Items related to The Lost Heart of Asia
Synopsis
Thubron's first travel book since "Behind the Wall" (winner of the Hawthornden Prize and the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award) describes the newly emergent countries of Central Asia, originally part of the Soviet Union. They contain the magical cities of Bukhara, Samarkand and Tashkent, the Kazakh steppes, the deserts of Karakum and the Pamir mountains. North of Iran and west of China, east of the Caspian Sea, this is an enormous land, as big as Western Europe, heart of the great Mongol Empire of Tamerlane, route of the silk roads and scene of Stalin's most devilish deportations.
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Review
West of China, south of Russia, hemmed in by mountains, steppe, and desert, lie the five Central Asian republics of the former Soviet Union. Cut loose from Moscow in the early '90s, the five "Stans" (Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan) discover that their newly found freedom plays tug-o-war with despair and a nostalgia for the certainties of the Soviet past. It's during this time that author Colin Thubron travels the width of central Asia, asking questions about the past, present, and future. Not content to simply bounce from place to place, Thubron travels from person to person, uncovering their many vibrant stories and developing a deep understanding of the area's lesser-known history. Kyrgyz and Uzbeks debate the place of Islam. Koreans and Germans, descendants from forced migrants, wonder if they know enough of their ethnic tongue to return to their homelands. Russians find themselves left behind, disbelieving, as the tide of Russian power recedes toward Moscow.
Central Asia was mostly off limits to foreigners during the Soviet years, and while officials are still uncertain about how to deal with a backpack-wearing solo traveler, the locals Thubron meets are not. Thubron finds the heart of Asia in the hearts of its people, swimming in a sea of tea, vodka, and hospitality. From the oldest-known Quran to a deserted Soviet naval base on the shores of a high mountain lake 1,500 miles from the ocean (used to test torpedoes far from spying eyes), Thubron's writing echoes the melancholy emptiness of the wide spaces he passes through. The Lost Heart of Asia is a rare meeting of a marvelous writer and a mysterious land. --Ken Peavler
From the Inside Flap
A travel book on the newly-emergent countries of central Asia which contain the magical cities of Bukhara and Samarkand, the Kazakh Steppes, the deserts of Karakum and the Pamir Mountains.
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- PublisherPenguin
- Publication date1995
- ISBN 10 0140246193
- ISBN 13 9780140246193
- BindingPaperback
- Rating
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