e-Book Flying Visits (Picador Books) download

by Clive James

ISBN: 0330288393
ISBN13: 978-0330288392
Language: English
Publisher: Pan Books Ltd (September 27, 1985)
Pages: 192
Subategory: Traveling

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Rating: 4.8
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Postcards from the Observer. After I learned the trick of carrying nothing much except hand baggage and nothing much in that except a few good books, I quite enjoyed the delays.

Postcards from the Observer. Then, forehead against the pane, I suddenly feel. Even within the confines of Europe, the idea that all airports were the same turned out to be exactly wrong. In fact any airport anywhere immediately reflects the political system, economic status and cultural characteristics of the country where it is situated.

Clive James has never been able to conceal his passion for air travel. Mass Market Paperback Paperback Hardcover Mass Market Paperback Paperback Hardcover.

Clive James, Flying Visits. Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.

A collection of Clive James's 'Postcards' originally written for The Observer between the years 1976 and 1983 about his experiences travelling abroad, from Peking, Los Angeles and Sydney. Full of James's distinctive wit and satire, this is a timeless collec.

Written by. Clive James. Manufacturer: Picador Release date: 27 September 1985 ISBN-10 : 0330288393 ISBN-13: 9780330288392.

Clive James' television criticism from "The Observer" newspaper covers the decade 1972-1982 and is incorporated in his three books "Glued to the Box", "Vision Before Midnight" and "The Crystal Bucket". Written with humour and a real love of the medium they are the best of TV criticism. Then again, some might say they are the only books on TV criticism but I think that is not really true.

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item 7 Flying Visits (Picador Books), Clive James, Used; Acceptable Book -Flying Visits (Picador Books), Clive James, Used; Acceptable Book. Effervescent, energetic and eclectic, this is one of the late twentieth century's finest minds (and bellies) on show. Even As We Speak is an illuminating and hilarious collection of essays by one of Picador's most beloved authors.

Clive James eBook Online Read. Published Year: 1994 History & Fiction. The Meaning of Recognition. Published Year: 2012 History & Fiction. Published Year: 2015 History & Fiction. Published Year: 2008 History & Fiction. Published Year: 2000 History & Fiction. The Revolt of the Pendulum. Published Year: 2014 History & Fiction.

Город: LondonПодписчиков: 67 ты. себе: 'We believe the way the story is told i. . себе: 'We believe the way the story is told is just as important as the story itself. Imprint of the Year - British Book Awards 2019

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Comments:

Rishason

Now we know why this book is out of print . Strangely not typical of Clives womnderful witty works. Frankly vanilla boring .

OTANO

FLYING VISITS consists of twenty travel pieces – or “postcards” – that Clive James wrote for “The Observer” between 1976 and 1984. That was relatively early in his career as a cultural critic, and the Clive James of FLYING VISISTS was not yet the Clive James who wrote “Cultural Amnesia” (one of the best books I have ever read). But a more serious drawback to FLYING VISITS is that it is badly dated. Among the pieces are reviews of “La Clemenza di Tito” and “Das Rosenkavalier” at the Salzburg Festival of 1979 and reports on Margaret Thatcher’s trip to China in 1982 and Queen Elizabeth’s to California in 1983. At this remove, they possess infinitesimal intrinsic interest. Most of the pieces are journalistic snapshots of notable world cities for the readers back home in the United Kingdom, and as such they deal primarily with matters of contemporary flavor and interest (as opposed to matters, say, of history and long-standing culture). Hence, they too do not age particularly well. The “postcards” on New York, Paris, and Washington, D.C. (three of James’s destinations I have visited in the last decade) report on cities that have changed significantly in the last third of a century, as presumably too have most of the subject cities to which I have never been, such as Sydney, Moscow, Munich, and Jerusalem.

Putting aside the mustiness of the book, FLYING VISITS is not bad. There are frequent instances of James’s wit, although it is not quite as rapier-like as it later became. And there are enough astute, or at least provocative, observations to keep the reader of 2013 going. Here are three:

Commenting on the crowdedness of Japan and its commercial and industrial efficiency: “One day all the world will be like Japan, full of more and more people with less and less to do. We can scarcely hope to make the transition better than Japan is doing. To a remarkable extent she has preserved the old along with the new, and preserved her own culture while absorbing an extraordinary amount of everybody else’s.”

“Punctilious editing is the real secret behind most of the good literary journalism done in London. Even the best of the Australian publications are full of copy which in London would be regarded as unpublishable.” (What would James have said in 1976 about American literary journalism? And what would he say today about London’s literary journalism?)

Regarding the United States: “Is there any other country * * * which places such emphasis on symbolic activity?”

Clever

Clive James was a young person fascinated by planes , airports, and flying. This fascination has its literary expression in this collection of 'Observer' columns focused on his immediate impressions of cities he alights in. He starts with two pieces on his native Sydney and makes something of a world tour which includes Washington,New York, Moscow, Tokyo,Rome, Los Angeles, Salzburg, Epcot, Munich, Paris and Jerusalem. Everpresent is his astonishing liveliness, ironic humor and wit. He is a sharp observer and above all a somewhat cantankerous and brilliant commentator. Non- conventionality and freshness seem to be something which are just what he is.
James is not shy and he mixes in everything he knows or has thought. And often the pleasure of the work is in his description of the reality he meets in contradiction to the expectations he has brought with him.
There are plenty of delights in this work. It is also a very light read which can be sped through at supersonic pace.
A highly enjoyable read.