Reading about someone insulting whole nations and their way of life isn’t really my cup of tea. Things I was chuckling at in the first few countries, quickly became immature, rude and xenophobic. Bill Bryson is a complainer, big time! Everywhere he goes, he finds something to complain about! But as Bryson continued to travel, from Scandinavia all the way through to Turkey, his style really began to grate on me. He’s witty and I definitely laughed out load a couple of times.
Now 20-odd years later, Bryson is an older, married father, determined to recreate the trip.ĭescribing the people and places he encountered, I really enjoyed Bryson’s humour to start with.
I was looking forward to reading about places I could relate to or places I could easily visit on my next trip abroad.Īs a college student, Bill Bryson toured Europe with his friend Katz.
I haven’t been a great fan of many travel books, but when it comes to Europe, I like to think of myself as pretty well travelled. Whether braving the homicidal motorists of Paris, being robbed by gypsies in Florence, attempting not to order tripe and eyeballs in a German restaurant or window-shopping in the sex shops of the Reeperbahn, Bryson takes in the sights, dissects the culture and illuminates each place and person with his hilariously caustic observations.
Fluent in, oh, at least one language, he retraces his travels as a student twenty years before. In Neither Here nor There he brings his unique brand of humour to bear on Europe as he shoulders his backback, keeps a tight hold on his wallet, and journeys from Hammerfest, the northernmost town on the continent, to Istanbul on the cusp of Asia. Publisher: Black Swan (first published 1991)īill Bryson’s first travel book, The Lost Continent, was unanimously acclaimed as one of the funniest books in years. Neither Here, Nor There: Travels in Europe
0 kommentar(er)
