Rory Stewart - The Marches (2nd Hand Paperback)
ISBN / GTIN-13 : 9781328745651
Synopsis
Waterstones Non Fiction Book of the Month for October 2017.
Longlisted for The Orwell Prize 2017.
From the best-selling author of The Places in Between, "a flat-out masterpiece" (New York Times Book Review), an exploration of the Marches - the borderland between England and Scotland - and the people, history, and conflicts that have shaped it.
His father Brian taught Rory Stewart how to walk, and walked with him on journeys from Iran to Malaysia. Now they have chosen to do their final walk together along 'the Marches' - the frontier that divides their two countries, Scotland and England.
Brian, a ninety-year-old former colonial official and intelligence officer, arrives in Newcastle from Scotland dressed in tartan and carrying a draft of his new book You Know More Chinese Than You Think. Rory comes from his home in the Lake District, carrying a Punjabi fighting stick which he used when walking across Afghanistan. On their six-hundred-mile, thirty-day journey - with Rory on foot, and his father 'ambushing' him by car - the pair relive Scottish dances, reflect on Burmese honey-bears, and on the loss of human presence in the British landscape.
On mountain ridges and in housing estates they uncover a forgotten country crushed between England and Scotland: the Middleland. They cross upland valleys which once held forgotten peoples and languages - still preserved in sixth-century lullabies and sixteenth-century ballads.
The wild places of the uplands reveal abandoned monasteries, border castles, secret military test sites and newly created wetlands. They discover unsettling modern lives, lodged in an ancient land.
Their odyssey develops into a history of nationhood, an anatomy of the landscape, a chronicle of contemporary Britain and an exuberant encounter between a father and a son. And as the journey deepens, and the end approaches, Brian and Rory fight to match, step by step, modern voices, nationalisms and contemporary settlements to the natural beauty of the Marches, and a fierce absorption in tradition in their own unconventional lives.
Details
- Format : Standard 2nd Hand Paperback
- Condition : Very Good (Almost As New)
- Category : Non-Fiction - Britain
- Published : 2017 (Mariner USA)
- ISBN : 9781328745651
- SKU : B003094
- PPC : SP400gm
- RRP : $15.99
- Quantity Available : 1 only.
External Reviews
'This is travel writing at its best.' - Katherine Norbury, The Observer.
'A bewitching book. The entrancing bond between Stewart and his father brings the book alive.' - Tristram Hunt, The Sunday Times.
'Stewart is the nearest person I have identified in real life to Rudyard Kipling's Kim, the all-seeing, all-knowing man-child of Empire. The heart of the book is about love. He is observant, gently mocking and he writes beautifully.' - The Times.
'I thought at first Rory's book was about the French political party, but blow me it is all about our native heath, plus his dad, and is one of the most original books we have had in 33 years of the prize' - Hunter Davies.
'Engaging, intelligent, and ultimately moving.' - Stuart Kelly, The Scotsman.
'Suggests an open-mindedness in Stewart, a tolerance and flexibility that could make him an exceptional politician while it also continues to define him as a writer.' - Andrew Motion, The New York Review of Books.
'Engaging, intelligent and ultimately moving in some ways, Rory Stewart resembles a Robert MacFarlane who has chosen geopolitics over metaphysics.' - Scotland on Sunday.
'He is a gift to literature.' - Sarah Sands, Evening Standard.
'Stewart has a roving, enquiring mind, which makes him on the page . . . most agreeable company. This roving, discursive book is a delight to read.' - Allan Massie, Literary Review.
The Author
Roderick James Nugent Stewart OBE FRSGS FRSL is a British academic, diplomat, author, broadcaster, former soldier and former politician. He is the president of GiveDirectly and was a visiting fellow at Yale University's Jackson Institute for Global Affairs, where he taught politics and international relations.
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