Items related to Journey to Ithaca
In her first novel since the widely praised Baumgartner's Bombay, Anita Desai brilliantly evokes spiritual India in all its endless complexity, and examines the nature of pilgrimage through the aspirations and adventures of three superbly realized characters.
Matteo and Sophie join the 1970s flight of young Europeans to India. Matteo -- Italian, raised in the luscious countryside around Lake Como, restless since childhood -- has been introduced by a tutor to Hermann Hesse's The Journey to the East, and it opens in him a desperate longing. Sophie -- German, practical, worldly -- is willing to follow him to the ends of the earth.
In India, together they visit swamis, gurus, ashrams -- always searching. Matteo is seeking spiritual enlightenment, but for Sophie fulfillment lies in earthly love. And when they meet a holy woman known as the Mother, the differences between them seem to explode.
When we learn the Mother's story, we see it as an earlier version of their own -- the story of a young girl growing up in Cairo and finding her way East by joining a troupe of Indian dancers she has met in Europe. Her journey, a young woman's daring progress through Paris and Venice and New York, until she finds her moment of transcendence in India, comments on, and gives added breadth to, the young couple's quest.
In telling what happens to Matteo and Sophie and the mother, Anita Desai gives us a novel of great richness, an extraordinary vision of a country, and a compassionate portrait of people struggling to find a spiritual home. Journey to Ithaca is her most powerful and most involving novel.
Matteo and Sophie join the 1970s flight of young Europeans to India. Matteo -- Italian, raised in the luscious countryside around Lake Como, restless since childhood -- has been introduced by a tutor to Hermann Hesse's The Journey to the East, and it opens in him a desperate longing. Sophie -- German, practical, worldly -- is willing to follow him to the ends of the earth.
In India, together they visit swamis, gurus, ashrams -- always searching. Matteo is seeking spiritual enlightenment, but for Sophie fulfillment lies in earthly love. And when they meet a holy woman known as the Mother, the differences between them seem to explode.
When we learn the Mother's story, we see it as an earlier version of their own -- the story of a young girl growing up in Cairo and finding her way East by joining a troupe of Indian dancers she has met in Europe. Her journey, a young woman's daring progress through Paris and Venice and New York, until she finds her moment of transcendence in India, comments on, and gives added breadth to, the young couple's quest.
In telling what happens to Matteo and Sophie and the mother, Anita Desai gives us a novel of great richness, an extraordinary vision of a country, and a compassionate portrait of people struggling to find a spiritual home. Journey to Ithaca is her most powerful and most involving novel.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
Review:
"A beautiful book of epic scope... Anita Desai has surpassed her own previous high standards" (Literary Review)
"Full of revelations and pleasures" (Independent on Sunday)
"She writes an extraordinarily delicate, lucid English... She is a writer's writer in that anyone who has ever set pen to paper must ask himself just what it is about the writing that makes it so memorable" (Victoria Glendinning Times Literary Supplement)
"Superbly powerful... A rich, evocative book" (Spectator)
Book Description:
"Full of revelations and pleasures" (Independent on Sunday)
"She writes an extraordinarily delicate, lucid English... She is a writer's writer in that anyone who has ever set pen to paper must ask himself just what it is about the writing that makes it so memorable" (Victoria Glendinning Times Literary Supplement)
"Superbly powerful... A rich, evocative book" (Spectator)
'One of the best Indian novelists writing in English' - Independent
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- ISBN 10 8175300086
- ISBN 13 9788175300088
- BindingHardcover
- Rating
Buy New
Learn more about this copy
£ 5.33
Shipping:
£ 6.50
From United Kingdom to U.S.A.
Other Popular Editions of the Same Title
Top Search Results from the AbeBooks Marketplace
Stock Image
Journey to Ithaca
Published by
Ravi Dayal Publishers
(1996)
ISBN 10: 8175300086
ISBN 13: 9788175300088
New
Hardcover
Quantity: 4
Seller:
Rating
Book Description Condition: New. pp. viii + 301. Seller Inventory # 7827610
Buy New
£ 5.33
Convert currency
Stock Image
Journey To Ithaca
Published by
Ravi Dayal Publishers
(1996)
ISBN 10: 8175300086
ISBN 13: 9788175300088
New
Quantity: 2
Seller:
Rating
Book Description N.A. Condition: New. ISBN:9788175300088 N.A. Seller Inventory # 2074430
Buy New
£ 2.47
Convert currency