Penguin Travel Library and other literary travel books

[Extollager]

In today's mail: The Flight of Ikaros: Travels in Greece During a Civil War by Kevin Andrews.

I found some material about the author --

Roy Kevin Andrews was the second son of Roy Chapman Andrews and his first wife, Yvette Borup Andrews..... He always preferred to be called Kevin, not Roy and absolutely never Roy Jr.


Overshadowed by his Father's fame, Kevin Andrews' contributions to Greek Archaeology, Travel Writing and Literature, have remained largely unappreciated outside of a small group of academics and admirers. That is, until the recent publication of Roger Jinkinson's new book - American Ikaros: The Search for Kevin Andrews. Published by Racing Horse Press, London, England, 2010.


A chance encounter in a small cafeneion on a remote Greek Island led Roger Jinkinson on a quest to find out what had happened to Kevin Andrews, the author of The Flight of Ikaros, described by Patrick Leigh Fermor as "One of the great and lasting books about Greece".

he search for Kevin Andrews covers half the globe and contains a glittering array of characters including W. H. Auden, Louis MacNeice, Dylan Thomas, Patrick Leigh Fermor, E. E. Cummings, Scofield Thayer, Amelia Earhart, Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany and Queen Frederika of Greece.

Kevin was born in Peking in 1924. His Mother, Yvette Borup, beautiful and spirited was married at the time to Roy Chapman Andrews, but Jinkinson and others contend that Andrews may not have been Kevin's biological Father.


Gifted with good looks, charm and intelligence, Kevin grew to be a confused and troubled man. His one constant love was Greece and the Greeks. He relinquished his American nationality and became a Greek citizen in 1975. The last few years of his life were spent in Athens living as a recluse. He dies in 1989, swimming in wild seas off the Greek Island of Kythira.

http://whalescampsandtrails.blogspot.com/2011/01/kevin-andrews-1924-1989-american-ikaros.html

The blog from which the above info is taken, on traveller Roy Chapman Andrews, looks like a fun place to poke around. Just savor a photo like this:

​

 

[Extollager]

Two travel books arrived in the mail today, Blind White Fish in Persia mentioned above, and Gavin Young's Slow Boats to China.

This is a Penguin, but not an entry in the Travel Library. The book's now offered by Faber, who say:

Gavin Young (1929-2001) was a journalist, writer, and briefly a member of MI6. As a journalist, he was most associated with the Observer, being in the words of Mark Frankland's obituary 'a star foreign correspondent'. When disenchantment with journalism set in he turned to the writing of books. The two most famous ones are Slow Boats to China and its sequel Slow Boats Home. He himself had a particular affection for two later books In Search of Conrad (winner of the Thomas Cook Book Award) and A Wavering Grace. These and Beyond Lion Rock, From Sea to Shining Sea, Return to the MarshesandWorlds Apartare all being reissued in Faber Finds.

 

[Extollager]

Eric Newby was an exceptional travel writer -- Extollager, have you read the book where he talks about how he met Wanda in WWII? Can't recall which one, but a moving love story.

Yes! Love and War in the Apennines was great. I've read three of Neby's books in close succession and relished them all.

 

[hitmouse]

I think I mentioned Slow Boats to China at the beginning of this thread. One of the Picador Travel Classics. You should enjoy this one. Really good fun.

I haven't read any of his others but I will add some to the Summer Holiday reading pile.

 

[Extollager]

I wrote:

Penguin Travel Library -- Complete List (?)

Here I will list books that appear to have belonged to the Penguin Travel Library of approximately 1983-late 1980s. I list books that I have owned or remember having seen seen that have the cover style (typeface, etc.) indicated.....

Lee, As I Walked Out One Midsummer Morning L
Theroux, The Old Patagonian Express L
Wain, House of Exile L
Welch, Maiden Voyage (it is about Shanghai) L

I now doubt very much that these four books were in the Penguin Travel Library. Anyone looking to collect the PTL books should check carefully before buying these unseen. They were travel books, I take it, and they certainly were published by Penguin, but do not appear to have been in the PTL series. Eventually I will probably pull together what I've found out since starting this thread and offer a revised list of confirmed PTL books.

Here's Douglas's Siren Land in a bonafide PTL-design form:

By the way, I recently received this item in the series, Bibby's Looking for Dilmun (which is an ancient civilization, not a person).

For connoisseurs of rarities, I would say that, at the moment, the hardest PTL book to find cheap appears to be Barbara Greene's Too Late to Turn Back. As I am not seriously attempting to acquire all of these books, this doesn't bother me personally. I'm finding that most of the books can be picked up from abebooks.com or amazon for $4 or $5 postpaid. Finding them in highly collectible condition could be another matter; some of the ones I've ordered in the past month have come with stickers on them that are not always easy to peel off without a tiny amount of damage.

 

[Extollager]

Looks like Barr's The Deer Cry Pavilion and (to judge from the back cover here) The Coming of the Barbarians were indeed in the PTL series:

Also Forster's Hill of Devi:

And Glazebrook's Journey to Kars is confirmed:

And Hoagland's African Calliope:

 

[Extollager]

Lawrence's Mornings in Mexico was in the series:

Also Gavin Maxwell's A Reed Shaken by the Wind:

Also Matthiessen's Under the Mountain Wall and his Cloud Forest:

However, James's Little Tour in France has the later cover style, in which the green strip is gone:

I note also that all of the PTL books that I have with the green strip have the characteristic Penguin symbol against a PINK background. Of the ones I've inspected, the later "PTL" books, with the orange strip, do not have the pink background for the Penguin emblem.

 

[Extollager]

Wilson's Reflections in a Writer's Eye confirmed as PTL:

Also Welch's Maiden Voyage:

And Somerville-Large's Grand Irish Tour was PTL:

 

[Extollager]

[FONT=&quot]Penguin Travel Library – 13 June 2013 List

Here I will list slightly more than 50 books that I have confirmed as belonging to the Penguin Travel Library of approximately 1983-late 1980s. I list books that I have own or remember having seen that have the cover style (typeface, etc.) indicated here
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]

[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] with the series title displayed in a distinctive typeface against a pale green strip on the bottom of the front cover. The Penguin bird-emblem on the spine and sometimes on the front cover always appears with a pink background. Except for Brazilian Adventure, the most recent copyright in which is 1957, I have given copyright dates for the ones I own. Sometimes there were multiple copyright dates and I might have erred in my decision of which to list as the proper PTL copyright date.[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Also, the numerous entries marked with O are ones that, so far as I remember, I haven’t seen except as shown online, but that appear there with the standard Penguin Travel Library appearance. [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]In some cases, I have added subtitles from abebooks.com descriptions.
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The list:[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Ackerley, Hindoo Holiday (1983)
Andrews, The Flight of Ikaros (1985)
Asher, A Desert Dies O
Barr, The Coming of the Barbarians: A Story of Western Settlement in Japan, 1853-1870 listed as PTL on back of following book, but not yet seen by me in reality or online; also The Deer Cry Pavilion: A Story of Westerners in Japan, 1868-1905 O
Beagle, I See by My Outfit (1985) (journey across America by motor scooter by two New York Tolkien fans)
Belloc, The Path to Rome (1985)
Bibby, Looking for Dilmun (1984; Persian Gulf)
Bowen, A Time in Rome O
Carrington, Granite Island O (about Corsica)
Conover, Rolling Nowhere (1985) (hobo life, America)
Doughty, Passages from Arabia Deserta (1984)
Douglas, Siren Land O (concerns southern Italy)
Farson, Caucasian Journey (1988)
Fleming, Brazilian Adventure (no date); also One’s Company O
Forster, The Hill of Devi O (concerns India)
Gide, Travels in the Congo (1986)
Glazebrook, Journey to Kars O
Greene, Too Late to Turn Back O[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Grimble, A Pattern of Islands O (atolls in the central Pacific)
Gorer, Africa Dances (1983)
Hearn, Writings from Japan (1984)
Hoagland, African Calliope: A Journey to the Sudan O
Lawrence, D. H. Lawrence and Italy (Twilight in Italy; Sea and Sardinia; Etruscan Places; 1985); also Mornings in Mexico O
Leigh Fermor, Mani (1984); Roumeli (1983); A Time of Gifts (1983)[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Levi, The Light Garden of the Angel King: Journeys in Afghanistan (1984)
Matthiessen, The Cloud Forest: A Chronicle of the South American Wilderness O; also Under the Mountain Wall: A Chronicle of Two Seasons in Stone Age New Guinea O
Maxwell, A Reed Shaken by the Wind: Travels Among the Marsh Arabs of Iraq O
Macaulay, They Went to Portugal O (appears to have appeared in this series in 1985)
Monfreid, de, Hashish (1985)
Newby, The Big Red Train Ride (multiple 1980s printings; I can’t tell when it entered PTL); also The Last Grain Race (1986); also A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush (1986); also Slowly Down the Ganges (1986); and Love and War in the Appenines (1990)
Pope-Hennessy, Aspects of Provence (1988)
Pye-Smith, The Other Nile (1987); also Travels in Nepal
Smith, Blind White Fish in Persia (1990)
Somerville-Large, Grand Irish Tour O
Thesiger, Arabian Sands (1984); also The Marsh Arabs (I think I have seen this, back in the 1980s; I don’t find it online now)[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Thubron, Journey into Cyprus (1986)
Welch, Maiden Voyage (it is about Shanghai) O
Wilson, Reflections in a Writer’s Eye O[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Wood, Third-Class Ticket O[/FONT][FONT=&quot]
Wright, Cut Stones and Crossroads: A Journey in the Two Worlds of Peru (1986); also On Fiji Islands (1987)[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Appendices:[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Cameron, Indian Summer O (about India) This is a questionable one. The cover reproductions that I have seen online have PTL-style lettering but not the green strip at the bottom of the cover, and I am not sure the book was published outside India. I doubt the Penguin appeared against pink.

[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]With somewhat different cover designs, but labeled as Penguin Travel Library:[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Barley, The Innocent Anthropologist O[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Byron, First Russia, Then Tibet (my copy has Penguin Travel Library banner in uncharacteristic orange background and slightly different typography from the standard PTL look of the books listed above; the date is 1985, but I think this is an early 1990s printing; Penguin bird emblem appears against orange)[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Hansen, Stranger in the Forest: On Foot Across Borneo ….have seen[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]James, A Little Tour in France O[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Macaulay, They Went to Portugal (1985 date, but, as with the Byron, I think this is probably an early 1990s printing; Penguin bird emblem appears with orange color)
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]McCarthy, Stones of Florence and Venice Observed (1 vol) O
Morris, Spain O[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Morris, Nothing to Declare: Memoirs of a Woman Traveling Alone [/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]With quite a different cover look:[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Nicholl, Borderlines O[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]This one MIGHT have been in the series, but I doubt it:[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]Newby, Round Ireland in Low Gear [/FONT]


​

 

[Extollager]

Just when I thought I'd maybe spotted 'em all, here's another, Pye-Smith's Travels in Nepal:

 

[Extollager]

Another Penguin Travel Library entry arrived today, Gavin Maxwell's A Reed Shaken by the Wind, and a Penguin that wasn't in the travel library, Charlie Pye-Smith's Rebels and Outcasts: A Journey Through Christian India. Maxwell was author of a book once famous, about otters:

http://www.worldagroforestry.org/WCA2009/meet-reporters-charlie-pye-smith

 

[hitmouse]

There's a nice 1960s film of Ring of Bright Water.

 

[hitmouse]

Ordered this to put on the pile for Summer Holiday reading. Lewis is one of my favourites:

An extract:

The room was owned by a Chinese merchant. It had been divided by partitions, and several tenants slept in beds that had been distributed as evenly as possible about the available space. It was reached by an outside staircase, at the top of which was a platform with a small table, an ancient, filthy but still beautiful pitcher, full of water, and an aluminium wash-basin. Here, at night, a lonely but brilliantly neon-illuminated figure, I performed my toilet, watched incuriously by the Burmese seated at the tables of the tea-shops below. It seemed that Mandalay was without drains. When I asked my Chinese host what was to be done with the waste water, he pointed to the palm-thatched roof of the house below. When I had finally brought myself to accept his implied suggestion, there was a sharp exclamation from within, as if the inmates had never been able entirely to accustom themselves to the procedure.
Night in Mandalay, called for special qualities of endurance. As the evening wore on, both heat and noise increased. The large, modernistic windows with their westerly exposure had been a sun-trap since the early afternoon, and by the evening the heat was seeping through the walls themselves. At about six-thirty the sun went down redly in a glittering haze of dust particles. Immediately the lights of Mandalay came on. A fluorescent tube had been installed for decorative purposes across the façade of our building, providing a pale glare until the early morning hours. The cinema across the road was outlined with flickering fires of neon. Probably as an anti-dacoit measure, because it was left on all night, a large, naked electric bulb was suspended outside my window. This supplied, when other sources failed, a continuous death-cell illumination.

 

[Extollager]

I've written a piece for the Mythopoeic Society's quarterly, Mythprint, in which I suggest that fantasy discussion groups might try a travel book as a change of pace. I recommended William Morris's Icelandic Journals or Newby's Slowly Down the Ganges in particular. Surely those would be better choices than ones that would require plodding through another entry in a derivative generic fantasy series -- Volume Five of the Lorazepam Series or something.

 

[hitmouse]

Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere, and A Machynlleth Triad (not strictly travel but geographical fiction, perhaps) both by Jan Morris. Another two for the holiday pile ordered today. Jan Morris is a very interesting writer. Fortunately she has been prolific, which means that there is still a lot to read.

Review here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2001/oct/20/travel.travelbooks

 

[hitmouse]

Another one for the holiday pile. I have been waiting for The Old Ways by Robert McFarlane to come out in paperback.

I haven't read McFarlane before. I get the impression that this falls into the category of metaphysical travel literature-cum nature writing, which I quite enjoy in small doses. In the same school as Roger Deakin, whose Waterlog, and Wildwood are well worth checking out:

Also Richard Mabey, who has written widely and in depth on the mythology and culture of the british natural landscape in his books Birds Brittanica, Bugs Brittanica, and Trees Brittanica, as well as the odd contemplative travel book Nature Cure:

Another one in a similar vein that I particularly enjoyed is Out of the Woods by Will Cohu, about a long walk through varied woods in Winter time, contemplating the texture and the nature of bare-branched trees:

 

[Bick]

I mentioned this in the month's current reading thread, but it really fits here, so I'll remention (I'm making up words): I'm reading John Steinbeck - Travels with Charley in Search of America, and I can recommend it unreservedly if you like travel writing. A bit like Bill Bryson's "Lost continent", but of course more beautifully written. His observations constantly have me nodding agreement, and his witticisms are making me chuckle too. It's a goodun.

 

[hitmouse]

Travels with Charley was my introduction to Steinback. A gem. I hadn't been aware quite how funny and accurate he was. He is also quite good at being angry (at the end.)

 

[Extollager]

Hitmouse and Bick, I've checked out a copy of Travels with Charley and maybe will get to it this month. We'll see. Let me know more about McFarlane, Deakin, and Cohu sometime; the latter two were new names to me.

 

[hitmouse]

This is Roger Deakin's obituary:
Obituary: Roger Deakin | Environment | The Guardian

One might argue that writing about the land with this degree of attention follows on from the tradition of Gilbert White's Natural History of Selborne, amongst others. could probably put Thoreau in there as well. Does Walden count as travel lit?