Greece Hotels Travel - Mani: Travels in the Southern Peloponnese (New York Review Books Classics)
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List Price: $15.95
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Manufacturer: NYRB Classics
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 914.9522
EAN: 9781590171882
ISBN: 1590171888
Label: NYRB Classics
Manufacturer: NYRB Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 336
Publication Date: 2006-06-06
Publisher: NYRB Classics
Release Date: 2006-06-06
Studio: NYRB Classics
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Editorial Reviews:
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The Mani, at the tip of Greece’s–and Europe’s–southernmost promontory, is one of the most isolated regions of the world. Cut off from the rest of the country by the towering range of the Taygetus and hemmed in by the Aegean and Ionian seas, it is a land where the past is still very much a part of its people’s daily lives.
Patrick Leigh Fermor, who has been described as “a cross between Indiana Jones, James Bond, and Graham Greene,” bridges the genres of adventure story, travel writing, and memoir to reveal an ancient world living alongside the twentieth century. Here, in the book that confirmed his reputation as one of the English language’s finest writers of prose, Patrick Leigh Fermor carries the reader with him on his journeys among the Greeks of the mountains, exploring their history and time-honored lore.
Mani is a companion volume to Patrick Leigh Fermor’s celebrated Roumeli: Travels in Northern Greece.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating: 
Summary: Outstanding Trip Through a Fascinating Land
Comment: I'll just defer to the other reviewers on this page since their views of this wonderful book agree with mine. Fermor is a treasure. I've read all of his books and enjoyed them.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Brilliant, heroic travel writing!
Comment: What a marvelous book! And written by a true, heroic genius. Fermor, a still living legend, seems to have disdained self-promotion, but upon reading a few pages of this book, you realize you have encountered a rare individual.
First, his writing. Encyclopedic, detailed, sensual, and imaginative. It exemplifies the finest characteristics of travel writing, and best of all, he explores a remote, largely unknown and distinct region of the world, the Mani. This area is a fine example of the fierce, independent Greek spirit. Fermor chronicles it through a bold exploration with his companion and future wife, Joan.
He understands the Greek mindset exquisitely well. The author is a gifted, self-taught linguist, and it is apparent that he concentrates on listening and observing intensely, then transforming his experiences into fascinating, readable prose. He comprehends the heart of the Greek people, and conveys it with an extensive knowledge of history.
Critiques? His fertile mind is so hungry that he tends to over-describe. Better to allow the reader the pleasure of using his or her imagination than recording every little detail with brilliant metaphors. You could also say he rambles, but that is common with travel writers.
Conclusion? A classic, but like most classics, not an entirely easy read. In the end, extremely worthwhile reading.
Reviewed by David Lundberg, author of Olympic Wandering: Time Travel Through Greece
Customer Rating:
Summary: Ah, Mani!
Comment: This must be the quintessential summer read.
While I was a bit put off at first by the exuberant luxury of the prose [at times I felt bludgeoned] and the rampant introduction of cultural terms I'd never heard before, it was also hard not to delight in a mind so cheerfully discursive.
Do you need to be a Grecophile to enjoy an outing with Fermor and Mani? I should think not. But you'll need to bring your own map.
Interestingly, it seems that the covers of Mani and Roumeli on the Amazon sites were swapped for mysterious reasons.
Customer Rating:
Summary: If you like showy writing
Comment: Leigh Fermor has written one (actually,two) of the best travels books in English, "A Time of Gofts" and "Between the Woods and the Water." This is not quite up to them--a bit of the edge has gone off the subject matter--but if you like showy, razzle-dazzle writing from a master stylist and raconteur, this will do very nicely.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Often Brilliant Writing
Comment: In this entertaining book, Leigh Fermor describes his travels in the Mani peninsula, the southernmost and at the time of his writing, one of the least developed parts of continental Greece. Like some of his other books, this book describes a traditional society that was disappearing at the time of his writing. Mani combines some brilliant descriptive writing, particularly with respect to landscapes, keen social observation, and a series of historical asides inspired by his travels. All of these components are individually compelling and the quality of writing is unusually good. There are times, however, when some of Leigh Fermor's asides tend to overpower the primary narrative which tends to disrupt the narrative flow.
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