essays on various cites of the world. Gloss over sex change of author

Finding something written by Jan Morris is like coming, comfortably, home. These word-pictures of various cities in which she has lived or briefly visited, shine, and the prose-flow excites and charms. This is the so-called travel narrative genre at its best, supremely written by a truly skillful professional. The descriptions give a strong presence to the cities – from Chicago to Darjeeling – and Morris relates strongly to the history, the culture, the architecture, the ‘street-sense’ and most of all, to the people.

I recently read a review (rant?) that condemned Jan Morris (and awarded Simon Winchester second place) as ‘spewing propaganda for the castrating English Empire’ and was able to calmly grin and read on, having reached an entirely different conclusion from reading most of her (and earlier, his) books. A compassionate writer who sees the people of the world whole and often, rather purer and more worthy, than we might find ourselves. One piece in this collection mentions the adorable babies of the Peruvian Andes and her immediate response was the desire to adopt and care for “half a dozen” herself. Or in Dublin, at the Post Office, scene of the doomed, too-early revolution…”I wept at the memory of that old tragedy and thought of those brave men so soon to be shot at dawn, and of the ignorant homely English at their guns behind their sandbags…”

On one of her regular annual pilgrimages to Manhattan (something she continued for over forty years) she once again falls in love with the dynamic city – and, of course, the characters who people it. She finds a woodland fairy-tale side of the city - which I am sure, eludes most of the rest of us. This love of Manhattan once led her to write (in 1985) the retrospective autobiography of the city, Manhattan ‘45 an exciting read still (http://www.librarything.com/work/235500). Another chapter takes the reader ‘back’ as it were into China … and “Alex”, and Beirut as it used to be and as some us still remember those once imposing cities … if you like to travel, even if just from an armchair, do be sure to read this book.