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Product Description
Review
‘Brilliant’
Spectator
‘Glorious’
Patrick Leigh Fermor
‘Dalrymple is probably the best travel writer of his generation’
Daily Mail
‘The future of travel writing lies in the hands of gifted authors like Dalrymple’
Sara Wheeler, Independent
Product Description
One of the most successful, influential and acclaimed travel books of recent years.
At the age of twenty-two, William Dalrymple left his college in Cambridge to travel to the ruins of Kublai Khan’s stately pleasure dome in Xanadu. This is an account of a quest which took him and his companions across the width of Asia, along dusty, forgotten roads, through villages and cities full of unexpected hospitality and wildly improbable escapades, to Coleridge’s Xanadu itself.
At once funny and knowledgeable, In Xanadu is in the finest tradition of British travel writing. Told with an exhilarating blend of eloquence, wit, poetry and delight, it is already established as a classic of its kind.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
44 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Anachronistic fun,
By A Customer
This review is from: In Xanadu: A Quest (Flamingo) (Paperback)
This is without doubt an enormously enjoyable, witty and informative book. It is also curiously dated - William Dalrymple reads here more like a young Evelyn Waugh, or possibly Graham Greene in Travels With My Aunt, than a 19 year old at the end of the 20th century. However, each to his own: personally I still enjoyed the account, despite occasionally feeling a slight desire to shake some of the pompous Empire-builder out of him (his later books have lost some of this tendency, apart from the 'amusing native' sketches which I found rather overdone in City of Djinns). One of the features of In Xanadu that I found most endearing was the fact that Dalrymple seemed, for much of the trip, to be having a thoroughly nasty time, and wasn't afraid to lose face by telling us so ('Latakia is a hole.') - as my experience is that much travel consists of being smelly, tired and miserable it was reassuring to find that someone else shared this viewpoint too. However, Dalrymple's overwhelming talent is definitely to convey a vivid sense of the places he's been, and In Xanadu displays that in spades. Really astonishly good for a first book.
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A remarkable journey by a gifted writer,
By A Customer
This review is from: In Xanadu: A Quest (Flamingo) (Paperback)
'In Xanadu' is both highly entertaining and impeccably researched. The success of a travelogue often hinges on the likeableness of the author, and William Dalrymple is affable, down to earth and funny. The tale of his remarkable journey through Asia is enriched by his ability to bring to life historical accounts and scholarly details. He also makes some fascinating discoveries on route, and the whole book is bursting with enthusiasm. The only thing I feel lets him down is a tendency to resort to racial stereotyping and generalising, which results in some rather dubious comments - otherwise an excellent book.
29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Intelligent Fun,
This review is from: In Xanadu: A Quest (Flamingo) (Paperback)
I first discovered William Dalrymple when my aunt gave me a copy of "From The Holy Mountain" when I went to Israel, which I greatly enjoyed. So, when I spotted "In Xanadu" in a bookstore, I decided I had to read it.In Xanadu is WD's first book, and, I think, also his best. The style is slightly fresher than in his later works. The jokes seem to be more natural, and there are more of them too...a good thing, as Dalrymple has a wonderuful sense of humor, especially in the little ridiculous details of life. The book is also amazingly well researched, and I learnt an enormous amount from it.
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