Flight to Arras (Penguin Modern Classics) (Paperback)

'Flight to Arrass' is an account of a reconnaisance flight over occupied France, probably based on his personal experience, first at high altitude, then lethally low. In this extraordinary pilot-writer's mind, potential sudden death becomes transmuted into a magical account of memories which provide beauty, humour and wisdom, and his extraordinary ability as a writer puts you in the pilot's seat as you have never been before. You live with him the peril of being there, and you enter the wonderful world of his mentality in his detached response to terror and imminent abrupt extinction. All his books give you immediate access to a world of experiences which you otherwise will never meet, seen through eyes of unique maturity and intelligence.

Listen: in the same way that flowers are their own best advertisement, St. Ex's books are their own best recommendation. For me, 'Flight to Arrass' is one of his best... You owe yourself contact with this better example of humanity. The work of the translator in the case of St. Ex. is also as near perfection as you will find - A pleasure to read. If you have not read any of his books, then you are fortunate; this magical world as seen through his eyes is waiting all fresh for your discovery. Don't wait. Buy it now. I recommend it to you.

To read this book is to understand two things: how the view of the pilot can increase his sympathy rather than his detachment, and what the collapse of France was like. How a country with rough parity of equipment and forces could be so quickly defeated by a neighbour is a matter for military historians, but as for what it was like to be on the losing side, I can not think of a better account.

He was said to be a terrible pilot, and intellectuals will pooh-pooh his 'metaphysics'. Forget that. When he disappeared, flying reconnaisance over the Med. during the war, we more normal mortals lost a marvellous example of how fine humans can be when given the chance, and humanity lost one of its graces. He was only forty or so, and had he lived he would have been recognised as one of the greats both of literature and of cultivated thought. As it is we have only these few little jewels of books by which we can appreciate his qualities and perhaps realise that we, too, can be so much better than we are.

'Flight to Arrass' is an account of a reconnaisance flight over occupied France, probably based on his personal experience, first at high altitude, then lethally low. In this extraordinary pilot-writer's mind, potential sudden death becomes transmuted into a magical account of memories which provide beauty, humour and wisdom, and his extraordinary ability as a writer puts you in the pilot's seat as you have never been before. You live with him the peril of being there, and you enter the wonderful world of his mentality in his detached response to terror and imminent abrupt extinction. All his books give you immediate access to a world of experiences which you otherwise will never meet, seen through eyes of maturity and intelligence.

Listen, in the same way that flowers are their own best advertisement, St. Ex's books are their own best recommendation. For me, 'Flight to Arrass' is one of his best, and it will cost you less than a cheap lunch. You owe yourself contact with this better example of humanity. The work of the translator in the case of St. Ex. is also as near perfection as you will find. If you have not read any of his books, then lucky you, in that this magical world as seen through his eyes is waiting all fresh for your discovery. Don't wait. Buy it. I recommend it to you.