July 26, 2004
News from Tartary: a Journey from Peking to Kashmir by Peter Fleming
This book describes a trip made in 1935 by the author from Peking to Kashmir through Xinjiang or Chinese Turkistan (what used to be called Tartary). This is a book for those interested in `Great Game' history where Central Asia was the place of intrigue between Russia and the British Empire. There is some interesting political information, often missing from history books, embedded in this travelogue. The uneven writing can perhaps be attributed to the fact that Peter Fleming had to fund his trip by sending regular dispatches to newspapers in London.
Circumstances early on dictate that he has to travel with Ella 'Kini' Maillart, a young Swiss journalist. Kini's addition makes the story more interesting, not only because neither of them wished a travel companion preferring their own company, but also because she was a woman traveler and journalist in a time and place when this was not common. One desire I was left with after reading this book was to read her account of the same trip (published in 1937 as "Forbidden journey: from Peking to Kashmir"; Translated from the French by Thomas McGreevy).
Most of the early part of the book is spent describing the struggle with the `inscrutable oriental' bureaucracy. Since their trip was contingent on the deception of the authorities it wasn't clear to me that the obstacles the various Chinese officials placed in their way was of healthy spite or knowledge of their deception which they could hardly be happy about.
Peter Fleming when he is successful at his writing reminds me strongly of authors like P. G. Wodehouse (who he mentions favorably in this book). Here is an example:
I have travelled fairly widely in `Communist Russia' (where they supplied me with the inverted commas): and I have seen a good deal of Japanese Imperialism on the Asiatic mainland. I like the Russians and the Japanese enormously; and I have been equally rude to both. I say this because I know that to read a propagandist, a man with vested intellectual interests, is as dull as dining with a vegetarian.
Despite his protests to the contrary, Fleming is anti-Russian (a common British sentiment at the time) and shows naive surprise that some of the natives treat the British along with the Russians and the Japanese as equal imperialist threats. In my view, there is little to distinguish British aggression from Russian in this region, although transgressions by the Russians have been more faithfully recorded by historians. He is also virulently abusive to his Uighur guides complete with a great deal of racist invective which is quite jarring with his otherwise debonair attitude.
Peter Fleming is Ian Fleming's older brother; less famous than Ian now ever since the James Bond movie franchise took off, but considerably more famous than Ian when he wrote this book. For more on Ian and Peter Fleming, read Ian Fleming's biography.
For more information about Ella (Kini) Maillart
%T News from Tartary %T :a Journey from Peking to Kashmir %A Peter Fleming %I The Marlboro Press/Northwestern %D 1999 %D :originally published 1936 by Charles Scribner's Sons, New York %G ISBN: 0810160714 (pb) %P 384 %K travel
Review written: 2000/01/02
Posted by anoop at July 26, 2004 04:52 PM