Quote:
Originally Posted by Walkabout
You need to read Zen and the Art at least twice and, even then, it needs a great deal of thought, not to say effort; without that effort, you won't progress with his theme.
Motorcycle riding is but the stage on which he sets his theme.
Perzig's later book, about morals, is still one that I haven't managed to finish.
In contrast, I lost interest in Stewart's book when he became a politician.
Anything written by Eric Newby is worth a look - he was a travel writer.
"A short walk" has very little to do with walking, but it is about the Hindu Kush.
Whereas, Thesiger happened to put his life into words.
Thesiger and Newby met in one or other of the Stans.
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I recently read a book by Newby from his 1977 journey on the Trans-Siberian. Good, but nothing like as witty as 'A Short walk...'
Thesiger was an amazing man, tough and extremely strong. When he came upon Newby and his climbing partner in Afghanistan, exhausted and sick with dysentery after their attempt on the summit of Mir Samir and presently trying to inflate an air mattress he remarked 'Gosh, you must be a couple of pansies'.
Thesiger managed to document a very intimate look into two societies now disappeared; The Bedu of Arabia and the Marsh Arabs. Sadly the rest of his travels in Africa and Central Asia are not very extensively documented.
I recently read a book in a similar vein to 'Arabian Sands'; 'Nunaga' by Duncan Pryde. It's a great look at the author's life with the Eskimos of northern Canada in the 1950s and 60s. A great account, though the author does not have Thesiger's social and academic credentials and the book may have been ghost-written.
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EurasiaOverland a memoir of one quarter of a million kilometres by road through all of the Former USSR, Western and Southern Asia.
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