From the Bookshelf of Retro Reads…

The Towers of Trebizond

Rose Macaulay,

Jan Morris (Introduction)

Start date: September 15, 2019

Finish date: October 14, 2019

Discussion: Group Reads

Discussion leader: Carol She's So Novel꧁꧂

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Jun 17, 2013 mark monday rated it really liked it

Shelves: these-fragile-lives, mind-the-gap

oh to travel, isn't that just the thing, everyone's favorite hobby, to get away and have adventures, see life from different angles, take in history and view the panorama of the world all at the same time, you go some wheres and see some things, but unless you are traveling for pure thrill-seeking or just to find a new setting to drink and to flirt, you go to someplace and see those things and you are really seeing all the things before them, the history of a place, reading and thinking and drea oh to travel, isn't that just the thing, everyone's favorite hobby, to get away and have adventures, see life from different angles, take in history and view the panorama of the world all at the same time, you go some wheres and see some things, but unless you are traveling for pure thrill-seeking or just to find a new setting to drink and to flirt, you go to someplace and see those things and you are really seeing all the things before them, the history of a place, reading and thinking and dreaming about all the things that used to be in that place, and so you find yourself in front of something that is quaint or beautiful or melancholy or depressing or even inexplicable but it is much more than that specific thing or place, it is at once itself and also all the things that came before, things you can never see and can only imagine. oh to time travel, that would really be the thing.

the 1956 novel Towers of Trebizond is about a trip to Turkey and beyond, and then back again to England. our narrator is Laurie and is accompanied, at first, by eccentric Aunt Dot and the vaguely malevolent Father Chantry-Pigg. they have different goals: Dot wants to emancipate women, Pigg wants to convert Muslims into high Anglicans, Laurie wants to relax & paint & contemplate history and religion & think on an adulterous, long-lasting, still current love affair. the whole thing is quite deadpan and, I suppose, almost stereotypically "upper-middle class English" - chatty, often dry, eccentric, judgmental, amusing, and amused. for a fully grown and obviously well-educated character, Laurie has an almost peculiarly child-like voice, faux-naïf I suppose. but perhaps not so faux at times. and at other times, not so naïf either. while there is a genuine and alternately irritating and charming innocence to Laurie's every thought process, there is also an odd and winsome sort of wisdom as well, one that casually demolishes religion and government and nations and nationalism at every turn.

the style takes some getting used to. as with many of my reviews, I tried to imitate it a little bit, in this case in my first paragraph. many long, long sentences, full of asides and off-kilter bits of commentary, often followed up by a brief, to-the-point sentence that runs in a different direction. so at first it was a challenge for me to stay focused on the story at hand as I lost myself in all the rather fabulously constructed but initially quite distancing prose. but as is often the case with me, a challenging style will also keep my interest, even when I'm being frustrated, and so after a few chapters what was a difficulty became a genuine delight. a witty and enchanting delight.

whimsical Laurie nonchalantly brings home an ape (the kind of ape is never specified), and there is a charmingly detailed little sequence showing the ins and outs of living with and training an ape who you want to act and think as a human. this is a minor (but thematically relevant) part of the book, but it is so delightful that I had to mention it.

because this novel is so droll and delightful, it was a painful shock when it took a surprise turn towards the tragic in its final act. shocking but it also rang true - a bleak and clear-eyed and not very warm kind of true. well, I guess I should have been warned when that one character gets eaten by a shark early on, and not much is made of it - Towers of Trebizond has a fist of cold iron underneath that lovely little glove.

Laurie travels like I've traveled: slowly, preferring to really get to know a place in its current incarnation while simultaneously imagining all the lost wonders of what came before. I suppose it can be a rather melancholy way of traveling, looking at the present but devoting as much time to the contemplation of the past, what has been lost and what can never be seen again. so I really got Laurie, I connected to the character and Laurie's oddly offhand, distracted, casual, thoughtful but still rather shallow way of looking at the world. I've also traveled through Turkey and been to many of the same places. Surprisingly, not only did I understand and agree with her assessment of the country and its people - over 50 years later! - I also found I was in almost complete sympathy with her thoughts on so many other things: how history can be viewed and how the history of humanity itself and its never-changing nature can be viewed - two entirely different things; religion in general and her confused and rather longing thoughts on God and belief; how love can feel and what that feeling can turn into when the object of your love is forcibly and permanently taken from you; how a person can then distract themselves with all the wonders of life and the world, and so how a person can just carry on, survive, a part of you dead but the rest of you still able to live and find pleasure and even delight in what the world has to offer, a shadow of true happiness but at least not a pale one. Trebizond's towers, and the city itself, will always be a place where Laurie can return, in her mind or in person, as a place that soothes and delights, a kind of constant, both a sweet memory and a pleasing reality... but how can any such place be the same, be seen as the same even if it actually remains the same, how can it give the same reward when you yourself have been changed? ...more

74 likes · Like · see review

Sep 22, 2019 Carol She's So Novel꧁꧂ rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: humour, modern-classics

I've changed my mind and I'm awarding the full 5★. I found the ending a bit abrupt and the change in tone quite startling - but it is 20th century. That was the way 20th century fiction rolled!

Or is it fiction? I've read a review that describes this novel as a roman à clef which is certainly how it feels. Definitely a satire about the travels of the wide-eyed and guileless Laurie and her travels through Turkey and beyond.

I found this old map helpful;

It isn't long before you realise t ...more

50 likes · Like · see review

Oct 05, 2020 LeahBethany rated it really liked it · review of another edition

The Towers of Trebizond was a quirky, strange, humorous, wandering novel that meandered through countries, thoughts, religions, animals and morality. I enjoyed it but wouldn't recommend it to just anyone…it's definitely a peculiar, fragmentary book. ...more

4 likes · Like · see review