Customer Reviews
a lyrical meander through Europe - By: El Sushi Supremo, 03 Mar 2008 
The simple concept of this journey was to walk from the hook of Holland to Istanbul following the two main arteries of Europe: the Rhine & the Danube. The book was written from pre-war notebooks so some of the language is slightly unfamiliar at first. Once you get over your modern cynicism the gentle pace & detailed descriptions will pull you through the slowly changing landscape of Europe. You will feel the cold of blizzards through dense woodlands & then warm up to drink schnappsin a Bavarian Inn. Despite the poetic prose & flawless rhythm the real strength of this book is the sheer scale & range of knowledge shown by PLF. I was never let down by his ceaseless curiosity, a curiosity which feeds off the assortment of characters he conversed with & the books he pored over en route. PLF is clearly a gifted Linguist & he has more than a passing interestin History, Folklore, Anthropology & Geography. This book also spurred me on to travel into Central Europe & see things for myself.
Deserves its reputation as a classic - By: P. Reavy, 25 Feb 2008 At first I had trouble adjusting to Leigh Fermor's extremely descriptive style. He furnishes his writing with rarely-used words & is happy to hold up the story for pages while he sidetracks us with art historical or architectural speculations. However, his charm & learning prove irresistible. This is an unforgettable book.
A work of literature rather than a travel book - By: John, 26 Jun 2007 
Less of a travel book, more of a vehicle for the author's literary pretensions. His frequent descents into ponderous descriptions of architectural minutiae meant that I found myself skipping whole pages, something that is a rare event for me.
Great travel classic and much more - By: , 04 Feb 2006 Leigh Fermor's great classic is extraordinary. His language is immensely beautiful, but I beleive that the secret to understand the book is that he is actually painting pictures with words. There are some great set pieces: the walkin Holland, breakfastin Rottterdam, the cold, the chateau life he began to lead after Munich. He is a polymath & the book is not really travel literature at all, or if it is, it is of a totally different order to anything I have ever read. Will Leigh Fermor write the promised third part of the great trilogy?
A Time of Gifts - By: , 03 Dec 2005 This book & it's companion Between the Woods & the Water are an enchantment rather than a literary experience. The printed words disolve instantly into brilliant pictures: sodden, grey Londonin December; magical images conjoured from distorted light on ripples of oily Thames water; magestic images of Storks soaring above red tiled roovesin Hungary, the keen bite of the wind coming over snow fieldsin Holland & the exhillaration of a sledge rushing over a frozen river. This is hardly prose at all, & sometimes it seems to get to somewhere beyond poetry.
