Irresistible North: From Venice to Greenland on the Trail of the Zen Brothers [Hardcover]

This is a book which touches on many themes. It is not easy to categorise. Andrea di Robilant is an historian and a journalist. In this book he interweaves the two genres. Perhaps the "Venetian Navigators" of the title also includes himself, as subject as well as author. Di Robiliant, who is half Venetian and half American, takes up the quest of the Zen explorers, suggested to him by a chance encounter with an American tourist at the Marciana Library in Venice, which piques his curiosity. A few days later, he happens to notice the Zen palace near the Campo dei Gesuiti, "embellished with Leventine motifs" and a "soot-covered plaque" dedicated to "Nicolo and Antonio Zen, wise and courageous navigators to the northern seas."
Di Robilant's previous books have all been based on his own illustrious Venetian family, and so what he sets out to explore here is, in more ways than one, uncharted waters. It is a controversial story based on a book printed in 1558 written by Nicolo Zen, which itself is based on the long-lost letters that were written by his great-great-great grandfather, one of the two Zen brothers who travelled to the North, to Orkney, the Faroes, Iceland and almost certainly as far as Greenland, though almost certainly not to North America (which was the premise of the American tourist's quest). Di Robilant meticulously unravels this extremely strange and complicated story: not only the story itself, which is intriguing enough, but the story of the story, which was a hugely influential book when it was first published and for centuries later (in fact, it figures in di Robilant's previous book "Lucia in the Age of Napoleon" when his heroine's son is constantly pestering his mother to send him a copy of this Zen book that he is obsessed with), until it was denounced as "a tissue of fiction" in the 1835 spring edition of the Royal Geographical Society journal that destroyed the reputation of the Zens. Di Robilant seems to take this almost personally, and rises to the unenviable challenge of defending the Zens' tattered reputation from calumny and almost universal derision from every scholarly source.
The magnificent achievement here is that, although no detail is left out, it is a light-hearted book, and fun and amusing to read. It is almost like a thriller, which one cannot put down because, unlike history which one already knows, at least vaguely, here there is no knowing how it is all going to turn out. There is much discussion of the elusive and intriguing character, Zichmni, assumed to be the Scottish knight Henry Sinclair, Earl of Orkney and vassal to the King of Norway, with whom di Robilant believes the Zen brothers joined forces in their explorations and adventures. Di Robilant travels himself to these remote places, giving the sense that now, as ever, explorers from Venice are thrilled to discover that there are other remote and improbable islands in the world which no one knows much about. A Venetian who ventures to these places cannot fail to find kindred spirits. And there is also something apt in the sense that emerges, which is what ultimately gives the whole Zen story credence, that exploration is not primarily about arriving at an intended goal, and from a certain perspective can be considered completely pointless. This book is the perfect illustration of the aphorism that the point of a journey is not to arrive, but the journey itself.

A `curious map' published by a 16th century Venetian at the back of a book he wrote is, in a sense, what drives the fascinating narrative of "Venetian Navigators". The old Venetian book was about voyages made by the author's ancestors in the late 14th century to the Far North, and the map, constructed on the basis of surviving fragments of their accounts, offered much new information about that part of the world. As nations competed to expand their empires, sending out explorers and keeping secret their findings, the map and the narrative of the voyage upon which it was constructed stirred up intense international rivalries. Some, like Queen Elizabeth I of England and her most learned advisor John Dee, looked upon the map and narrative as auspicious to expansionist endeavors. Later, others, with rival political agendas, would denounce the narrative as `a tissue of lies'. In the meantime, that map went on to play a prominent role in the history of map making and in particular in the way the icy waters and land masses of the North Atlantic were perceived to be configured for a very long time. Di Robilant traces over two hundred years of political schemings and international rifts that together the map and book stirred up.

Di Robilant happened upon the subject of his book quite a chance, and found himself, unaware, drawn into its mysteries. This was not a book he had been planning to write. His curiosity to investigate the claims made by those early modern Venetians, including their having reached the Americas a century before Columbus, led him on his own explorations northward into wondrously remote places. It is truly a pleasure to follow him on his own journeys and share his thoughts and scrupulous research as he gathers and pieces together his evidence like the best of sleuths.

Historian, detective, explorer, di Robilant weaves his research, evidence and personal experiences together with a neat, refreshing and often playful prose.

I had no idea how intriguing navigation narratives, cartography and the territorial rivalries of the Far North could be!

Andea Di Robilant happened upon a map and a cornerstone in Venice. The map was drawn by Nicolo Zen, who in 1558 published a narrative based on letters of two of his ancestors who went off course in a 1383 trading trip to Flanders. The cornerstone was on an aging building (shown on p. 192) on the Palazzo Zen, the Zen family mansion in Venice. As an historian, Di Robilard's interest was piqued and he set about his own voyage of discovery.

Antonio and Nicolo Zen may have traveled to what is now Orkney, the Faroes, Iceland and Greenland. They may have reached Newfoundland too, over 100 years before Columbus reached the "new world". While the book of their travels by their brother's descendant, "Nicolo the Younger", was a sensation at its publication and had an impact on future generations, its authenticity has faced and faces continuous challenges. In the intro to the Bibliography, Di Robilant writes, "The story of the Zen voyages has generated enough books and articles over the past four and a half centuries to fill a small library."

In his search for the truth, Di Robilant went to see some of the places the Zen brothers allegedly visited in the 1380's. He met people, who to this day, have strong opinions about the truth or falsity of the Zen voyage accounts. In finding and visiting the sites described by Zen, such as the monasteries and the smoking mountain, Di Robilant gives the reader a travelogue of places and a description of people who live well off the beaten path.

Through the interesting portraits of the Zens of the 1380's, Nicolo Zen of the 1500's, and Fracnesco Marcolini, the book's publisher, you learn a lot about Venice of the time. Through the portrait of Henry Sinclair, a Scottish vassal in service to the King of Norway, said to have traveled with the Zens 1380's, you learn something of Scotland as part of Norway and that Sinclair may have explored the coast of what is now New England. Another portrait of the times is seen through John Dee, an astrologer to Queen Elizabeth who arranged investors for Martin Frobisher's search for a "Northwest Passage" based on the Zen accounts.

In describing his visits to libraries and his chats with historians, Di Robilant presents the little discussed history of this remote part of the world. Especially interesting to me was the role of Greenland as a trading link between North America and Europe. Greenland imported its timber from Norway, but the exports are more varied. Boats of that time could get to what is now Canada in a 12 day voyage and goods could be brought to Greenland for export. Exotic luxury goods such as walrus tusks, polar bear and Arctic fox furs, white falcons, caribou meat, seal skins and wool spun by the Greenland women were shipped to Europe. With this background, it is not surprising that in his voyages of the 1530's to what is now Newfoundland, Jaques Cartier notes that the native people recognize words in a number of European languages.

I chose this because the author's other two other books A Venetian Affair: A True Tale of Forbidden Love in the 18th Century and Lucia: A Venetian Life in the Age of Napoleon about Di Robilant's Venetian ancestors were page turners and was not disappointed. Di Robilant has a talent for great writing and I will read whatever he publishes next.