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Le Monde en passant: Journal de voyage
240pages. 23x15x2cm. Broché.
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1925
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Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews
June 12, 2017
I picked up this book at a used books store, and was intrigued by the theme of this collection of essays- travel writing in the 1920s. The book was originally published in 1925 (and the copy I picked up was printed in 1927).
Part 1 of the collection is quite interesting mainly because of the quaint nature of travelling at the time. The subsequent essays did not hold much interest for me- they seem to be mostly about art, and I skipped to the last section which too did not arouse much interest- except for a short section about Michael Faraday's travels with Humphrey Davy. Some of the observations are decidedly snobbish and I would say even racist (but that was the period when England was a colonial super power).
There are a few interesting words that I discovered- mostly that have fallen into disuse or are used much sparingly, like: philoprogenitiviness, blackamoors,diplodocus, meridional and ermetic.
There are a few notable insights and quotable sentences, sample the following:
"It is in the civilized countries where humans beings eat the most and take least exercise that cancer is most prevalent. The disease spreads with every fresh expansion of Henry Ford’s factories."
"For every traveller who has any taste of his own, the only useful guidebook will be the one that he has written himself… the personal guidebook must be the result of bitter experience. "
"Old guidebooks, so out of date as to be historical documents, make excellent travelling companions. An early Murry is a treasure. Indeed, any volume of European travels, however dull,, is interesting provided it be written before the age of railways and Ruskin."(I wish it was true about Huxley’s own collection)
"Nature worship increases in an exact ratio with distance from the Mediterranean. "
There are interesting insights into the writings of Balzac and Chekov and on how differently Joseph Conrad and Catherine Mansfield write about the characters that one encounters while travelling:
“There are fewer pleasanter diversions than to sit in cafes or restaurants, looking at one’s neighbours and listening to such scraps of their talk as are wafted across the intervening space. From their appearance, from what they say, one reconstructs in imagination the whole character, the complete life history.”
Part 1 of the collection is quite interesting mainly because of the quaint nature of travelling at the time. The subsequent essays did not hold much interest for me- they seem to be mostly about art, and I skipped to the last section which too did not arouse much interest- except for a short section about Michael Faraday's travels with Humphrey Davy. Some of the observations are decidedly snobbish and I would say even racist (but that was the period when England was a colonial super power).
There are a few interesting words that I discovered- mostly that have fallen into disuse or are used much sparingly, like: philoprogenitiviness, blackamoors,diplodocus, meridional and ermetic.
There are a few notable insights and quotable sentences, sample the following:
"It is in the civilized countries where humans beings eat the most and take least exercise that cancer is most prevalent. The disease spreads with every fresh expansion of Henry Ford’s factories."
"For every traveller who has any taste of his own, the only useful guidebook will be the one that he has written himself… the personal guidebook must be the result of bitter experience. "
"Old guidebooks, so out of date as to be historical documents, make excellent travelling companions. An early Murry is a treasure. Indeed, any volume of European travels, however dull,, is interesting provided it be written before the age of railways and Ruskin."(I wish it was true about Huxley’s own collection)
"Nature worship increases in an exact ratio with distance from the Mediterranean. "
There are interesting insights into the writings of Balzac and Chekov and on how differently Joseph Conrad and Catherine Mansfield write about the characters that one encounters while travelling:
“There are fewer pleasanter diversions than to sit in cafes or restaurants, looking at one’s neighbours and listening to such scraps of their talk as are wafted across the intervening space. From their appearance, from what they say, one reconstructs in imagination the whole character, the complete life history.”
May 10, 2010
A mixed bag of Huxleyan essays, some (but not all) on the subject of travel. The travel pieces are good when he's not trying to impress you with his knowledge of artistic esoterica - a recurrent theme, I'm sorry to say.
The non-travel essays are of even poorer quality for the most part, opinionated exegeses salted with little snippets of casual racism, class snobbery, highbrow aesthetic prejudice and other predictable but unappealing foibles of the era and class Huxley represented and wrote for. He's actually a lot better than most of his contemporaries in this regard, but the essay on popular music, in particular, is made thoroughly repulsive by his prejudice and ignorance of the subject ('negro' and Italian music are vulgarly sexual, popular music is a vulgar and trivialized derivation from 'serious' music, jazz is primitive thumping, etc.)
If you like Huxley but aren't a big fan, give this one a miss. You'll think better of him for not having read it.
If you want to read a truly fine essayist of Huxley's generation, I recommend George Orwell. And there are any number of better contemporary travel writers, from the obvious (Graham Greene) to the exotic (Robert Byron).
The non-travel essays are of even poorer quality for the most part, opinionated exegeses salted with little snippets of casual racism, class snobbery, highbrow aesthetic prejudice and other predictable but unappealing foibles of the era and class Huxley represented and wrote for. He's actually a lot better than most of his contemporaries in this regard, but the essay on popular music, in particular, is made thoroughly repulsive by his prejudice and ignorance of the subject ('negro' and Italian music are vulgarly sexual, popular music is a vulgar and trivialized derivation from 'serious' music, jazz is primitive thumping, etc.)
If you like Huxley but aren't a big fan, give this one a miss. You'll think better of him for not having read it.
If you want to read a truly fine essayist of Huxley's generation, I recommend George Orwell. And there are any number of better contemporary travel writers, from the obvious (Graham Greene) to the exotic (Robert Byron).
October 8, 2024
Molt interessant, tot i que la part dedicada estrictament als viatges és més aviat curta. Recomanable si us interessa la crítica al turisme als anys 20 (fa pensar en "Viatges" de Zweig). Recomanable també si sou italòfils i us agrada l'art renaixentista (cosa que sol anar lligada); en aquest cas, millor si us estimeu més Alberti que Brunelleschi i Mantegna que Botticelli.
Tocarà tornar a Itàlia per comprovar l'estat de Sabbioneta 99 anys després.
Tocarà tornar a Itàlia per comprovar l'estat de Sabbioneta 99 anys després.
March 17, 2024
I had to stop reading this. What I thought might be well-written and thoughtful musings on travel turned out to be cranky pontifications by an immature and mannered youngster. Even then, his command of language is good, but he couldn’t get past the snobbish and racist glibness of his class and culture. I’m glad he matured into the mind that wrote “Brave New World” and other good books, but you don’t need to read this early uninteresting and tiresome work.
June 28, 2017
“And the snobbery which decrees that one must like Art—or, to be more accurate, that one should have visited the places where Art is to be seen—is almost as tyrannous as that which bids one visit the places where one can see Life” (13).
“Your genuine traveller, on the other hand, is so much interested in real things that he does not find it necessary to believe in fables” (16).
“Your traveller-for-travelling’s sake is like your desultory reader—a man addicted to mental self-indulgence.
“Like all other vicious men, the reader and the traveller have a whole armoury of justifications with which to defend themselves. Reading and travelling, they say, broaden the mind, stimulate the imagination, are a liberal education. And so on. These are specious arguments; but nobody is very much impressed by them for though it may be quite true that, for certain people, desultory reading and aimless travelling are richly educative, it is not for that reason that most true readers and travellers born indulge their tastes. We read and travel, not that we may broaden and enrich our minds, but that we may pleasantly forget they exist” (18).
“It was on the Mont Cenis that the cup of our humiliation flowed over and the blackest envy filled our souls” (25).
“We rolled along it in very dashing style; the smaller Fiats ate our dust” (25).
“It disappeared, carrying with it a load of hatred, envy and mixed uncharitableness of every variety” (27). **I love “mixed uncharitableness.”
“I could give many excellent reasons for my dislike of large dinner-parties, soirees, crushes, routs, conversazioni and balls. Life is not long enough and they waste precious time; the game is not worth the candle. Casual social intercourse is like dram-drinking, a mere stimulant that whips the nerves but does not nourish…But the final argument against large assemblages and in favour of solitude and the small intimate gathering has been, in my case, of a more personal character. It has appealed, not to my reason, but my vanity. The fact is that I do not shine in large assemblies; indeed, I scarcely glimmer. And to be dim and conscious of one’s dimness is humiliating” (31).
“From their appearance, from what they say, one reconstructs in the imagination the whole character, the complete life history. Given the single fossil bone, one fancifully build up the whole diplodocus” (33).
“If Conrad’s characters are mysterious, it is not because they are complicated, difficult or subtle characters, but simply because he does not understand them…The characters of the great novelists, like Dostoievsky and Tolstoy, are not mysterious; they are perfectly well understood and clearly displayed” (40).
“The traveller’s-eye view of men and women is not satisfying. A man might spend his life in trains and restaurants and know nothing of humanity at the end. To know, one must be an actor as well as a spectator. One must dine at home as well as in restaurants, must give up the amusing game of peeping in at unknown windows to live quietly, flatly, unexcitingly indoors. Still, the game, if it is kept as an occasional diversion and not treated as the serious business of life, is a very good one” (42).
"The hills stretched away as far as they eye could reach into the wintry haze, like a vast heaving sea frozen to stillness" (84).
“Vague memories of an escapade of Saturn’s float through my mind. But perhaps I am slandering a perfectly respectable deity” (133).
“The body is perfectly developed, like that of a Greek athlete; so formidably strong that the wound in its muscular flank seems somehow an irrelevance” (190).
“The Renaissance sculptor worked in an almost total ignorance of what had been done by other sculptors, at other periods or in countries other than his own. The result was that he was able to concentrate on the one convention that seemed to him good—the classical—and work away at it undisturbed, until he had developed all its potential resources” (201).
“That is the great danger attendant on the cult of the amusing; it makes its votaries forget that there are such things as the beautiful and the sublime” (208).
“In those bedrooms one could have preserved mutton indefinitely…While the sheets were yet unthawed, sleep was out of the question” (219).
“For it is certainly impossible to study nature at all closely without becoming convinced of the extraordinary strangeness and mysteriousness of the familiar world in which the mass of human beings unquestioningly pass their lives” (225).
“But Macbeth is a thing in itself, not a discovery on which other man can improve” (230).
“I was too cold even to feel a proper enthusiasm over the discovery that ‘the old sacrifical hymns were probably obscene and certainly nonsensical.’ Remembering that phrase in subsequent summers, I have been delighted by it” (233-234).
“Your genuine traveller, on the other hand, is so much interested in real things that he does not find it necessary to believe in fables” (16).
“Your traveller-for-travelling’s sake is like your desultory reader—a man addicted to mental self-indulgence.
“Like all other vicious men, the reader and the traveller have a whole armoury of justifications with which to defend themselves. Reading and travelling, they say, broaden the mind, stimulate the imagination, are a liberal education. And so on. These are specious arguments; but nobody is very much impressed by them for though it may be quite true that, for certain people, desultory reading and aimless travelling are richly educative, it is not for that reason that most true readers and travellers born indulge their tastes. We read and travel, not that we may broaden and enrich our minds, but that we may pleasantly forget they exist” (18).
“It was on the Mont Cenis that the cup of our humiliation flowed over and the blackest envy filled our souls” (25).
“We rolled along it in very dashing style; the smaller Fiats ate our dust” (25).
“It disappeared, carrying with it a load of hatred, envy and mixed uncharitableness of every variety” (27). **I love “mixed uncharitableness.”
“I could give many excellent reasons for my dislike of large dinner-parties, soirees, crushes, routs, conversazioni and balls. Life is not long enough and they waste precious time; the game is not worth the candle. Casual social intercourse is like dram-drinking, a mere stimulant that whips the nerves but does not nourish…But the final argument against large assemblages and in favour of solitude and the small intimate gathering has been, in my case, of a more personal character. It has appealed, not to my reason, but my vanity. The fact is that I do not shine in large assemblies; indeed, I scarcely glimmer. And to be dim and conscious of one’s dimness is humiliating” (31).
“From their appearance, from what they say, one reconstructs in the imagination the whole character, the complete life history. Given the single fossil bone, one fancifully build up the whole diplodocus” (33).
“If Conrad’s characters are mysterious, it is not because they are complicated, difficult or subtle characters, but simply because he does not understand them…The characters of the great novelists, like Dostoievsky and Tolstoy, are not mysterious; they are perfectly well understood and clearly displayed” (40).
“The traveller’s-eye view of men and women is not satisfying. A man might spend his life in trains and restaurants and know nothing of humanity at the end. To know, one must be an actor as well as a spectator. One must dine at home as well as in restaurants, must give up the amusing game of peeping in at unknown windows to live quietly, flatly, unexcitingly indoors. Still, the game, if it is kept as an occasional diversion and not treated as the serious business of life, is a very good one” (42).
"The hills stretched away as far as they eye could reach into the wintry haze, like a vast heaving sea frozen to stillness" (84).
“Vague memories of an escapade of Saturn’s float through my mind. But perhaps I am slandering a perfectly respectable deity” (133).
“The body is perfectly developed, like that of a Greek athlete; so formidably strong that the wound in its muscular flank seems somehow an irrelevance” (190).
“The Renaissance sculptor worked in an almost total ignorance of what had been done by other sculptors, at other periods or in countries other than his own. The result was that he was able to concentrate on the one convention that seemed to him good—the classical—and work away at it undisturbed, until he had developed all its potential resources” (201).
“That is the great danger attendant on the cult of the amusing; it makes its votaries forget that there are such things as the beautiful and the sublime” (208).
“In those bedrooms one could have preserved mutton indefinitely…While the sheets were yet unthawed, sleep was out of the question” (219).
“For it is certainly impossible to study nature at all closely without becoming convinced of the extraordinary strangeness and mysteriousness of the familiar world in which the mass of human beings unquestioningly pass their lives” (225).
“But Macbeth is a thing in itself, not a discovery on which other man can improve” (230).
“I was too cold even to feel a proper enthusiasm over the discovery that ‘the old sacrifical hymns were probably obscene and certainly nonsensical.’ Remembering that phrase in subsequent summers, I have been delighted by it” (233-234).
May 9, 2017
Though there are some gems in it and some really interesting stories as you'd expect from Huxley, some bits are rather dull. The most exciting bits to me were the ones talking about the traveller person, and some of the travel stories that were also vivid. It's an easy and overall enjoyable read so I'd still recommend it.
October 24, 2025
Actually, I didn't read a print edition, more's the pity, I read this online at The Huxley Archive. (The link is on my blog).
There are four parts, but I’m going to share my thoughts about Part 1, ‘Travel in General’. There is an air of tongue-in-cheek hubris about some of Huxley’s cheekier opinions, as if he is writing as an intellectual provocateur. Writers of today’s click-bait tabloid opinion pieces might read these and weep that their trade precludes writing anything so witty, erudite, and enduring.
The collection starts with a deliciously provocative essay about how most people do not enjoy travel but do it out of snobbery, a desire to be seen to do it and to have travel stories with which to impress other people.
Well indeed, a century ago i.e. before developments in transport and the age of mass tourism, he may have been right. Most travel would have been arduous to say the least, though depending on your destination, it still can be. And while we can use the internet to prepare ourselves for the attractions we can expect to see, in 1925 the traveller was reliant on word of mouth and the vagaries of amateur sketches, B&W photography of dubious quality and travel writing, such as it was. (Remember Herodotus and his facts, legends and bizarre digressions about gold-digging ants and hippos with manes like horses?) How could the would-be traveller feel confident that it was going to be worth the hassle and expense?
And surely you have to wonder about the selfie generation and their bucket lists, do they actually enjoy what they’re doing?
Anyway, I had a good chuckle when Huxley then undercut his own pomposity by declaring himself to be a ‘born traveller’ and likens his travelling to a vice.
To see the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2025/10/23/a...
There are four parts, but I’m going to share my thoughts about Part 1, ‘Travel in General’. There is an air of tongue-in-cheek hubris about some of Huxley’s cheekier opinions, as if he is writing as an intellectual provocateur. Writers of today’s click-bait tabloid opinion pieces might read these and weep that their trade precludes writing anything so witty, erudite, and enduring.
The collection starts with a deliciously provocative essay about how most people do not enjoy travel but do it out of snobbery, a desire to be seen to do it and to have travel stories with which to impress other people.
Some people travel on business, some in search of health. But it is neither the sickly, nor the men of affairs who fill the Grand Hotels and the pockets of their proprietors. It is those who travel “for pleasure,” as the phrase goes. What Epicurus, who never travelled except when he was banished, sought in his own garden, our tourists seek abroad. And do they find their happiness? Those who frequent the places where they resort must often find this question, with a tentative answer in the negative, fairly forced upon them. For tourists are, in the main, a very gloomy-looking tribe. I have seen much brighter faces at a funeral than in the Piazza of St. Mark’s. Only when they can band together and pretend, for a brief, precarious hour, that they are at home, do the majority of tourists look really happy. One wonders why they come abroad.
The fact is that very few travellers really like travelling. If they go to the trouble and expense of travelling, it is not so much from curiosity, for fun or because they like to see things beautiful and strange, as out of a kind of snobbery. People travel for the same reason as they collect works of art: because the best people do it. To have been to certain spots on the earth’s surface is socially correct; and having been there, one is superior to those who have not. Moreover, travelling gives one something to talk about when one gets home. The subjects of conversation are not so numerous that one can neglect an opportunity for adding to one’s store.
Well indeed, a century ago i.e. before developments in transport and the age of mass tourism, he may have been right. Most travel would have been arduous to say the least, though depending on your destination, it still can be. And while we can use the internet to prepare ourselves for the attractions we can expect to see, in 1925 the traveller was reliant on word of mouth and the vagaries of amateur sketches, B&W photography of dubious quality and travel writing, such as it was. (Remember Herodotus and his facts, legends and bizarre digressions about gold-digging ants and hippos with manes like horses?) How could the would-be traveller feel confident that it was going to be worth the hassle and expense?
And surely you have to wonder about the selfie generation and their bucket lists, do they actually enjoy what they’re doing?
Anyway, I had a good chuckle when Huxley then undercut his own pomposity by declaring himself to be a ‘born traveller’ and likens his travelling to a vice.
To see the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2025/10/23/a...
August 22, 2025
Let's set the premise of the book first of all right here: this is a collection of highly opinionated essays about some of Huxley's travels in Italy, and his haughty opinions about nearly everything else: people, places, art, music, leisure, work, etc., etc. ....in which everybody suffers his subtle but deadly opinions of us lesser mortals.
I believe these essays were written when he was still quite a young man (published 1923), and therefore probably full of himself. But, his obvious erudition and boundless education comes through as it always does in his works, and once again I express my amazement at how many British writers in his generation managed to become so well versed in the classical humanities. That is a whole 'nother world to an American rustic. I envy that sort of education, I wish someone could explain to me how they did it, when it seems so unattainable in this life.
Written in his own voice he comes off as an enormous snob, a definite elitist, and a thoroughly upper-class English prig. He also mentions a couple of racist words that would not work today. In other words, his opinions are wonderfully candid and snarky, and dare I say, liberating. I am overjoyed to think that I finally learned something about the "real Aldous Huxley" that you do not see in his slick sophisticated novels. In my experience I think it is rare to find something by an author that so directly reveals his inner and everyday self.
My association with Aldous Huxley started long ago in my teen years and has been kept alive by my periodic forays into what is considered the best of his oeuvre. Now comes this astounding little book that until a few days ago I didn't even realize I had, and I have no idea how it came into my possession. It turned out to be one hundred years old, so I pulled it out to add it to the shelf of antique books, while knowing little about what was in it. But curiosity took over and I read a few pages, and now I am here trying to explain this remarkable book.
This book was easier to read than most of Huxley's work, but as usual he liberally sprinkles in bits of foreign languages, French in this case, and drops dozens of references to bits of classical knowledge that most of us Americans have to look up. The book is divided into four Parts: Travel, Places, Art, By the Way (topics on modern music, plays, work, leisure)--all with a bite.
Some of the essays might not suit your tastes or interests, but the ones that do will thrill your mind. So if you can I hope you will crack the book open and find something that interests you.
And by the way, he travels over mountain and dell by motorcar, a ten horsepower Citroen, which would seem to be the early days of touring by automobile, and the car was probably an early forerunner to the quirky little French Citroen that I have always loved...the 2 CV-the deus chevaux, which was produced from 1948. My first Volkswagen, a 1949 model, had 13 or 18 horsepower, can't remember which. It was plenty fast but the mechanical brakes could never be properly adjusted so it was uniquely dangerous. Today I would drive either one proudly.
I believe these essays were written when he was still quite a young man (published 1923), and therefore probably full of himself. But, his obvious erudition and boundless education comes through as it always does in his works, and once again I express my amazement at how many British writers in his generation managed to become so well versed in the classical humanities. That is a whole 'nother world to an American rustic. I envy that sort of education, I wish someone could explain to me how they did it, when it seems so unattainable in this life.
Written in his own voice he comes off as an enormous snob, a definite elitist, and a thoroughly upper-class English prig. He also mentions a couple of racist words that would not work today. In other words, his opinions are wonderfully candid and snarky, and dare I say, liberating. I am overjoyed to think that I finally learned something about the "real Aldous Huxley" that you do not see in his slick sophisticated novels. In my experience I think it is rare to find something by an author that so directly reveals his inner and everyday self.
My association with Aldous Huxley started long ago in my teen years and has been kept alive by my periodic forays into what is considered the best of his oeuvre. Now comes this astounding little book that until a few days ago I didn't even realize I had, and I have no idea how it came into my possession. It turned out to be one hundred years old, so I pulled it out to add it to the shelf of antique books, while knowing little about what was in it. But curiosity took over and I read a few pages, and now I am here trying to explain this remarkable book.
This book was easier to read than most of Huxley's work, but as usual he liberally sprinkles in bits of foreign languages, French in this case, and drops dozens of references to bits of classical knowledge that most of us Americans have to look up. The book is divided into four Parts: Travel, Places, Art, By the Way (topics on modern music, plays, work, leisure)--all with a bite.
Some of the essays might not suit your tastes or interests, but the ones that do will thrill your mind. So if you can I hope you will crack the book open and find something that interests you.
And by the way, he travels over mountain and dell by motorcar, a ten horsepower Citroen, which would seem to be the early days of touring by automobile, and the car was probably an early forerunner to the quirky little French Citroen that I have always loved...the 2 CV-the deus chevaux, which was produced from 1948. My first Volkswagen, a 1949 model, had 13 or 18 horsepower, can't remember which. It was plenty fast but the mechanical brakes could never be properly adjusted so it was uniquely dangerous. Today I would drive either one proudly.
March 6, 2024
Boy if this was my introduction to Huxley, I'd never read anything else by him. He comes across as a cantakerous, opinionated, racist snob. Any number of his essays in this book are downright silly.
He's a Baliol man, don't you know, an Old Etonian who complains about "working for the enrichment of the Jew".
He does write well, but it ain't enough for me.
Typical quote: "They overwhelm us not merely with Russian and negroid noises, but with Celtic caterwaulings on the black notes, with dismal Spanish wailings, punctuated by the rattle of the castanets and the clashing harmonies of the guitar. When serious composers have gone back to civilized music—and already some of them are turning from barbarism—we shall probably hear a corresponding change for the more refined in popular music."
Or how about this one: "It becomes at once sufficiently evident that the leisured classes do take and have always taken a much keener and, I might say, more professional interest in love than the workers."
Take it from there.
He's a Baliol man, don't you know, an Old Etonian who complains about "working for the enrichment of the Jew".
He does write well, but it ain't enough for me.
Typical quote: "They overwhelm us not merely with Russian and negroid noises, but with Celtic caterwaulings on the black notes, with dismal Spanish wailings, punctuated by the rattle of the castanets and the clashing harmonies of the guitar. When serious composers have gone back to civilized music—and already some of them are turning from barbarism—we shall probably hear a corresponding change for the more refined in popular music."
Or how about this one: "It becomes at once sufficiently evident that the leisured classes do take and have always taken a much keener and, I might say, more professional interest in love than the workers."
Take it from there.
May 25, 2021
The early chapters of this book of essays that are specifically about travelers and travel in the 1920s are the most interesting to me. Some pieces on specific locations are interesting, but his ideas on art and music are not very supportable. He can sound callow and in fact was only about 30 years old when he wrote this book. Many of his better books were yet to come, although he had written Chrome Yellow in 1921.
A side note—he states very bravely in Along the Road that Piero Della Francesca’s Resurrection is the greatest painting in the world. In World War II, British artillery officer Tony Clarke was given instructions to shell the town of San Sepolcro where The Resurrection is located. He had read Huxley’s Along the Road and made the choice not to go ahead with the order. That would mean that Huxley is responsible for saving what he says is the worlds greatest painting!
A side note—he states very bravely in Along the Road that Piero Della Francesca’s Resurrection is the greatest painting in the world. In World War II, British artillery officer Tony Clarke was given instructions to shell the town of San Sepolcro where The Resurrection is located. He had read Huxley’s Along the Road and made the choice not to go ahead with the order. That would mean that Huxley is responsible for saving what he says is the worlds greatest painting!
August 9, 2022
An excellent, biting little collection of essays with several of the most insightful on the art and abuse of travel in the early 20th century. Brilliant, witty, and delightfully pretentious, those who can handle his off-color remarks, and sit through his reflections on long-forgotten Italian painters, will be richly rewarded.
Currently reading
November 19, 2020It says that I can read it then review it, but there is no way I find where to read it !
October 12, 2021
I am not a big fan of essays. The tourism part was done in Europe.
August 29, 2023
"With me, travelling is frankly a vice. The temptation to indulge in it is one which I find almost as hard to resist as the temptation to read promiscuously, omnivorously and without purpose."
Read
May 4, 2025(Hardcopy mit ISBN 9783737101929, meinen Lesebuddies zum Welttag des Buches 2025 geschenkt)
February 16, 2025
Aufzeichnungen eines Reisenden, so lautet der Untertitel dieses Buchs. Aufzeichnungen von was, sollte sich der Betrachter des Covers fragen. Aufzeichnungen von Orten, malerischen Landschaften und Eindrücken? Die Antwort lautet: „auch das wird in diesem Buch thematisiert.“ Die Ausführungen zu Europa, Reiseliteratur und Brueg(h)el sind spannend. Das Buch nimmt den Leser mit, auf eine Reise durch die Gedankenwelt der geistigen Erhebung. Ein Meisterwerk des Tiefgangs, welches den Blick lenkt auf das Wesentliche, das Reisen durch die Welt der geistigen Freiheit!
January 3, 2026
Un llibre per aprofundir en el pensament de Huxley, un escriptor polièdric que, tanmateix, s'endinsa en diversos aspectes del fet de viatjar i es pregunta, al primer capítol, per què no romandre a casa. El viatger, com el lector empedreït, entre els quals es compta, no ho fa per eixamplar o enriquir el pensament, sinó per oblidar agradablement que existeix.
Les guies de viatge, la moda burgesa d'escapar al medi rural els caps de setmana, les noves formes d'art, com ara el jazz o la pintura abstracta, i, en general, la incorporació de sabers forans al classicisme europeu, entre d'altres, els passa pel sedàs amb intel·ligència i ironia.
La traducció i l'edició de l'obra, a càrrec de Rafael Tasis i de Dolor Udina, respectivament, garanteixen la qualitat dels articles, en què les descripcions són d'una qualitat extraordinària, no exempta a voltes de monotonia.
Les guies de viatge, la moda burgesa d'escapar al medi rural els caps de setmana, les noves formes d'art, com ara el jazz o la pintura abstracta, i, en general, la incorporació de sabers forans al classicisme europeu, entre d'altres, els passa pel sedàs amb intel·ligència i ironia.
La traducció i l'edició de l'obra, a càrrec de Rafael Tasis i de Dolor Udina, respectivament, garanteixen la qualitat dels articles, en què les descripcions són d'una qualitat extraordinària, no exempta a voltes de monotonia.
May 26, 2022
I came to this book after seeing a reference to one of the essays, "The Best Picture", in the book Double Entry, by Jane Gleeson-White. The essay describes, among other things, an al fresco painting by Piero della Francesca located in the Town hall of San Sepolcro, a small village in Tuscany (https://www.visittuscany.com/en/desti...). The painting depicts the resurrection of Christ, and Huxley claims this is the best picture in the world, giving a number of reasons why he believes this. In doing so, he describes a few other paintings by della Francesco, and it's clear that he is a big admirer of this artist. I found Huxley's enthusiasm very contagious, and really enjoyed reading this essay. So much so that I also read a couple of others: "Why not stay at home?" and "Breughel". I would like to read a few more, but I'm putting the book aside for now to finish Double Entry. I may very well come back and finish it at another time.
August 6, 2010
good insights on how to be a good traveler.
Read
July 16, 2012Disappointing.
October 20, 2015
keen insight
Displaying 1 - 21 of 21 reviews