Archives de catégorie : Travel

ZWISCHEN DURCHKOMMEN UND UMKOMMEN de Reinhold Messner

« Old-school alpinism is the art of survival in a place not fit for humans » Reinhold Messner

ZWISCHEN DURCHKOMMEN UND UMKOMMEN:
(Meeting the Challenge or Meeting One’s End)
by Reinhold Messner
Ludwig/Penguin Random House Verlagsgruppe, October 2021

Old-school mountaineers confront the unknown with courage and self-sufficiency. They go where no one else dares to go, and take unbelievable risks. Ever since man first stood on top of Mont Blanc in 1786, they have continuously pushed the boundaries of the supposedly impossible. Reinhold Messner’s new book is a memorial to those pioneers, a history of traditional mountaineering told through the stories of its most celebrated heroes, often in their own words. Messner’s incisive essays reveal the mental and physical qualities needed to achieve what they did: qualities such as courage and passion, self-reliance in the face of danger, and the ability to focus on important things – and the refusal to use technically sophisticated gear.
In ZWISCHEN DURCHKOMMEN UND UMKOMMEN, Messner pays tribute to the human thirst for adventure and exploration, intimate encounters with nature, and climbing mountains without a safety net or ‘false bottoms’ – and calls on us to keep the legacy alive.

Reinhold Messner, born in 1944, is the most famous mountaineer and adventurer of our time. He was the first person to reach the top of all fourteen eight-thousanders, as well as the first to climb Everest solo and, together with Peter Habeler, the first to do so without supplemental oxygen. He has also crossed the Antarctic, Greenland and the Gobi desert on foot. He gives talks all over the world, is a documentary filmmaker, contributes to major international magazines, and has published countless books which have been translated into numerous languages. His most recent book was the 2019 « Nanga Parbat – Mein Schlüsselberg » (« Nanga Parbat – Paragon and Nemesis »), published by Ludwig.

NOWHERE FOR VERY LONG de Brianna Madia

In this beautifully written, vividly detailed memoir, a young woman chronicles her adventures traveling across the deserts of the American West in an orange van named Bertha and reflects on an unconventional approach to life.

NOWHERE FOR VERY LONG:
The Unexpected Road to an Unconventional Life
by Brianna Madia
HarperOne, April 2022

A woman defined by motion, Brianna Madia bought a beat-up bright orange van, filled it with her two dogs Bucket and Dagwood, and headed into the canyons of Utah with her husband. Nowhere for Very Long is her story of exploration—of the world outside and the spirit within.
Brianna knew her road would be the one less traveled from an early age. Rejecting the competitive and capitalistic path set out before her, she chose to seek a different version of happiness, a road scary, uncertain, and entirely her own. But pursuing a life of intention isn’t always what it seems. In fact, at times it was downright boring, exhausting, and even desperate—when the van overheated and she was forced to pull over on a lonely stretch of South Dakota highway; when the weather was bitterly cold and her water jugs froze beneath her as she slept in the parking lot of her office; when she worried about money, her marriage, and the looming question mark of her future. But she was living a life true to herself, come what may, and that made all the difference.
NOWHERE FOR VERY LONG is the chronicle of a woman learning and unlearning, from backroads to breakdowns, married to solo, and finally, from lost to found.

Brianna Madia is a writer, adventurer, and desert-dweller. For the last several years, she and her now three pups Bucket, Dagwood, and Birdie call her big orange van, Bertha, home. An avid climber, canyoneer, mountain biker, kayaker, and explorer, Brianna believes in moving against the grain, embracing her true self, and trying all the things that scare you.

PARADISE OF THORNS de Aidan Hartley

The irresistible account of building a life on the frontier of climate change in Africa’s last wilderness, by the bestselling author of The Zanzibar Chest.

PARADISE OF THORNS: Adventures in an African Wilderness
by Aidan Hartley
Atlantic Monthly Press, Spring 2022

Aidan Hartley is the bestselling author of The Zanzibar Chest, which was a finalist for the Samuel Johnson and Duff Cooper Prizes and appeared on best of the year lists from the Economist and Publishers Weekly. In his new book, Hartley chronicles an adventure in one of Africa’s last patches of wilderness. Concerned by the increasing violence of city life, Hartley moves north with his young family. His aim is to acquire a herd of cattle and live alongside the Samburu, a tribe of nomads who for centuries have lived in harmony with immense herds of wildlife in an unspoiled natural paradise north of Mount Kenya. The family buys a tract of remote desert where they carve out a life from scratch, establishing a ranch in a rugged terrain still teeming with elephants, lions, and other wildlife. Over the next seventeen years in this harsh Eden, the family builds a home and learns to live off the land. There are scorpions and snakes under every stone, charging buffalos, and leopards stealing through camp—but there are no fences in the endless landscape and in the night sky far from towns, the stars twinkle brighter than anywhere. As they build their farm alongside their Samburu neighbors, Hartley finds that the nomads’ way of life has been thrown off balance by environmental collapse and corrupt politics. Worsening droughts instill tribal tensions as these once-proud people compete over dwindling resources. And when a demagogue gains power in Hartley’s district, he uses the unpredictable rains to incite division and bloodshed—leading armed militias into wildlife conservation areas and farming hamlets where villagers are murdered, elephants are poached, and the pastures are worn down to dust. In the end, the demagogue is beaten at the polls by an enlightened Samburu woman famous for breastfeeding her baby in parliament, the scented African rains finally arrive to wash away the bad memories, and harmony returns. The nomads find redemption in a great coming of age ceremony for their young generation. A mother cheetah births a litter of cubs on the plains above the Hartleys’ home and the family resolves to preserve nature in what’s left of paradise. In this age of environmental collapse, PARADISE OF THORNS gives us a unique view from the frontline of climate change in Africa’s last wild spaces. It is infused with the romantic spirit of all writers seeking their own redemption in the natural world—or at least what’s left of it.

Aidan Hartley was born in 1965 and grew up in East Africa. He is the author of The Zanzibar Chest, an international bestseller that was short-listed for the Samuel Johnson and Duff Cooper Prizes. He has covered the Balkans, the Middle East, and Russia for Reuters and currently writes a column about Africa for the Spectator in London. He lives in Laikipia, in northern Kenya with his wife and two children.

GOODBYE EASTERN EUROPE de Jacob Mikanowski

“Eastern Europe is disappearing. Not the physical place, but the idea. Whatever held the region together in the mind’s eye — a shared experience of occupation and exclusion, the permanent-seeming weight of economic backwardness, treasured memories of defeat — is gone, or at least not as present as it had been.” – Jacob Mikanowski

GOODBYE EASTERN EUROPE
by Jacob Mikanowski
Knopf, Winter 2021
(chez Frances Goldin Literary Agency – voir catalogue)

In the wake of the Soviet Union’s collapse, the bonds that held all the various nations of Eastern Europe together as Soviet satellites have dissolved, calling into question what exactly connects them, and whether there was ever any such place to begin with. But, Mikanowski argues, there really was something more to Eastern Europe than shared political subjection. Eastern Europe had a particular character, and this book will name and describe the peculiar flavor of the place, from the Baltics to the Balkans, from Prague to Kiev. Part history, part travelogue, part reading of the disparate canon of Eastern European literature, GOODBYE EASTERN EUROPE will be a work in the tradition of Ian Frazier’s Travels in Siberia, or Simon Winder’s Germania or Danubia—an anatomy of a region as refracted through its literature, and a fascinating exploration of an incredibly diverse, complex, and surprising terrain.

Jacob Mikanowski is a journalist, critic and essayist. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, The Guardian, Lapham’s Quarterly, and elsewhere. He grew up in the US, but his family is Polish.

MAKERS: PARIS de Kate Van Den Boogert, photos de Carrie Solomon

Meet the extraordinary community of artisans and creative entrepreneurs making their mark on Paris today.

MAKERS: PARIS
by Kate Van Den Boogert, with photographs by Carrie Solomon
Prestel, April 2021
(chez David Black Literary Agency)

This inspirational guide introduces you to the locals behind thirty-five of Paris’s unique shops, studios, and more. Through beautifully illustrated spreads, immerse yourself in the daily practices of diverse creatives including fashion designer Isabel Marant; baker Apollonia Poilâne, whose sourdough loaves are the toast of the city; fourth-generation art supplier Sophie Sennelier; Palais-Royal shoe designer Pierre Hardy; jet-setting street artist and hotelier André Saraiva; bookseller Sylvia Whitman who continues her father’s literary heritage with flair; French cocktail expert Franck Audoux; the duo behind ecological sneaker brand Véja; the inventor of the bistronomy movement Yves Camdeborde; plus a host of chocolatiers, florists, cheesemakers, patissiers, stationers, and more. Each maker links to the next with a personal introduction that adds insight to how these interconnected communities thrive and grow together. You’ll get to know each maker—their tools, practices, passions, histories, inspirations, and work environments. MAKERS: PARIS takes you inside their businesses to show you how they invent, craft, and sell their wares, and demonstrates in the process how each maker’s own passions and talents splendidly intersect with their city’s hunger for quality, style, and substance. Whether you’re planning a trip to Paris, looking for inspiration, or just wondering what’s hot in the City of Lights, this thrilling tour will leave you inspired, satisfied…and hungry for more.

Kate Van Den Boogert is Founding Director of Gogo City Guides, up-to-date, seasonal guides to Paris & London.
Carrie Solomon, one of France’s most renowned still-life photographers, is a food and travel writer/photographer for Elle France. Her most recent book is Inside Chefs’ Fridges : Europe and she is working on a new volume exploring the home fridges of chefs across the world.