Bookish Connections: Travels around Great Britain

I always love it when things line up suddenly, and today, I have a fun story about a surprise book connection, and with it, a couple very back-list books that may interest you.

To start with, when I was 13, my family moved to England for a year as part of a Fulbright teacher exchange. As was usual for me, I read everything I could get my hands on, and as we traveled that was often whatever books were at the rentals and places we stayed. Somewhere in our travels, I picked up an old trade paperback called The Kingdom by the Sea, which was written by a travel writer called Paul Theroux (father of the documentary filmmaker Louis Theroux). I remember it well, especially as we traveled quite a bit around the British Isles and it was fun for me to compare my own experiences to his from 30 years before. It remains one of the books I remember vividly from that year, and I enjoyed it a lot.

Flash forward almost 20 years, when I read Bad Land, a captivating account of the settlement of Eastern Montana (I know this sounds dry, and while the land might be dry, the book it not!). It was well written, and I immediately wanted to read more from the author, Jonathan Raban. The book I was most interested in was his account of sailing around the British Isles, called Coasting, which appealed to me on so many levels, including my memory of Theroux’s book. I bought it, entered it into my ever growing collection of books I want to read eventually, and that was that for now.

Picking Coasting up recently, I was immediately struck by the references to the Falkland’s War, which was also a big theme in The Kingdom by the Sea. And then, about 50 pages in, Raban mentions Theroux by name, including the fact that they were both traveling around the British Isles and writing about it! I immediately decided to reread The Kingdom by the Sea as well, and found that Theroux had mentioned meeting Raban as well, but of course, at the time, it wasn’t a passage I noticed that much. I love little moments like this, and really enjoyed finding this connection.

So, here are my two linked books for you, and one additional one that is a little more modern. In one, Jonathan Raban sails around the England and Scotland over 1982-85, and examines his own upbringing in the English countryside. In the other, Paul Theroux, an American living in London walks and takes the train around much of the UK and details the many different people he meets along the way. In the final book, Bill Bryson, whose work is slightly more humorous, takes public transport throughout Great Britain and writes about his experience as well.

Coasting by Jonathan Raban

The Kingdom by the Sea by Paul Theroux

Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson

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