William Dalrymple

In Xanadu: A Quest (Text Only)

Notify me when the book’s added
To read this book, upload an EPUB or FB2 file to Bookmate. How do I upload a book?
One of the most successful, influential and acclaimed travel books of recent years from the author of ‘Return of a King’, which has been shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson prize.
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.
This book is currently unavailable
364 printed pages
Publication year
2012
Have you already read it? How did you like it?
👍👎

Quotes

  • Rinku Hiranhas quoted4 years ago
    The priggish Muslim traveller Ibn Jubayr was a particularly fierce critic. ‘Its roads are choked by the press of men, so it is hard to put foot to ground,’ he wrote. ‘Unbelief and unpiousness there burn fiercely, and Pigs [Christians] and crosses abound. It stinks and is filthy, being full of refuse and excrement.’
  • Rinku Hiranhas quoted4 years ago
    The Israeli woman next to me pointed it out proudly. ‘Look,’ she said. ‘We have everything!’ Not wishing to give offence I nodded. But I thought: No. You’ve taken the oldest country in the world, one of the great centres of civilization, a kind of paradise – and you’ve turned it into suburbia.
  • Rinku Hiranhas quoted4 years ago
    ‘ … my cousin speaks better Hebrew than I do it’s kinda intimidating he went on a kibbutz and worked with chickens … there are six major cities I gotta see my interests are very diverse … look Burger Ranch well fancy that burgers in Israel … home is a big air force base East Coast absolutely gorgeous my boyfriend Rob he’s graduating in statistics wants me to get a lot out of this … I guess I could do it but I’d prefer not to enough problems I have allergies neuroses I’m a vegetarian I could really use a sterile environment my analyst childhood problems some long name for it cruise long holiday … Rob and I difficult time this girl in the statistics department we will work it out … I’m very curious links Zen Buddhism Jewish mysticism kibbutznik philosophy …’

On the bookshelves

fb2epub
Drag & drop your files (not more than 5 at once)