Traveller's Life - Hardcover

Newby, Eric

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 070891117X ISBN 13: 9780708911174

Publisher: Ulverscroft, 1984

Synopsis

Eric Newby’s life of travel began with strange adventures in prams, forays into the lush jungles of Harrods with his mother and into the perilous slums of darkest Hammersmith on his way to school. Such beginnings aroused his curiosity about more outlandish places, a wanderlust satisfied equally by travels through the London sewers, by bicycle to Italy and through wildest New York. His book chronicles the whole range of situations into which he has thrown himself with characteristic verve and optimism, and his perception of the incongruous is as sharp when travelling abroad in search of high fashion, as buyer to a chain of department stores, as it is when recalling his reluctant participation in a tiger shoot in India.

‘In order to belong to the inner circle of free-range travellers you have to be willing to choose the hard and hazardous bits – and this is where Eric Newby is so outstandingly good’ – Punch

‘Whatever his may be he allows us to accompany him vicariously on it . . . and his book is a delight to read’ Auberon Waugh

‘Everything Eric Newby has written is a joy. This compendium is a treat’ Geoffrey Moorhouse

‘Eric Newby’s admirers will not be disappointed’ Listener

About this title

Review:

'Eric Newby writes as lightly as he travels. “A Traveller's Life” is a tonic and a pleasure' William Trevor, Guardian

'The thing that sets Eric Newby quite apart from other literate travellers is his gusto. Where others flutter on impressionistic wings, tread self-consciously across unpeopled wastes, or muse lyrically and sometimes disproportionately about the past, Newby barges into everything with relish and mockery in the very opposite of the grand manner. . . . Everything Eric Newby has written is a joy. This compendium is a treat' Geoffrey Moorhouse, The Times

'The highly engaging peripatetics of a man who was born with a natural hunger for lonely and exacting places, a wry but charitable outlook on his scurrying fellows, and a silver pen in his hand' Observer

'This is a collection of jewelled vignettes: part travel, part life. A feast. . . . One of the few great travel writers who makes you want to follow in his footsteps. . . . As he travels on, Newby never loses this childhood freshness of vision, his essential innocence as a traveller. Perhaps this is his greatest gift' Times Literary Supplement

'Whatever his quest may be, he allows us to accompany him vicariously on it ... and his book is a delight to read' Auberon Waugh

'Appealing autobiography by ex-travel editor who can find adventure in a pram trip or a London sewer' Sunday Telegraph

'A Traveller's Life offers a high-spirited collection of memories, packed with good things, of a man who can make a schoolboy holiday in Swanage as colourful as a walk in the Hindu Kush' Observer

'In order to belong to the inner circle of free-range travelers you have to be willing to choose the hard and hazardous bits - and this is where Eric Newby is so outstandingly good' Punch

'Eric Newby's admirers will not be disappointed' Listener

Book Description:

‘Eric Newby writes as lightly as he travels. A Traveller’s Life is a tonic and a pleasure’ Guardian

About this edition

• Publisher: Ulverscroft
• Publication date: 1984
• ISBN 10: 070891117X
• ISBN 13: 9780708911174
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 592