Review - Edges of The World

Title : The Lost Heart of Asia

By: Colin Thubron

Pages: 374's

Ever since the collapse of the old Soviet Union, the magnetism of Central Asia has become irresistible to travel writers. First, of course, is the opportunity now to wonder around free from the clutches of intourist guides. Then there is the challenge of finding the answer to the fascinating question of what is the become of these five newly independent republics artificially created by Stalin. “Would they hurl themselves into the Islamic furnace,” the author asks, “Or reconvene in a communist mass?”

Finally there is the sheer romance of the place. Who can visit Samarkand – “it conjured no earthly city. It is a heart-stealing sound” – and be unmoved ? The author begins his jurney in Turkmenistan, poorest and wildest of the Central Asian republics, and winds his way leisurely through the rest of them, visiting shrines, encountering people, exploring markets and museums.

Thubron seems to have an affinity for big places. His last two efforts – Among the Russians and his 1987 book on China, Behind the Wall – were wide-ranging travelogues. This one is huge and formless too, like the emerging republics themselves.

***

Image source: Asiaweek Magazine

Aurel Stein: Pioneer of The Silk Road

By: Annabel Walker
Publisher: John Murray, 50 Albemarle St. London,

WIX 4BD, UK, 393 Pages.

When Aurel Stein died in Kabul in 1943, the London Sunday Express declared that this name “will live in history with that of Marco Polo as one of the great explorers of Central Asia.” Fifty years later, Stein’s memory has disappeared with the shifting sands. 

Perhaps if he had, like Egyptologist Howard Carter, discovered gold, jewelry and other fabulous funerary objects during his exploration of the ancient overland road to China rather than musty books of Buddhist sutras (even if they did include the world’s oldest known printed volume), his lasting fame might have been secured. 

But in this exquisitely researched and beautifully told biography, Walker suggests that Western deference to Chinese feelings may have affected Stein’s posthumous reputation. While he was once viewed as a model of the romantic explorer-scientist, the Chinese see Stein as just another European looter of its ancient heritage. 

The final irony is that Stein risked his life to unearth treasures from the sands of the Taklamakan Desert only to have them buried in the basement of the British Museum.

***Sumber foto: Amazon.com

UltimateRisk: The Inside Story of Lloyd’s Catastrophe

By: Adam Raphael
Publisher: Transworld/Bantam Press, 61-63 Uxbridge Rd.,
London, W5 5SA, U.K., 335 pages.

Three hundred years old, Lloyd’s of London was once a byword for fair dealing and trustworthiness. It was brought to the brink of financial catastrophe by rampant greed and dubious practices, which were allowed to flourish unchecked by the management.

It’s a fascinating story,part morality tale and part corporate intrigue, that is made all the more interesting because of the spirited narrative, which sets down the facts but never ignores the human element. The author is a distinguished journalist, but his own enormous losses have made him less than completely disinterested.

The book’s tone is irate, but the author never loses his perspective. The story of Lloyd’s financial misadventures and its prospects for the future is engagingly and carefully laid out in a cautionary tale which, as yet, has no happy ending.

**Sumber foto: Asiaweek