Jan Morris was a British historian, author and travel writer. Morris was educated at Lancing College, West Sussex, and Christ Church, Oxford, but is Welsh by heritage and adoption. Before 1970 Morris published under her assigned birth name, "James ", and is known particularly for the Pax Britannica trilogy, a history of the British Empire, and for portraits of cities, notably Oxford, Venice, Trieste, Hong Kong, and New York City, and also wrote about Wales, Spanish history, and culture.
In 1949 Jan Morris married Elizabeth Tuckniss, the daughter of a tea planter. Morris and Tuckniss had five children together, including the poet and musician Twm Morys. One of their children died in infancy. As Morris documented in her memoir Conundrum, she began taking oestrogens to feminise her body in 1964. In 1972, she had sex reassignment surgery in Morocco. Sex reassignment surgeon Georges Burou did the surgery, since doctors in Britain refused to allow the procedure unless Morris and Tuckniss divorced, something Morris was not prepared to do at the time. They divorced later, but remained together and later got a civil union. On May, 14th, 2008, Morris and Tuckniss remarried each other. Morris lived mostly in Wales, where her parents were from.
This book has the most breath-taking, awe-inspiring photographs for anyone to appreciate. I loved it and think it can be appreciated by anyone, especially someone who is interested in Europe and it's gorgeous countries. Five stars for sure!
This has amazing photographs. It's a large heavy book. (I got it on sale for $1). I read the descriptions under all the photographs, but skipped all the few pages introducing each section of Europe. The reason, the author was so boring with European history in the Introduction she nearly put you to sleep. So skipped all the pages of writing in the book (a few at the beginning of each section of Europe) and just stuck with the photos and their descriptions. The photos I'd give 4****, but for the text, I've got to downgrade the whole book to 3*** because her writing is just awful, dull, and boring.
The loveliest pictures. Bought it for a gift, but could not resist looking. I am glad that not everything is shrink-wrapped. Europe from the air is spectacular.