My Journey to Lhasa - Alexandra David-Neel
Alexandra David-Neel, in the tradition of Great White Explorers, journeys to Lhasa, Tibet, forbidden to all Western Women. This, in 1923, largely on foot, with her faithful companion and adopted son Tibetan Llama Yongden.
Now, a fine adventure, and the situations and people she encounters are so rustic it's hard to believe this took place a mere 100 years ago. There are the monks, medieval intrigues, robbers, fine accounts of the superstitions, customs, politics, there are the amusing 'vignettes' or portraits of domestic Tibetan life, bliss, or otherwise, stories told in the character of Chaucer.
There is, something I've noticed in these older lady explorer types, a certain style of narrative that they adhere to, it's as if they were telling you the stories themselves. In the first person, a very natural tone that other male authors try to distance themselves from.
Anyways that said she's as prone to telling her own romantic brand of Travelers tales as anyone, and while she professes Western Skepticism she as well buys into the Llama /Superstitious aspects of Buddhism as much as the next person- just not as much as your indoctrinated Tibetan. The occasional fantastic happening can't possibly hurt readership, can it?
And, there is something else that slightly annoyed me about it. This voyage, by necessity a deception (she impersonates a Tibetan Beggar Lady, the Holy City of Lhasa is off-limits to Western Women), yet she harps continually upon her cleverness, the near exposures, and somewhat paints the people who good-naturedly accept the deception as rubes. Perhaps they are, but - dependent as she is upon their hospitality, it would be kinder if she never mentioned it.
A fine read but not a great book, merely another view into a culture and way of life that's largely vanished.
You can read it online here: https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.40184, although it's not too hard to find in paperback - reprinted in 1986, maybe even again since.
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Nemo Gould - "Click Bait"
Found this online this morning, and reminded me of a post I did a month or so ago....
Link: Nemo Gould - Click Bait
Which, you'll recall, resembles my own fancy somewhat: http://rodboyle.com/index.php/78-creative/3702-the-reddit-rat-trap
Anyways, another ship sailed...
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WIlfred Thesiger - The Marsh Arabs
I'd read his "Arabian Sands", and, for want of anything better, picked this up to read. Interesting, a fine documentation of a way of life I suspect by now to be entirely extinct.
This, the Arabs that live in the Salt Marshes at the Mouth of the Euphrates - and his years amongst them. This - written in the early to late 50's, and he's seeing the changes that are already happening - his disparaging views of the Oil Industry, which (as he prophesized) entirely ruined their way of life. Which - to a casual reader - might not seem like such a big deal, they were pretty primitive - but we all lose with the dearth of diversity.
Of note, he mentions a legendary village in the Salt Marshes - Hufaidh - that is hidden by Djinn and addles the speech of any who come across it. He talks of the Arabs belief that there is hidden treasure, (not unsurprising, given the 5000+ years of occupation), a bit of the history of the area, of being a doctor to everyone he meets (he's a limited knowledge of medicine, and a chest filled with cures) - and he tells of him being recruited to perform circumcisions, and, as a result of his superior techniques and after-care ends up doing some days more than 100 - and - amongst the uncircumcised the "...was circumcised by an angel at birth" - to avoid the unwanted infections & mutilations, he tells of the blood feuds, and his bringing an air rifle - which is popular to shoot birds, and his observation: "You can usually get on terms with people by helping them to kill something". And there's mention of the people of the South Marshes, the Sabaeans - neither Muslim, Christian or Jew, something quite other entirely. Which, if true makes them something of an anachronism, as Wiki refers to the cult as dying out by 275 AD.
Anyways, a diversion in line with much of my current reading. Good.
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J. Augustus Knapp
I should know him, really, I've seen his illustrations in countless books, just never thought to look him up.
Anyways, metaphysical artist, one of the enlightened, famous for his occult and related illustrations. Reminding me a bit of William Blake, only - well, a little more refined, less spontaneous.
Link: Etidorhpa
Google Image Search: Images J. Augustus Knapp
Oddly enough not a lot written about him. The illustrator of Manly P. Hall's "The Secret Teaching of All Ages" deserves a little better than this...
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