| The Site |
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| The Books |
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"A collection of literature unequaled for style and consistency"
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| The Articles |
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"Raban's occasional journalism is like a running coversation with the world"
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| Bits and Bobs |
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Irregular short contributions from the desk of Jonathan Raban
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| books by jonathan raban |
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| Witty, elegaic, and magnificently erudite, Old Glory is as filled with strong currents as the Mississippi itself. |
| | It is as big and depthless as the sky itself. You can see the curve of the earth on its surface as it stretches away for miles to the far shore." So begins Old Glory, in which Jonathan Raban recounts his eye-opening descent of the Mississippi River in a 16-foot aluminum motorboat. As the English author explains, his obsession with the subject began with Huckleberry Finn, which he first read as a 7-year-old. And in fact, his opening sentences refer as much to the imaginary river as to the real one, which turns out to be less bucolic than Raban expected. Three miles upstream from Oquawka, Illinois, he's nearly pulverized by a towboat. Later on, the intrepid voyager only just manages to escape a treacherous whirlpool near St. Louis, calming himself afterwards with a generous dose of tobacco and Valium.
True, when Raban isn't cheating death he encounters some stunning terrain, which he describes in no-less-stunning prose. Yet Old Glory is much, much more than a travelogue. It is also a brilliant interrogation of the American psyche, in the tradition of De Tocqueville and Crevecoeur. And ultimately, Raban tells us a great deal about the very phenomenon of travel, with all its rigors and rewards, and its peculiar, metaphysical dislocations: "Riding the river, I had seen myself as a sincere traveler, thinking of my voyage not as a holiday but as a scale model of a life. It was different from life in one essential: I would survive it to give an account of its end."
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| Reviews |
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Raban’s way of looking at the world in "Old Glory" is so trenchant, his writing so vibrant, that you too, will be disappointed when the trip ends.
Nancy Chapelle, Books I Loved.com, 2006-05-15 more > |
If someone were to come along, dig a moderately deep hole in my garden, give me a metal box and tell me I had half an hour to put together a 2006 time-capsule, Jonathan Raban's new novel is the first thing I'd grab.
Toby Litt, The Guardian, 2006-09-30 more > |
We need sane voices in these times, and they don't come much saner, or indeed much more alert and stylish, than Jonathan Raban's.
Nicholas Lezard, The Guardian, 2006-04-15 more > |
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| the books |
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| Surveillance
|  Explore the current political climate in this clever, unsettling novel set in a near-future Seattle More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
buy at amazon (UK) >
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| My Holy War: Dispatches from the Home Front
|  Raban showcases his unparalleled ability to articulate an incisive intellectual position from the morass More > | buy at amazon (US) >
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| Waxwings
|  a caustic, affectionate commentary on the manic gyrations of millennial America More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
buy at Amazon (UK) >
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| Passage to Juneau: a sea and its meanings
|  "Gallivanting around the world in a small boat is a continuing education in one's limitless capacity for self-delusion." More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
buy at Amazon (UK) >
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| Badland: An American Romance
|  "No one has evoked with greater power the marriage of land and sky that gives this country both its beauty and its terror."
More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
buy at Amazon (UK) >
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| Hunting Mr Heartbreak
|  An exhilarating, often deliciously funny book that is at once a travelogue, a social history, and a love letter to the United States. More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
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| Soft City
|  Part fact, part fiction, it holds up a mirror to the modern city and finds there a stage for a unique personal drama. More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
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| For Love & Money: Writing, Reading, Travelling 1968-1987
|  Reportage, travel writings and literary criticism. More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
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| God, Man and Mrs. Thatcher
|  Provocative pamphlet More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
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| Foreign Land
| | Foreign Land is an exquisitely moving tale of awkward relationships and quiet redemption. More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
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| Coasting
|  “A lively, intensely personal recounting of a voyage into a gifted writer's country and self.” More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
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| Old Glory
|  Witty, elegaic, and magnificently erudite, Old Glory is as filled with strong currents as the Mississippi itself. More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
buy at Amazon (UK) >
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| Arabia
|  A must read for anyone seeking to understand the Middle East and it's people. More > | buy at Amazon (US) >
buy at Amazon (UK) >
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