Travel Blog: Life of a Travel Writer
Bill Bryson Becomes Made Man in Britain
by Michael Yessis | 12.14.06 | 8:33 AM ET
The author of much-loved travel books A Walk in the Woods, In a Sunburned Country and others has been made an honorary Order of the British Empire. Congrats, Bill. No word on whether Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell will also be honoring Katz.
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Yahoo! Buzz‘Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance’ Author’s ‘Last’ Interview
by Jim Benning | 11.29.06 | 4:23 PM ET
The reclusive Robert Pirsig, author of classic philosophy-travel tome Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, recently gave what he said was his final interview. Tim Adams’s compelling story in the Guardian, based on the interview, covers some tragic ground, from Pirsig’s struggle with depression to the death of his son. “When the book came out, in 1974, edited down from 800,000 words, and having been turned down by 121 publishers, it seemed immediately to catch the need of the time,” Adams writes. “George Steiner in the New Yorker likened it to Moby Dick. Robert Redford tried to buy the film rights (Pirsig refused). It has since taken on a life of its own, and though parts feel dated, its quest for meaning still seems urgent. For Pirsig, however, it has become a tragic book in some ways.”
Eric Newby, One of the Last of the ‘Fearless English Gentlemen-Adventurers’
by Jim Benning | 10.30.06 | 1:26 PM ET
That’s how Pico Iyer recently described Newby, the author of “A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush,” who died earlier this month at the age of 86. Michael Shapiro recalled the author’s life in Sunday’s San Francisco Chronicle. In an e-mail, Iyer told Shapiro: “Newby was one of the last of that dazzling generation of fearless English gentlemen-adventurers distinguished by Norman Lewis, Wilfred Thesiger and Patrick Leigh Fermor, the kind who could toss off a walk across Afghanistan as easily as a journey to the corner shop and who in their travels remind us how small are the distances between Englishman and Bedouin. What made Newby so wonderful and distinctive was that he often seemed to be traveling in spite of himself, less professional explorer than professional Everyman.” Earlier this year, Shapiro sang the praises of Newby’s “A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush” for our list of the top 30 travel books of all time.
Related on World Hum:
* NPR Remembers Eric Newby
* Rory MacLean Remembers Eric Newby
* R.I.P. Eric Newby
‘Expats’ in Busan: Rolf Potts in South Korea
by Jim Benning | 10.25.06 | 7:18 AM ET
Rolf Potts is filing stories from South Korea for Slate this week. His first dispatch came from the port city of Busan, where he attended a film festival. “I am here because I worked in Busan as an English teacher in the late ‘90s, and Korean-born U.S. director Wonsuk Chin has written a screenplay about this experience, titled ‘Expats,’” Potts writes. “Since Chin is at the festival, meeting with possible financiers for his film, I’ve made plans to see him this afternoon at the Grand Hotel.” It turns out Chin was inspired, at least in part, by a story Potts wrote years ago for Salon.
NPR Remembers Eric Newby
by Jim Benning | 10.24.06 | 7:37 PM ET
All Things Considered aired a terrific interview this afternoon with Wanda Newby, wife of the famed travel writer, who died Friday at the age of 86.
Rory MacLean Remembers Eric Newby
by Michael Yessis | 10.24.06 | 6:38 AM ET
R.I.P. Eric Newby
by Michael Yessis | 10.22.06 | 5:43 PM ET
Eric Newby, author of the classic travel book “A Short Walk In The Hindu Kush” and other works, passed away of natural causes Friday evening in Southern England. He was 86, and lived an adventurous life.
Readings by World Hum Contributors
by Jim Benning | 10.16.06 | 2:42 PM ET
Two of our esteemed contributors will be out and about in the coming days and weeks doing readings. World Hum books editor Frank Bures will be appearing at the Wisconsin Book Festival in Madison on Friday. He’ll be reading his story from the new Travelers’ Tales collection What Color is Your Jockstrap? Funny Men and Women Write from the Road. Meanwhile, contributor Jeff Biggers will be doing readings from St. Louis to Los Angeles and beyond in support of his new memoir, In the Sierra Madre, which is based on a year he spent with the Tarahumara in Mexico’s Copper Canyon. For a list of all his appearances, click “Continue reading.”
From Our Own Correspondent: An Appreciation
by Frank Bures | 10.12.06 | 6:15 AM ET
Late last month, the BBC’s Andrew Harding ate at an unusual restaurant in Beijing. He reported back to the Beeb for the show that is one of my favorites anywhere, and a real gem for many of us who love good, vivid travel writing: From Our Own Correspondent. As Harding sat in the restaurant, he stared at the the grey and shiny food on his plate:
R.I.P. R.W. Apple
by Michael Yessis | 10.05.06 | 3:30 AM ET
Legendary New York Times journalist R.W. “Johnny” Apple passed away yesterday from complications of thoracic cancer. Apple, who made his name as a hard-hitting newsman, wrote mostly food and travel stories in recent years. Times editor Bill Keller wrote in a note to his staff that Apple wrote his last story for the Times—this story about 10 restaurants abroad worth boarding a plane to visit—from his sickbed.
Culture Shock and the Meaning of Pain
by Jim Benning | 10.03.06 | 6:20 PM ET
If you see a motorist on the Florida highways leaning on the horn like a driver in Ho Chi Minh City, or searching for shops curiously advertising “pain,” or trying to bribe a state trooper as though he were a Balinese cop, look closely. It’s probably World Hum contributing editor Terry Ward. On Sunday, in her South Florida Sun-Sentinel travel column, she explored the culture shock she experiences upon returning home from trips abroad. Ward has some amusing anecdotes. “Last year, the day after I returned from a summer in France, I found myself eagerly turning into the parking lot of a chiropractor’s office after spotting a large sign labeled ‘Pain?’ Yeah, I wanted some pain. I could almost smell the pain au chocolat baking, flaking off in sweet papery layers. My brain, still stuck overseas, had misread the sign as the French word for ‘bread.’” That’s rough, Terry. As a fellow pain-lover, I feel your pain.
Video: Neil Peart on “Roadshow”
by Michael Yessis | 10.03.06 | 6:29 AM ET
Neil Peart, drummer for the Canadian trio Rush and author of the current best-selling travel book on Amazon, Roadshow, consented to a rare television interview broadcast this week on that hard-hitting literary channel, VH1 Classic. The interview mostly covered his book and his travels, and has already been YouTubed. See it below.
Happy Birthday Jan Morris
by Jim Benning | 10.02.06 | 3:44 PM ET
The prolific author, who has written often about her travels, turns 80 today. The Guardian pays tribute: “[S]he is one of the great pioneers of modern travel writing, displaying quirkiness, cultural curiosity and evocation in her essays and books.” Morris’s Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere made World Hum’s list of the all-time Top 30 Travel Books.
Profiling Lonely Planet’s Tony Wheeler
by Jim Benning | 10.02.06 | 3:11 PM ET
Linda Watanabe McFerrin profiles the guidebook publisher in Sunday’s San Francisco Chronicle. One interesting tidbit in the story I don’t recall coming across before: Lonely Planet guidebooks, she writes, “have been used to plan rebellions and successfully depose dictators. According to Reuters correspondent Aidan Hartley (in his book ‘The Zanzibar Chest’), Ethiopian rebels informed advance troops with a map of Addis Ababa torn hastily from his copy of Lonely Planet’s ‘Africa on a Shoestring’ when they overthrew the Mengistu dictatorship.” Perhaps there’s another guidebook to be done: “African Coups on a Shoestring.”
Related on World Hum: When You’ve Launched a Guidebook Company Celebrating Bohemian Charm, Should You Fly Business Class?
Seven Travel Stories to Tell Before You Die
by Jim Benning | 10.02.06 | 6:43 AM ET
I’ve never been too enamored of the 1,000 Places to See Before You Die approach to travel—or at least the approach that the title of the book suggests. Among other things, it emphasizes quantity over quality. But the San Francisco Chronicle’s John Flinn has offered a modest alternative checklist that I can get behind: seven travel stories you should be able to tell before you die. It puts the emphasis where it belongs, I think: on experiences and stories. Flinn just concluded a series of columns exploring the seven stories he believes are essential for every traveler, and he recounted his own version of each. “Go ahead and visit every one of those ‘1000 Places to See Before You Die,’ as catalogued in the best-selling book,” he wrote. “But spare your friends the description of the Taj Mahal. Yes, it’s beautiful. And, yes, of course, the Great Barrier Reef is awesome. Everybody knows this. And we don’t need to hear about the seventh hole at Pebble Beach. What we want to hear are stories.”
