Travels with Herodotus (Vintage International) | 
 enlarge | Author: Ryszard Kapuscinski
Publisher: Vintage
Category: Book
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Rating:  21 reviews
Sales Rank: 16290
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 288
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.7
ISBN: 1400078784
Dewey Decimal Number: 938
EAN: 9781400078783
ASIN: 1400078784
Publication Date: June 10, 2008
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Product Description
From the renowned journalist comes this intimate account of his years in the field, traveling for the first time beyond the Iron Curtain to India, China, Ethiopia, and other exotic locales.
In the 1950s, Ryszard Kapuscinski finished university in Poland and became a foreign correspondent, hoping to go abroad – perhaps to Czechoslovakia. Instead, he was sent to India – the first stop on a decades-long tour of the world that took Kapuscinski from Iran to El Salvador, from Angola to Armenia. Revisiting his memories of traveling the globe with a copy of Herodotus' Histories in tow, Kapuscinski describes his awakening to the intricacies and idiosyncrasies of new environments, and how the words of the Greek historiographer helped shape his own view of an increasingly globalized world. Written with supreme eloquence and a constant eye to the global undercurrents that have shaped the last half-century, Travels with Herodotus is an exceptional chronicle of one man's journey across continents.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 16 more reviews...
 The best book of 2008 (on my list of have-reads) January 1, 2009
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
I am celebrating the first day of 2009 by reviewing the best book I read in 2008. And the winner is -- "Travels with Herodotus," by Polish journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski, who died of a fast cancer in early 2007. This book, along with "The Other," was published posthumously.
Here is a man, landlocked and controlled by communism, whose greatest dream was to cross the border, just go over and return. A couple of years later, his editor sent him to India (!) with a copy of Herodotus's "Histories." This book was to accompany Kapuscinski for the rest of his life. And profoundly direct him.
"Travels" is a compilation of commentaries on some of his travels, Herodotus and his book, and its application to his own stories on the road. It is framed in memorable language--clear, vivid, and pictorial.
"He had a gray, ravaged face, covered in wrinkles. A musty, cheap suit hung loosely on this thin, bony frame....Tears were flowing down his cheeks. And a moment later I heard a suppressed but nevertheless distinct sob. "I'm sorry," he said to me. "I'm sorry. But I didn't believe that I would return."
"It was December 1956. People were still coming out of the gulags" (38).
On Amazon's Product Page, RK's friend Tahir Shah tells the reader that RK kept two notebooks on his trips. One was for his news stories; the other kept his travel notes that lead to his books. RK reveals his journalist's mind early on to ask all kinds of questions about Herodotus. What kind of toys did he play with? Who did he sit next to in school? Did his mother hug him goodnight? Where did he die? Under what circumstances? He reveals the journalist's propensity to ask questions.
When RK visited China for stories, he came to see the Great Wall as a metaphor...."to shut oneself in, fence oneself off" (59). This is the second assignment, the first being India, where RK discovered himself as The Other, which became the title of the second posthumously published book.
In his chapter on memory RK ruminates on what memory is and why Herodotus undertook his vast traveling plans. Because memory is elusive, he wanted to "prevent the traces of human events from being erased by time," so he set out on his "enqueries," which RK terms "investigations." He wanders the world, meeting people, listening to what they tell him, or as RK terms him: Herodotus is the first globalist. But he is also "a reporter, an anthropologist, an ethnographer, a historian" (79). Herodotus is "the first to discover the world's multicultural nature" and that we must know and embrace "others" (80).
When RK first set out to "cross the border' of Poland, he had no idea he would cover news in Africa, India, China, Malaysia, Central and South American. And in reading and studying Herodotus, he learns much about the world. In places where he had to wait, he spent it pouring over Herodotus's words and retells many of the stories therein.
If you saw the movie "300" with Gerard Butler, you may remember how huge Xerxes was--a literal giant. Herodotus makes no mention of such size, but does describe Xerxes in terms writ large. In other words, Xerxes was larger than life. This story is just one of many that RK retells from Herodotus, each more fascinating than the one before.
"Travels with Herodotus" is rich with details, observations, anecdotes, stories that require crackling fires. It is the story of Ryszard Kapuscinski's travels, it is the story of Herodotus's travels. It is must reading and will enrich your life more than you can imagine.
"His [Herodotus's] most important discovery? That there are many worlds. And that each is different. Each is important" (264). We could say that about RK's work, as well.
A great valedictory from a superb author December 5, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Ryszard Kapuscinski's works -- often described as "literary reportage" -- transcended genres. They blended travel with history, current affairs with political theory, biography with philosophy. And all with wit and sensistivity -- a rare and remarkable accomplishment.
So it's somehow fitting that Kapuscinski's final book should be the one where he looks back at how his peripatetic life and, for that matter, how his yearning to peer over the horizon (literally and rhetorically) took root in his childhood in a Polish village. Kapuscinski didn't discover Herodotus until much later (at that point, he notes, the Polish translation was "looked away in a cupboard", unpublished.) But Herodotus's pioneering work accompanies him on his first voyage, to India, and he somehow forms a bond with the long-dead adventurer. "Herodotus wanders the world, meets people, listent to what they tell him." So does Kapuscinski, and both are wide-eyed at their discoveries of new, strange lands. Both -- although Kapuscinski is too modest to make such a claim for himself -- create memorable prose that capture the imaginations of readers.
In a sense, Kapuscinski, even as he tells stories about his experiences in countries ranging from Egypt to the Congo (and interweaving those with tales from Herodotus), is shedding light on the human urge to roam. "What set him into motion?" he muses of Herodotus. "Made him act? compelled him to undertake the hardships of travel?" The conclusion he reaches might be applied to the author himself, and to any journalist: "The desire to be there, to see it at any cost, to experience it no matter what."
Thankfully, those of us who won't have the opportunity or ability to venture into the places that Kapuscinski (or Herodotus) did, or missed a unique chance, can share his (their) experiences through this book -- a triumphant final accomplishment by this great writer.
Awesome book. October 24, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Two stories in one book. One is what Kapuscinski see, second the world in Herodotus eyes. I love his book, because he gives me another perspective on live and I can learn a lot too.
Makes you want to read Herodotus October 7, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
While I read Herodotus many years ago, this book made me dust it off and reread it again. A great book for travellers, and to get you in the mood for your next adventure.
 Crossing the Border September 27, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
"We are, all of us, pilgrims who struggle along different paths toward the same destination."
- Antoine De Saint-Exupery
Ryszard Kapuscinski was Polish. He was born in Pinsk which is now Belarus ; but became one of the most famous and honored foreign correspondents. He is now deceased. For forty years, he traveled the globe from Iran to China to El Salvador to India. Like the ancient historian Herodotus, whose book The Histories was carried by Kapuscinski in all of his travels, Ryszard traveled the globe learning about the similarities and the many differences between the cultures of this planet.
Kapuscinski takes us on his journeys and through his eyes we capture his views of the new globalized world. He shows the reader how an ancient man (Herodotus, considered the Father of History) taught him with the work he published almost 2500 years ago to seek understanding first; and then to learn from the various cultures he would come across as a foreign correspondent.
Kapuscinski shares his gifted insights and observations as he remembers his past journeys; this memoir captures the essence of a very sensitive wanderer who wants to talk intimately about his travels and his life.
When Kapuscinski "crossed the border" and was allowed to travel outside of Poland, his world and his vantage point exploded into a vast number of possibilities that he had previously only dreamed about. It is my feeling that with this memoir the author wanted all of us to reach across our boundaries and our self imposed borders so we could experience more of what life has to offer. Maybe he is saying that all of us should not only look around us; but seek the unknown and wander beyond our comfort zone.
The author owed a lot to Herodotus as he traveled and this is as much a tribute to the memory of the ancient Herodotus as to the "memory of Kapuscinski".
"All memory is present."
- Novalis
Recommended.
Bentley/2008
Travels with Herodotus (Vintage International)
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