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The Journey Matters: Twentieth-Century Travel in True Style
What was it really like to take the LNER's Art Deco Coronation streamliner from King's Cross to Edinburgh, to cross the Atlantic by the SS Normandie, to fly with Imperial Airways from Southampton to Singapore, to steam from Manhattan to Chicago on board the New York Central's 20th Century Limited or to dine and sleep aboard the Graf Zeppelin?
In the course of The Journey Matters, Jonathan Glancey travels from the early 1930s to the turn of the century on some of what he considers to be the most truly glamorous and romantic trips he has ever dreamed of or made in real life.
Each of the twenty journeys allows him to explore the history of routes taken, and the events - social and political - enveloping them. Each is the story of the machines that made these journeys possible, of those who shaped them and those, too, who travelled on them.
In the course of The Journey Matters, Jonathan Glancey travels from the early 1930s to the turn of the century on some of what he considers to be the most truly glamorous and romantic trips he has ever dreamed of or made in real life.
Each of the twenty journeys allows him to explore the history of routes taken, and the events - social and political - enveloping them. Each is the story of the machines that made these journeys possible, of those who shaped them and those, too, who travelled on them.
- GenresTravel
384 pages, Hardcover
Published November 7, 2019
6 people are currently reading
71 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 13, 2022
Traveling these days is more something that someone has to endure to get where you want to go as opposed to something to be enjoyed. More than a few of us pine for “the good old days”, where the journey was an amazing part of the travel experience. Until someone invents a time machine, Jonathan Glanchey’s book is the closest thing we’ll ever get to experiencing some of the greatest experiencing from a lost era of travel.
With meticulous research and a little imagination, Jonathan takes us back with him to experience some of the best travel experiences of the twentieth century, like traveling across the Atlantic on the Normandie, flying down to Rio on the airship Graf Zeppelin, flying from Southampton to Singapore by flying boat, and traveling by steam train from London to Scotland and New York to Chicago. Some of the journeys might have been more mundane in their day, such as traveling by train to a far-flung corner of Ireland or going to the outskirts of London by an original double-decker bus, but even those journeys take us to a world that has long since vanished. In more contemporary times, Jonathan shares his own real-life experiences, like traveling through Iraq prior to the overthrow of Saddam Hussein to visit ancient ruins, traveling to remote areas of Poland and China to still see steam trains at work, or taking his dog on a ferry cruise from Germany to Finland on one of the last ships to allow dogs to accompany human passengers. Each journey represents a visit to a time and place that is now out of reach, and each leaves you wondering what we lost in the name of progress.
Jonathan’s journeys, both real and imagined, are fascinating, featuring encounters with real-life characters who help us appreciate the journeys we’re taking and the conveyances that are taking us there. Jonathan manages to inform the reader without bogging him or her down in minutiae, and at the end of each piece provides an update of the fate of the place or conveyance featured.
Is getting there no longer half the fun of travel? We may never know for sure, but Jonathan Glanchey wants us a to gain a greater appreciation for making the journey - because some day, we may not be able to travel that way anymore. Recommended!
With meticulous research and a little imagination, Jonathan takes us back with him to experience some of the best travel experiences of the twentieth century, like traveling across the Atlantic on the Normandie, flying down to Rio on the airship Graf Zeppelin, flying from Southampton to Singapore by flying boat, and traveling by steam train from London to Scotland and New York to Chicago. Some of the journeys might have been more mundane in their day, such as traveling by train to a far-flung corner of Ireland or going to the outskirts of London by an original double-decker bus, but even those journeys take us to a world that has long since vanished. In more contemporary times, Jonathan shares his own real-life experiences, like traveling through Iraq prior to the overthrow of Saddam Hussein to visit ancient ruins, traveling to remote areas of Poland and China to still see steam trains at work, or taking his dog on a ferry cruise from Germany to Finland on one of the last ships to allow dogs to accompany human passengers. Each journey represents a visit to a time and place that is now out of reach, and each leaves you wondering what we lost in the name of progress.
Jonathan’s journeys, both real and imagined, are fascinating, featuring encounters with real-life characters who help us appreciate the journeys we’re taking and the conveyances that are taking us there. Jonathan manages to inform the reader without bogging him or her down in minutiae, and at the end of each piece provides an update of the fate of the place or conveyance featured.
Is getting there no longer half the fun of travel? We may never know for sure, but Jonathan Glanchey wants us a to gain a greater appreciation for making the journey - because some day, we may not be able to travel that way anymore. Recommended!
October 9, 2020
Marvelous. Jonathan Glancey recreates some classic journeys from the 1930’s onwards - Southampton to Singapore on a flying boat, the Graf Zeppelin from Frankfurt to Rio and the SS Normandie from New York to Southampton, amongst others. His fictional alter ego who undertakes these journeys is credible and informed and metamorphoses into his own journalistic self in the journeys set in the 1990’s and 2000’s. For the steam and car enthusiast this has plenty of technical detail, for those of us who aren’t, it’s not too much of a distraction. In a time where we can’t travel, this is a wonderful escape.
April 14, 2020
A wonderful book to read while 'travelling by armchair' (which is my term for what I do while reading books about travel- all rights reserved:-) ). A wonderful description of travel and history- although I did keep expecting either Hercule Poirot or Captain Hastings to invite me to join them for dinner in the dining car, or to be asked by Miss Marple to join her for tea. I would definitely recommend this and I would definitely read more like it. More please!
January 7, 2025
Abandoned on page 80 of 370. I had high hopes for this book but it was too much train spotting and not enough social history. I didn’t feel like I got a flavour of what the journeys would be like. Also the whole pretence that the author is making the journeys just didn’t work for me.
November 1, 2021
Stopped reading after two chapters- seemed more like a technical description than travel stories....
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews