Quote:
Originally Posted by fantasyfan
One of the things that stand out for me is the remarkably vivid language which must be a mirror of a very intense, insightful and vigorous mind.
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Yes, I’m also enjoying his vivid language. There are some striking similes- “A Persian-speaking infant adorned with eyelashes as long as ospreys conducted us to the necessary officials”; “Dawn, like a smile from the gallows, pierced the gusty, drizzling night.”
What I particularly like are his descriptions of the countryside - “From the pass above Amiriya we looked back over a mounting array of peaks, ranges, and buttresses to the white cone of Demavend in the top of the sky; and forward over a plain of boundless distances, where mountains rippled up and sighed away like the wash of a tide, dark here, shining there, while shadow and sunshine followed their masters the clouds across the earth’s arena. Trees of autumn yellow embowered the lonely villages. Elsewhere, desert; the stony black-lustred desert of eastern Persia.” Here is a view of
Mt Damavand: - the photograph does not do justice to his description.
While he often is not funny to the modern ear, I did greatly enjoy his story of the arrival of the bus at Meshed.
One supposes he could be a great travelling companion - resourceful, hardy, cheerful and adventurous.
For anyone curious about the vehicles he travelled on through eastern Persia:
the Morris “The back axle has broken, sixty miles from Teheran”
The
Bedford Bus with the pilgrims to Meshed.
And the magnificent
Reo Speed Wagon
“Never in all Persia was there such a lorry as I caught at Damghan: a brand new Reo Speed Waggon, on its maiden voyage”