Patrick Leigh Fermor

INTRODUCED BY JAN MORRIS In 1933, at the tender age of eighteen, Patrick Leigh Fermor embarked on a remarkable year-long journey on foot from the Hook of Holland to Istanbul. Decades later, he penned A Time of Gifts, a dazzlingly original and evocative narrative of the first part of this epic trek through Europe. This literary masterpiece takes readers on...

'Nothing short of a masterpiece' JAN MORRIS '[This] gloriously ornate account of that epic journey is a classic' ROBERT MACFARLANE 'Not only is this journey one of physical adventure but of cultural awakening. Architecture, art, genealogy, quirks of history and language are all devoured -- and here passed on -- with a gusto uniquely his' COLIN THUBRON, Sunday Times 'One...

Between the Woods and the Water by Patrick Leigh Fermor is a remarkable continuation of the author’s youthful odyssey through 1930s Europe, a journey he began to document in his celebrated work, A Time of Gifts. This second instalment picks up seamlessly from his pause on a bridge over the Danube. In a vibrant narrative filled with curiosity and wonder,...

Patrick Leigh Fermor's Mani compellingly revealed a hidden world of Southern Greece and its past. Its northern counterpart takes the reader among Sarakatsan shepherds, the monasteries of Meteora, and the villages of Krakora, among itinerant pedlars and beggars, and even tracks down at Missolonghi a pair of Byron's slippers. Roumeli is not on modern maps: it is the ancient name...

The Broken Road by Patrick Leigh Fermor is the third and final volume of his famed trilogy, chronicling an extraordinary journey across Europe. At the tender age of eighteen, Fermor embarked on an epic walk from the Hook of Holland to Constantinople. This final instalment picks up where A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water left...

For the first time in John Murray B-format paperback, this is Patrick Leigh Fermor's spellbinding part-travelogue, part inspired evocation of a barely-written part of Greece's past. Joining him in the Mani, one of Europe's wildest and most isolated regions, cut off from the rest of Greece by the towering Taygettus mountain range and hemmed in by the Aegean and Ionian...

In spring 1956, Deborah, Duchess of Devonshire—youngest of the six legendary Mitford sisters—invited the writer and war hero Patrick Leigh Fermor to visit Lismore Castle, the Devonshires' house in Ireland. This halcyon visit sparked off a deep friendship and a lifelong exchange of sporadic but highly entertaining letters. There can rarely have been such contrasting styles: Debo, unashamed philistine and...

From the French Abbey of St Wandrille to the abandoned and awesome Rock Monasteries of Cappadocia in Turkey, the celebrated travel writer Patrick Leigh Fermor studies the rigorous contemplative lives of the monks and the timeless beauty of their monastic surroundings. In his occasional retreats, the peaceful solitude and the calm enchantment of the monasteries was passed on as a...