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| Folio Society |
Black Sea
Folio Society, London 2011
34,- €; three-quarter-bound, in Slipcase
richly illustrated
On principle, one should perhaps not recommend a book without having read all of it or pretty far into it. But given the alternative -- which is to leaf all the way through a very pretty, bound volume ("three-quarter-bound in buckram with a Modigliani paper side") intended for purchase -- I will do so for Neal Ascherson's Black Sea. The reader, at any rate, is warned to take the following with a grain of salt.
Neal Ascherson was a journalist with the Observer and the Independent; this occupation is hinted at in his writing style, for the brief and factual sentences never bury the reader's energies under their accumulated weight. But fortunately what he writes is never a string of facts devoid of interpretation or individuality; he has not lost the facility of composing well-rounded paragraphs couched in a characteristic style, which is very welcome in the sphere of a book.
The scope of his book is as great, one may say, as the geographical area which he covers. He neglects, as he warns the reader at the outset, much of Turkey and Romania. But he delves into the region's history as far as the ancient Greeks and sketches its economy, politics, wildlife, art, peoples, and so on and so forth.
Many connections wind among these perhaps disparate-seeming spheres, and historical threads can reemerge into the forefront unexpectedly in the course of time. All of it is portrayed with warm affection and with the curiosity which one expects of the traveller.
It is also refreshing that, in the end, the book is written not by a venturesome hero who is trumpeting his own odysseys. He is a guest who, in recounting his vicarious and immediate experiences, puts the realm which he traverses in the forefront. /edi
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| Vintage Books |
Publisher's price: £ 9.99
shipping: 3 - 4 weeks on order
I couldn't find a copyable image of the cover at the publisher's site. However, you shall find further information by using the link. This image was actually taken from another blog: caucascapades. There you shall find a further long review of Neal Ascherson's book.
Die deutsche Ausgabe "Das Schwarze Meer" war bei Suhrkamp erschienen, ist aber nur noch antiquarisch zu bekommen./mh
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| Folio Society |
... A Spy in Dark Times
The author, Neal Ascherson, reviews the film Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy from the perspective of his own years as a Cold War correspondent in Berlin and Moscow."The real-life spies of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy"
in the Guardian of September 11, 2011
John le Carré
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
Folio Society, London 2009
32,80 €, Buckram bound in Slipcase
