-
Seasonal Offer:
This title is part of our Seasonal Offers promotion.
A Time of Gifts
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in A Time of Gifts: On Foot to Constantinople - From the Hook of Holland to the Middle Danube for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Special Offers and Product Promotions
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Review
' Nothing short of a masterpiece' (Jan Morris )
'A treasure chest of descriptive writing' (Spectator )
'Not only is the journey one of physical adventure but of cultural awakening. Architecture, art, genealogy, quirks of history and language are all devoured - and here passed on - with a gusto uniquely his' (Colin Thubron, Sunday Telegraph )
'Every page of this book is distinguished by an image, a metaphor, a flash of humour always original and sometimes as incisive as a laser beam.' (Vincent Cronin )
'A tremendous journey ... and he's fabulous company' (Manchester Evening News )
' This is a traveller's tale at its infectious and informative best; vividly remembered and beautifully written' (Church Times )
'John Murray is doing the decent thing and reissuing all of Leigh Fermor's main books ... But what else would you expect from a publisher whose commitment to geography is such that for more than two centuries it has widened our understanding of the world?' (Geographical Magazine )
'Rightly considered to be among the most beautiful travel books in the language' (Independent )
'Bringing the landscape alive as no other writer can, he uses his profound and eclectic understanding of cultures and peoples ... to paint vivid pictures - nobody has illuminated the geography of Europe better' (Geographical Magazine )
'A treasure chest of descriptive writing' (Spectator )
'Not only is the journey one of physical adventure but of cultural awakening. Architecture, art, genealogy, quirks of history and language are all devoured - and here passed on - with a gusto uniquely his' (Colin Thubron, Sunday Telegraph )
'Every page of this book is distinguished by an image, a metaphor, a flash of humour always original and sometimes as incisive as a laser beam.' (Vincent Cronin )
'A tremendous journey ... and he's fabulous company' (Manchester Evening News )
' This is a traveller's tale at its infectious and informative best; vividly remembered and beautifully written' (Church Times )
'John Murray is doing the decent thing and reissuing all of Leigh Fermor's main books ... But what else would you expect from a publisher whose commitment to geography is such that for more than two centuries it has widened our understanding of the world?' (Geographical Magazine )
'Rightly considered to be among the most beautiful travel books in the language' (Independent )
'Bringing the landscape alive as no other writer can, he uses his profound and eclectic understanding of cultures and peoples ... to paint vivid pictures - nobody has illuminated the geography of Europe better' (Geographical Magazine )
Spectator
'A treasure chest of descriptive writing'
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
At first I had trouble adjusting to Leigh Fermor's extremely descriptive style. He furnishes his writing with rarely-used words and is happy to hold up the story for pages while he sidetracks us with art historical or architectural speculations. However, his charm and learning prove irresistible. This is an unforgettable book.
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I bought this book on the strength of the reviews having stumbled across it on one of my Amazon rambles and I am very glad that I did. I am giving it 5 stars and my own review as I wanted to join the already substantial voices that praise this book.
The lyrical prose that Leigh Fermor uses deftly draws us into this almost magical Europe. He summons up images from a bygone era without once touching on cliche or the sometimes pedestrian descriptions often found in travelogues. Following him from the ice-bound canals of the polders of the Netherlands, down the castle strewn Rhine and across the snowy mountains and woods of Bavaria and Austria we are introduced to a range of fascinating characters and lost customs. Tableaus of Breughelesqe scenes in tankard-filled inns or moonlit trudges across a starlit landscape come alive in his skilled hands.
Clearly an incredibly talented linguist, observant social anthropologist and knowledgeable individual he uses his talents liberally to describe and illuminate Europe in the early 1930's. The fact that it was written with the benefit of hindsight adds to the book's rich detail rather than detracting from it.
The lyrical prose that Leigh Fermor uses deftly draws us into this almost magical Europe. He summons up images from a bygone era without once touching on cliche or the sometimes pedestrian descriptions often found in travelogues. Following him from the ice-bound canals of the polders of the Netherlands, down the castle strewn Rhine and across the snowy mountains and woods of Bavaria and Austria we are introduced to a range of fascinating characters and lost customs. Tableaus of Breughelesqe scenes in tankard-filled inns or moonlit trudges across a starlit landscape come alive in his skilled hands.
Clearly an incredibly talented linguist, observant social anthropologist and knowledgeable individual he uses his talents liberally to describe and illuminate Europe in the early 1930's. The fact that it was written with the benefit of hindsight adds to the book's rich detail rather than detracting from it.
36 of 38 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Leigh Fermor's great classic is extraordinary. His language is immensely beautiful, but I beleive that the secret to understand the book is that he is actually painting pictures with words. There are some great set pieces: the walk in Holland, breakfast in Rottterdam, the cold, the chateau life he began to lead after Munich. He is a polymath and the book is not really travel literature at all, or if it is, it is of a totally different order to anything I have ever read. Will Leigh Fermor write the promised third part of the great trilogy?
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
A gem of a book
If you haven't read this book, you are missing a gem. Written up years after the original journey; it is an eclectic snapshot not just of Germany just after Hitler had come to... Read more
Published 2 months ago by Steve W
Tired feet but wonderful prose.
Patrick Leigh Fermor's book recounting the first part of his walk from Rotterdam to Constantinople is a wonderful word portrait of the places and peoples he encountered on his... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Edicarian
Traveller's tales
A Time of Gifts is a most absorbing book. Patrick Leigh Fermor tells an excellent story, vividly described. Read more
Published 3 months ago by S. M. Pettit
Delightful
Having been fascinated by the personality of this auhtor for along time, this was in fact my first experience of reading any of his books. Read more
Published 3 months ago by hansdane
A Time of Gifts: On Foot to Constantinople - From the Hook of Holland...
Although I've just bought my kindle copy of "A Time Of Gifts", because I have a much enjoyed hardback copy which over the years I've enjoyed dipping-into, I really didn't need to... Read more
Published 4 months ago by C. ANTJOULE
Travel in the Thirties
Reading a Time of Gifts was like enjoying a magical mystery tour of Europe. A walking tour from the Hook of Holland to Vienna. The prose is truly magnificent. Read more
Published 5 months ago by Marco Polo
"Pleasure is spread through the earth
In stray gifts to be claimed by whoever shall find."
The opening line of William Wordsworth's "Stray Pleasures" captures accurately Patrick Leigh Fermor's "A Time of... Read more
The opening line of William Wordsworth's "Stray Pleasures" captures accurately Patrick Leigh Fermor's "A Time of... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Leonard Fleisig
A Wonderful Book
A fantastic and scholarly journey through pre-war Germany, Austria and Hungary. One of the great travel books, written 30 years later and based on the travel journals of an 18... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Retired Salesman
A gift from time
If you fancy an easy, mindless holiday read, look elsewhere.
This isn`t one to be read in the queue at Heathrow, but find a comfortable armchair in a quiet, well lit... Read more
This isn`t one to be read in the queue at Heathrow, but find a comfortable armchair in a quiet, well lit... Read more
Published 9 months ago by Dave Wilcock
Lost track of the number of times i've read this.
I don't know how many times I've read "A Time of Gifts"and it's sequel "Between the Woods and the Water"but both are little short of masterpieces of travel writing covering all... Read more
Published 9 months ago by eoinrob
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
