A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush

Product Information

Newby and Carless try to acclimatise to the altitude with a practice walk. They visit the Foreign Ministry, hire an Afghan cook, and buy a "very short" list of supplies. Newby describes the geography of Nuristan "walled in on every side by the most formidable mountains" and a little history, with the legend of descent from Alexander the Great, the British imperial adventures, and pre-war German expeditions. [14] I’m only adding this note because I recently re-encountered that wonderful incident Newby tells against himself where they happen to meet Wilfred Thesiger, the legendary solo explorer of the Middle East; and I’d recently read in Among the Mountains that Thesiger wrote of the same incident (and how very English for the two to meet like that!) urn:lcp:shortwalkinhindu00newb:epub:99851117-9bc1-45e4-860e-bfacc8f7ce0a Foldoutcount 0 Identifier shortwalkinhindu00newb Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t76t1q20t Ocr_converted abbyy-to-hocr 1.1.20 Ocr_module_version 0.0.17 Openlibrary_edition Topsy Turvy. I started off not really liking the two main protagonists - they came across as a couple of English upper class twits who think nothing of buying a car and driving it to Tehran. Hardly the norm in 1950s Britain. But, slowly Eric's self-deprecating humour and the warmth he shows to the rest of his party won me over. The book comes with a sketchy map, hand-drawn by the author, on which the reader can follow a dotted line marking Newby's route. The map, indeed the entire trek, brings to mind Frodo's quest in Lord of the Rings. Although no orcs or dwarves come bounding out of any of the many caves Newby and Carless pass, their adventure is odd enough, and divorced enough from how we picture the world of 1956, that we would hardly have been surprised. Newby even happens upon a faded inscription carved into stone in an unknown tongue -- strangely reminiscent of Tolkien's elvish runes.

FROM MY BLOG) By 1956, Eric Newby had devoted ten years of his life to working as a dress buyer for a London fashion house. Then one day, he received a telegram from Hugh Carless, a casual friend, asking "CAN YOU TRAVEL NURISTAN JUNE?" The witty narrative that is the first chapter had this reviewer enthralled and with that I was looking for words that were to describe my thoughts as to the magnificent adventure that Newby tells us. About how he and Carless do what to me is the unthinkable, walk to and then climb a mountain in a place that few Europeans had ever ventured at the time, the Hindu Kush.

My Book Notes

a b c Frater, Alexander (29 October 2006). "Eric Newby | 'I remember the hum of excitement he created' ". The Guardian . Retrieved 20 February 2018. Notable addition to the literature of unorthodox travel ... tough, extrovert, humorous and immensely literate' Times Literary Supplement It was during his time at the Observer that Newby became an expert photographer, often with the help and advice of exasperated picture editors. He left the paper in 1973 to produce The World Atlas of Exploration (1975), on terms that were alleged to put him on a secure financial footing for good. Subsequently, he published books in swift succession, often going over the same ground; in 1973 he brought out two within months. The spring of rich, fruity prose seemed inexhaustible. Wanda, a splendid homemaker who stood little, if any, nonsense, saw to his creature comforts, finally settling him down, spectacularly well-fed, in a lovely house in Surrey. Newby and Carless climb 2,000 feet out of the valley to reach Arayu village. At Warna they rest by a waterfall with mulberry trees. They walk on, Newby dreaming of cool drinks and hot baths. They struggle on over a high cold pass. The last village of Nuristan, Achagaur, is peopled by Rajputs who claim to come from Arabia. They reach the top of the Arayu pass [27] and cheerfully descend on the far side. They meet the explorer and author of Arabian Sands, Wilfred Thesiger, who is disgusted by their air-beds and calls them "a couple of pansies". [28] [29] Reception [ edit ] The book definitely has its humorous moments. He quotes from his Bashgali(Kafir) phrasebook, which turned out to be of questionable usefulness.

Easy, moderate, difficult, very difficult, severe, very severe, exceptionally severe, and excessively severe.”The first embarrassing reality he has to deal with is that Carless may be an obsessive wonder in outfitting their expedition but he has exaggerated his skills in mountain climbing based on a brief excursion to Nuristan when he was with the Kabul embassy. They have to take a detour to Wales for a crash hands-on education led by a trainer they hire and supplemented by peer guidance from a zany pair of intrepid college-age women climbers. It was lots of fun to experience them learning the arts of rappelling and belaying, but we can only shake our heads over their inadequate preparation in mastery of glacier hopping in spikes or in carving ice stairs. After completing a milestone Newby asks the instructor on its difficulty rating: A classic of travel writing, ‘A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush’ is Eric Newby’s iconic account of his journey through one of the most remote and beautiful wildernesses on earth. Access-restricted-item true Addeddate 2010-03-01 17:23:28 Boxid IA108921 Call number 3743049 Camera Canon EOS 5D Mark II Donor I had searched the internet for the best travel book ever and this book showed up on almost every list. How good can a book about two guy hiking up a mountain be? Well, I found out; fantastic, mind blowing great.

urn:lcp:shortwalkinhindu00eric_0:epub:61fcce03-2a36-495b-8adb-914566f30566 Extramarc OhioLINK Library Catalog Foldoutcount 0 Identifier shortwalkinhindu00eric_0 Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t8v99cm1c Isbn 0140095756 The travel writer John Pilkington stated that the book had been an early inspiration in his life, and wrote of Newby that "He had an understated, self-deprecating sense of humour which was very British – perfect travel writing." [35] Michael Shapiro, interviewing Newby for Travelers' Tales, called the book "a classic piece of old-school British exploration, and established Newby's trademark self-deprecating wry humor" [36] and included it in WorldHum's list of favourite travel books. [37] Boyd Tonkin, writing in The Independent, called the book a "classic trek", and commented that while it is told light-heartedly, Newby, despite his comic gift, always retained his "capacity for wonderment". [38] Newby meets the explorer and travel writer Wilfred Thesiger, at the end of the book. Painting by Anthony Devas, 1944Newby begins with an anecdotal description of his frustration with life in the fashion business in London, and how he came to leave it. Critics such as the travel writer Alexander Frater have noted that while the book is held in extremely high esteem, [b] and is enjoyably comic, [30] [31] it is not nearly as well-written as his later autobiographical book, Love and War in the Apennines (1971), a judgement in which Newby concurred. [29] [32] [33] [34] I still think the last few sentences of “A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush” the funniest ending to any book I have read' Geoffrey Moorhouse, The Times