Widely recognized as one of the 20th century's great English prose stylists, Patrick Leigh Fermor led a life most people only dream of. In 1934, the 18-year-old Leigh Fermor set out on foot from Britain to walk the breadth of a Europe teetering on the edge of catastrophe. On just a £5 allowance per major city, he dined, conversed and slept under the roofs of diplomats and farmers, aristocrats and parish priests, making friends and kindling an insatiable curiosity for the lives, lore and languages of the diverse groups and lost civilizations across the continent. After serving in the Irish Guards during World War II, he resumed his peripatetic lifestyle, travelling through and writing about the Caribbean and the Peloponnesus, steadily adding to his treasure trove of knowledge.
Artemis Cooper's Patrick Leigh Fermor: An Adventure deftly brings its subject to life, drawing on Leigh Fermor's own memoirs and travel narratives--including A Time of Gifts, the memoir that brought enduring literary fame upon its 1977 publication. Wide-ranging conversations and interviews with Leigh Fermor and his acquaintances, along with access to their letters and journals, flesh out the portrait of this remarkable citoyen du monde. Cooper has written a riveting biography sure to captivate any reader. --Benji Taylor, freelance writer, student, blogging at Destructive Anachronism