation for a week-long stay in the Italian city.

Broken into three sections -- The People, The City, The Lagoon -- "Venice" is not a chronological history of the city but a meandering look at its past, present and future. Nor is it a guidebook, although it does contain a mine of information about what to see and where to go.

I think "The Times" probably described it best when they said it was "a classic love letter to Italy's most iconic city", because it is, indeed, a beautiful missive dripping with exquisite descriptions. I found it an enormously engaging and evocative read by an accomplished writer who really knows how to string a simile or two together.For example: "Venice is ... Read More:
>>See More Reviews & Details on Venice

Used Price: £3.32

Average Rating:

.Spain

by: Jan Morris

August 07, 2008
This perhaps is no longer a travel book, in the sense that the Spain that the author writes so evocatively about has in most part dissipated like the rare mist on the Castilian plain. Whilst modern Spain is a fine example of a modern, liberal industrialised society; at least in its principle cosmopolitan areas - one senses the lost of the Iberia that was. The grandeur of a nation that imparted so much to the world in the discovery of a New World, the staunch pride of a community of believers that was nearly biblical, a country of individuals who were in tune with the cycles of nature. This book serves as a paean to what was once, like a dusty knight tilting at those windmills.
>>See More Reviews & Details on Spain

Used Price: £3.13

Average Rating:

.Between the Woods and the Water (New York Review Books Classics)

by: Patrick Leigh Fermor

October 10, 2005
I read both of Fermor's books of his trek from UK towards Instanbul in sequence, and enjoyed both hugely. It was a great pity he never produced the projected 3rd volume! This (2nd) volume covers his travels through Hungary and Romania, largely by being befriended by local people and being in turn passed on to their friends, so he had the enormous luck of not only their open-handed hospitality but also of their local knowledge. Many of these characters are compelling: I especially loved the studious land-owner who opened the conversation by asking what was Fermor's special research topic. He was clearly disapproving that the 19y old had not got one, and was only mollified by his evidently wide classical reading. Fermor writes perceptively and sympathetically, ... Read More:
>>See More Reviews & Details on Between the Woods and the Water (New York Review Books Classics)

Used Price: £3.93

Average Rating:

.Venice for Pleasure (Pallas for Pleasure)

by: J.G. Links, Jan Morris

October 01, 2008
I read both of Fermor's books of his trek from UK towards Instanbul in sequence, and enjoyed both hugely. It was a great pity he never produced the projected 3rd volume! This (2nd) volume covers his travels through Hungary and Romania, largely by being befriended by local people and being in turn passed on to their friends, so he had the enormous luck of not only their open-handed hospitality but also of their local knowledge. Many of these characters are compelling: I especially loved the studious land-owner who opened the conversation by asking what was Fermor's special research topic. He was clearly disapproving that the 19y old had not got one, and was only mollified by his evidently wide classical reading. Fermor writes perceptively and sympathetically, ... Read More:
>>See More Reviews & Details on Venice for Pleasure (Pallas for Pleasure)

Used Price: £13.57

Average Rating:

.Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere

by: Jan Morris

July 22, 2002
I really enjoyed this book about a city I drove through many times but only recently stopped in to enjoy its atmosphere. When I came home I eagerly read this book and was so taken by Jan's writing on the city that I want to go back at the earliest opportunity. That for me is travel writing at its best.
>>See More Reviews & Details on Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere

Used Price: £1.90

Average Rating:

.Conundrum

by: Jan Morris

April 08, 2002
Transsexual biographies are a mixed bunch. Jan Morris's Conundrum is one of the few by a really good writer. Much of what she said resonated with my own experience of gender dysphoria and reading her book helped me through my own sex change.
>>See More Reviews & Details on Conundrum

Used Price: £1.30

Average Rating:

.Wales Epic Views of a Small Country

by: Jan Morris

April 27, 2000
If you are Welsh, have Welsh ancestors or went on holiday to Rhyl as a child, this book will induce a sense of bitter-sweet homesickness for a country with a fierce pride in being 'not English', despite being regarded as an English region by most of the rest of the world.

The author brings out the pride, sadness and essential 'otherness' of the Welsh people and culture. The sadness comes from many sources - the dark melancholy of a Celtic race, the centuries of losing on the battlefield to a larger foe, the grey, damp, rocky landscape seeping into it's people's souls and joints. But the pride comes from still having a language that is central to their culture and from feeling part of a distinct country, for surviving, despite all the forces of history.

Jan ... Read More:
>>See More Reviews & Details on Wales Epic Views of a Small Country

Used Price: £4.45

Average Rating:

.Heaven's Command: An Imperial Progress (Pax Britannica)

by: Jan Morris

February 03, 2003
The great thing about Jan Morris is that she brings so many different qualities to her books. Nostalgia, humour, insight, and wonderful storytelling, all of which are present in abundance in this marvelous account of the Genesis of that most remarkable of Empires. It was an Empire that was cruel, repressive, civilising, gracious and compassionate depending on which subject of the Crown was dispensing the rules to the natives. Being a native of one of the former colonies (Ireland) I am all too familiar with the negative aspects of the Empire. Our famine is at once an epic tragedy and also an indictment of the British Empires lack of compassion. On the other hand when you read this book you cannot but admire the great energy and sacrifice of so many loyal British subjects who lived ... Read More:
>>See More Reviews & Details on Heaven's Command: An Imperial Progress (Pax Britannica)

Used Price: £1.63

Average Rating:

.Pax Britannica: The Climax of an Empire (Pax Britannica)

by: Jan Morris

February 03, 2003
This, together with the other 2 books in this trilogy by Morris remain among my favourite books. The rich storytelling, the attention to detail and the many amusing footnotes to the history of the British Empire are fascinating. I have been to many of the places Morris describes, and he brings them to life, even now.
>>See More Reviews & Details on Pax Britannica: The Climax of an Empire (Pax Britannica)

Used Price: £5.00

Average Rating:

.A Venetian Bestiary

by: Jan Morris

September 20, 2007
This, together with the other 2 books in this trilogy by Morris remain among my favourite books. The rich storytelling, the attention to detail and the many amusing footnotes to the history of the British Empire are fascinating. I have been to many of the places Morris describes, and he brings them to life, even now.
>>See More Reviews & Details on A Venetian Bestiary

Used Price: £6.75