A Merry Dance Around the World

Description

A collection of writing from Britain's best-loved travel writer, 'A Merry Dance around the World' is the culmination of a lifetime of adventure. Covering everything from the birth of Eric Newby in 1919 at the 'ghastly hour' of 3.45am, to Herculean cycling escapades in his seventies through the wiles of the Irish winter, this is an astonishing catalogue of disasters and misunderstandings. Newby's compassionate grace and sharp wit ensure that every adventure is as charming, hilarious and wild as his last. Including extracts from his masterpiece of love and courage in wartime, 'Love and War in the Apennines', travelling epiphanies against the breathtaking backdrop of 'A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush' and the memorable excursions of the long-suffering and truly heroic Wanda Newby on bikes, in boats and planning daring prison escapes. A brilliant introduction for any Newby newcomer, or handy collection for the intrepid Newby veteran traveller, 'A Merry Dance around the World' is a whirlwind tour around the globe, guided by the forefather of the modern comic travel book.

Eric Newby was born in London in 1919 and educated at St Paul's School. In 1938 he joined the four-masted Finnish barque Moshulu as an apprentice and sailed in the last Grain Race from Australia to Europe by way of Cape Horn. During World War II he served in the Special Boat Service, and was awarded the Military Cross in 1945. He was a prisoner of war in Italy from 1942-5, and it was during this time that he met Wanda, his beloved wife and travelling companion of many years. Following the war he spent ten years as a commercial traveller in the rag trade and in a London couture house and then resumed his independent travelling career when he decided to take a short walk in the Hindu Kush. For many years he was travel editor of the Observer. He was the author of a number of bestselling travel books, including Slowly Down the Ganges, A Small Place in Italy, Departures and Arrivals, and two books of photographs: What the Traveller Saw and Around the World in Eighty Years. He was made CBE in 1994. Eric Newby died in October 2006.

'Newby is an incomparable, shrewd and witty travel writer ... Immensely enjoyable' John Mortimer, Mail on Sunday 'Newby has quite rightly established himself as one of the sharpest, funniest and most boisterously entertaining of all travel writers' Sunday Telegraph 'Cost me a lot of sleep because it was too enjoyable to put down' Peter Lewis, Daily Mail 'Still holds the laurels as the country's wittiest travel writer. A Merry Dance Around the World is a collection of all the master's best traveller's tales from a lifetime's travel writing. It is an astonishing catalogue of disasters and misunderstandings, but it had me laughing so uncontrollably, my wife eventually forbade me from reading it in public' Sunday Times 'In the increasingly popular realm of travel writing, Eric Newby has acquired Homeric status . . . The extract from Love and War in the Apennines, arguably one of the best travel books ever written, shows Eric Newby at his most scintillating, and the chapter from A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush includes the most luminous moment in modern travelling history' Daily Telegraph 'Whatever Eric Newby writes, I read with uncritical pleasure. The Newby travels are classics of their time' Financial Times 'Keeping up with Eric Newby, every breathless puff and pant of it, is worth it all the way. His vitality, which was always more than most people's, gets bigger and his writing richer and funnier' Observer 'Compassionate and hilarious' Independent on Sunday 'Wonderful stuff' Wanderlust'