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Title: The Royal Road to Romance: Travelers' Tales Classics
ISBN: 1885211538
Author:
Richard Halliburton
Publicate Date: 2000-10-30
Publish: 2000-10-30
List Price: $14.95
Average Customer Rating: 4.5
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $7.95
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $0.94
Amazon Merchant Price: $10.17
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Great Travel Books: The Royal Road to Romance
Great Travel Books: The Royal Road to Romance
Meknes, Morocco
September 22, 2007
Homepage: Cancion del Vagabundo, http://canciondelvagabundo.googlepages.com
Great Travel Books page: http://canciondelvagabundo.googlepages.com/greattravelbooks
"The Vagabond life is the logical life to lead if one seeks the intimate knowledge of the world we were seeking."
-Richard Halliburton, Royal Road to Romance
The Royal Road to Romance was the first work of the adventurous, horizon chasing romantic, Richard Halliburton. It, essentially, is an account of a Walkabout around the world that he undertook around 1926 and later wrote down in a New Jersey mental institution. It seems evident to me that Halliburton read (and probably reread) Harry Franck's A Vagabond Journey Around the World and was deeply influenced by it. Everything from Halliburton's route, his travelling style, to his somewhat unsteady use of vagabond slang echos Harry Franck's monumental work. But this is not meant as a slight to Halliburton, as any wanderer, myself included, who has read Vagabond Journey has the spirit of the book forever etched into their very psyches. The Royal Road to Romance is completely able to stand on its own two feet, as it takes travel writing into a completely new direction- the direction of Romance.
At the onset of the story, Halliburton explains the impetus behind his journey by reciting Dorian Grey's ominous warning:
"Realize your youth while you have it. Don't squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, or giving your life away to the ignorant and the common. These are the sickly aims, the false ideals, of our age. "Live " live the wonderful life that is in you. Be afraid of nothing. There is such a little time that your youth will last- such a little time."
Halliburton continues by exclaiming:
"The romantic- that was what I wanted. I hungered for the romance of the sea, and foreign ports, and foreign smiles. I wanted to follow the prow of a ship, any ship, and sail away, perhaps to China, perhaps to Spain, perhaps to the South Sea Isles, there to do nothing all day but lie on a surf-swept beach and fling monkeys at the coconuts.
The Royal Road to Romance is just that: the story of one man's search for the Romance of life- not the romance of women, but the Romance of the pure, essential underpinnings of the human spirit and the quest for pure substance. In this search, Halliburton turns to the Open Road and lives out the ingrained human urge to travel, to seek out adventure, to find out what is on the other side of the hill, and to embrace everything that is joyous, exciting, and essential. Royal Road is a declaration of the base impulse that is the impetus of every journey: the Wanderlust. It also shows us the reasons why we need to travel and what happens when you throw all discretion to the wind and fully embrace the Open Road and providence.
In these journeys, Halliburton becomes a sailor, frolics with French actresses, has tea with the president of Andorra, gets arrested for photographing the prison at Gibralter, sleeps on top of an Egyptian pyramid, spends a night hiding inside the Taj Mahal, steals rides on Indian trains, visits Kashmir, is almost killed by a cobra in Thailand, is robbed by pirates in Hong Kong, sneaks into Siberia, and sends his lucky tiger tooth to the Empress of China immediately prior to her banishment.
"I suppose she never received the tooth," he wrote.
The Royal Road to Romance is a story about running life to the very edge just to feel its gentle touch. It is Hallibuton's approach towards living that really makes this book special. He places the substance with which we fill our days above any abstract notion of wealth and prestige.
It is the kind of book that has the power to change someone's life, as Halliburton's message is actually very simple:
"Let those who wish have their respectability- I wanted freedom, freedom to indulge in whatever caprice struck my fancy, freedom to search in the farthermost corners of the earth for the beautiful, the joyous, and the romantic."
The Royal Road to Romance is a truly beautiful expression of the joy of the Open Road and adventure for its own sake. It is an ecstatic cry to jolt us into action so that we do not let another day slip by without living it to its fullest.
"Sun and wind and beat of sea,
Great lands stretching endlessly.
Where be the bonds to bind the free?
All the world was made for me."
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2: Ugly American
A hard to evaluate book. In some respects it is great fun. The author, a recent college graduate, goes through a series of adventures that are often outrageous, or impossible in today's world. They reflect a different world when national borders were maybe a little less gaurded and tourism less a worldwide force.
I'm not at all one to insist on "political correctness" or to judge people 80 years ago by current moral standards. At the same time, the author could be insufferably boorish, and the constant racism and stereotyping grates. His description of Asians, rather than being full of keen insight, is mostly limited to stating their respective civility. A horiffic piracy attack is hampered by the author's utter lack of concern or sympathy with the brutally and suddenly murdered Chinese victims, and he instead prattles on about his watch, and concocts an explanation how the white people could have stopped the piracy had they really tried. Even if it accurately reflected the author's concerns, it isn't what you read travel books for.
As the author himself says, this isn't quite a travel book, and as a lot of the attraction to the book is whether you find the narrator sympathetic, this boorishness is no minor failing. Coupled with the brevity of each described scene, and the wildly overblown prose, the book has a certain repetitiveness to it.
Other authors published under the Traveller's Tales Classic Series may have been a little less adventurous but were much more insightful in their observation and more in-depth in their exploration of each nations. I'd recommend Isabella Bird's books before this one.
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3: Fifty years and this book still sticks with me
As a child in Paris in the early 50's it was tough finding English-language books to read. Now and then my Dad would take me to a small library at the American embassy to check out books, and it was there he urged me to read Richard Halliburton. In my mind's eye I can still see that big thick book and the photo of Halliburton in front of the Taj Mahal.
Hardly anyone knows his name today, but in the 1930's Halliburton's name was well-known and his travel/adventure books were best sellers. My dad had read them in the depths of the Depression and they'd engendered in him a thirst for travel, which he fulfilled many times over with a career in the airline industry.
I guess the same thing happened to me when I read "The Royal Road to Romance" around 1952 and was permanently bitten by the travel bug. I was surfing around the net tonight and ran across a story on Richard Halliburton and thought I'd check to see if any of his books were still in print. I was quite surprised to see they are and people are still reading him.
Give this book to a kid with dreams, or read it yourself. Any book that sticks with you for 52 years has got to be very special.
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4: Fantastic Read
I am nearing the end of the book and Loving it!
I purchased the book after hearing aobut Richard Halliburton on "Writer's Almanac" on NPR. This is such a wonderful and witty book that I am looking forward to sharing it with my friends and family so we can discuss it.
I recommend it to anyone that wants to get a feeling of what it was really like to travel the world as a vagabond prior to WWII.
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5: Made me yearn to see the world
I first read this book as a child about 25 years ago. It was pure luck that I found "The Royal Road..." at a furniture store's going-out-of-business sale. The store was selling off books they used to decorate furniture displays. Although I'm not sure what prompted me to buy this book as a child, I am grateful to have found it. It gave me a sense of wonder about the world and a love for exotic places and peoples. Growing up in the 70s with the war and demonstrations and Watergate, I think I felt jaded about the world from an early age. The world seemed kind of a seedy, drab and dingey place to me at the time. Every great accomplishment had already been done and every once-wonderous place on the planet had long ago been explored, commercialized...used up. Royal Road to Romance changed my world view and made me really hunger to see the wonderous, beautiful places Halliburton describes. I think there are probably many kids in this generation with similar feelings who might really benefit from this book. Most of Halliburton's stories are happy-go-lucky tales about traveling with friends, meeting interesting and charming people, and generally making life into an adventure. They make you wish you could have been there with him. Or at least follow in his footsteps. At the beginning of the book, Halliburton talks very eloquently about the choice he made to travel and see the wonders of the world instead of pursuing a traditional career after college. How he rebelled against what was expected of him and decided to Live and Enjoy Life while he was young. I think most people have felt the desire to run off at some point in their life -- to abandon the mundane life they are expected to lead and go where the wind leads. I know that I have felt that often, and many times, I have thought of Richard Halliburton and his thoughts and life. Although, yes, the book is dated in attitudes and much has changed in the world, I believe that people who read it can find a sense of fun and wonder they never knew they were missing.
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