- Paperback: 336 pages
- Publisher: Cyan Books and Marshall Cavendish (14 Sep 2006)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1904879934
- ISBN-13: 978-1904879930
- Product Dimensions: 21.6 x 13.8 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 504,066 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- See Complete Table of Contents
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More About the Author
Product Description
Book Description
Ali Smith finds the modern landscape still suggests the other-worldly creatures she used to read about in folk tales. Niall Griffiths laments the clumsy tributes to Dylan Thomas that cover every available surface in Laugharne. Virginia Woolf’s Orlando might seem to be standing beside you in the unchanged parkland around Knole. How does Jaspar Fforde’s alternative Swindon compare with our comparatively prosaic version? And who would have thought the M40 such a rich seam for Will Self?
Every writer contributing to this amazing tour of literary Britain continues to be inspired by the writers who lived in their region. They find, whether or not the landscape is changed, some common ground with them.
Every writer contributing to this amazing tour of literary Britain continues to be inspired by the writers who lived in their region. They find, whether or not the landscape is changed, some common ground with them.
From the Publisher
The writers covered include: Van Morrison, Paul Abbott, Alan Garner, Edward Thomas, Mary Butts, Patrick Hamilton, John Burnside, Harold Pinter, Dylan Thomas, Will Self, Julian Barnes, Robert Louis Stevenson, Hilaire Belloc, Jaspar Fforde, Keith Waterhouse, John Milton, David Lodge, Giles Smith, Major H.W. 'Bill' Tilman, Thomas Hardy, Hugh Miller, Stuart Murdoch, Charles Dickens, T.S.Eliot, F.W. Lister, George Mackay Brown, William Shakepeare, Virginia Woolf, Rev. W. Awdry and Richard Long.
The contributors include: Ali Smith, Niall Griffiths, Elise Valmorbida, Richard Clayton, Sarah McCartney, Rob Williams, John Mitchinson, Justina Hart, Robert Mighall, Tim Rich, Jonathan Holt, Rishi Dastidar, Will Awdry, Sarah Burnett, Penelope Williams, Jim Davies, Stuart Delves, Jamie Jauncey, Neil Taylor, Roger Horberry, Stephen Brown, Lorelei Mathias, Tom Wilcox, William Easton Laura Forman, John Simmons, Maja Pawinska Sims, Molly Mackey, Peter Kirby, and Richard Medrington.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
What a lovely book. The articles get across a really strong flavour of each author and place, so you end up knowing much more about 30 really interesting authors while reading 30 personal and entertaining articles. This book has inspired me to read all sorts of authors I'd never have thought of reading before, like Jasper Fforde, Alan Garner and Hilaire Belloc (look out for that, it's a great chapter).
Ali Smith writes a wonderful chapter on the folklorist and geologist Hugh Miller, who lived in Cromarty, and Niall Griffiths contributes a brilliant look at Dylan Thomas in Laugharne. There's a variety here too, so there are poets and novelists, but also pieces on the Tv writer paul Abbott who writes Shameless, Van Morrison, and Stuart Murdoch from the band Belle & Sebastian. There's also a great punky piece on being in a band in Essex. How nice to see such a breadth of writers featured, not just famous names. Even the chapters on the famous manage to take a fresh angle, so it looks at Dickens in Kent, John Milton's cottage in Buckinghamshire, and there's a witty look at modern 'Shakespeare's Stratford'. It would be lovely to see more books about literature like this.By combining the personal experiences of the writers with the works of the authors you learn a lot while being entertained and told some moving personal stories.
Ali Smith writes a wonderful chapter on the folklorist and geologist Hugh Miller, who lived in Cromarty, and Niall Griffiths contributes a brilliant look at Dylan Thomas in Laugharne. There's a variety here too, so there are poets and novelists, but also pieces on the Tv writer paul Abbott who writes Shameless, Van Morrison, and Stuart Murdoch from the band Belle & Sebastian. There's also a great punky piece on being in a band in Essex. How nice to see such a breadth of writers featured, not just famous names. Even the chapters on the famous manage to take a fresh angle, so it looks at Dickens in Kent, John Milton's cottage in Buckinghamshire, and there's a witty look at modern 'Shakespeare's Stratford'. It would be lovely to see more books about literature like this.By combining the personal experiences of the writers with the works of the authors you learn a lot while being entertained and told some moving personal stories.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I love books that take me somewhere I wasn't expecting to go. I also like personal recommendations about which authors to explore next. There are too many books to choose from (and so few of them represented in high street book shops) so it's lovely to have Penny Williams introducing me to the work of Bill Tilman (whom she met when she was ten years old) or Tim Rich make me want to order a copy of Hilaire Belloc's collected works. I'm also reading 'Lost in Music' by Giles Smith because Tom Wilcox was so passionate about it in his Common Ground chapter (which is so funny that you'd best not read it in public). As a northener moved south, I lapped up Roger Horberry's chapter on Keith Waterhouse's Billy Liar and his own poignant tale of shifting from the top England to the bottom and back again.
With each chapter you never know what you're going to discover. Some are the kind of reviews you'd expect to read in literary supplements. Others are fiction. Still more explore territory which borders on performance art. Some tell fascinating personal stories. Each one gives you something new to consider. This is a book which makes me want to see more of Britain, reducing my carbon footprint and spending all my holidays taking the train to parts of my country that I've missed so far.
Perhaps it'll even encourage you to visit Middlesbrough, once you've read the chapter on FW Lister. (I wrote that one.)
With each chapter you never know what you're going to discover. Some are the kind of reviews you'd expect to read in literary supplements. Others are fiction. Still more explore territory which borders on performance art. Some tell fascinating personal stories. Each one gives you something new to consider. This is a book which makes me want to see more of Britain, reducing my carbon footprint and spending all my holidays taking the train to parts of my country that I've missed so far.
Perhaps it'll even encourage you to visit Middlesbrough, once you've read the chapter on FW Lister. (I wrote that one.)
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